1000. Peoples and Cultures of the World
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
An introduction to the anthropological understanding of human society through ethnographic case studies of selected peoples and cultures, exploring the richness and variety of human life. Encourages students to learn about different cultures and to apply their knowledge to make sense of their own society. CA 2. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »1000W. Peoples and Cultures of the World
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
An introduction to the anthropological understanding of human society through ethnographic case studies of selected peoples and cultures, exploring the richness and variety of human life. Encourages students to learn about different cultures and to apply their knowledge to make sense of their own society. CA 2. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »1001W. Anthropology Through Film
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
An introduction to cultural anthropology, approached through the medium of ethnographic film. Particular attention is given to how films represent humans' varied beliefs and behavior. CA 1. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »1006. Introduction to Anthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The biological and cultural development of humans from their origin to the present. A brief survey of human evolution is followed by a comparative study of behavior and beliefs of our own and other societies. CA 2. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »1010E. Global Climate Change and Human Societies
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
A multidisciplinary examination of the nature, anthropogenic drivers, range of expressions, and impacts of contemporary and future global climate change as well as cultural understandings of this significant environmental process and diverse human responses to it. CA 2. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »1093. Foreign Study
1.00 - 17.00 credits | May be repeated for credit.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Special topics taken in a foreign study program. May be repeated for credit to a maximum of 17.
View Classes »1095. Special Topics Lecture
1.00 - 3.00 credits | May be repeated for credit.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
May be repeated with a change in topic.
View Classes »1500. Great Discoveries in Archaeology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Survey of important discoveries in archaeology spanning the whole of human prehistory across the globe. Current issues, methods, and techniques in the field of archaeology. CA 2. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »2000. Social Anthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
A comparative study of social structure including an analysis of kinship, marriage, community organization, political and economic institutions, and the role of the individual in these institutions. CA 2. CA 4.
View Classes »2000W. Social Anthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
A comparative study of social structure including an analysis of kinship, marriage, community organization, political and economic institutions, and the role of the individual in these institutions. CA 2. CA 4.
View Classes »2200. Race and Human Biological Diversity
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
An introduction to race and racism, concepts of racial difference, and the patterns of human biological variation. Special emphasis on understanding human biodiversity within historical, scientific, and social contexts. CA 3. CA 4.
View Classes »2501. Introduction to Archaeology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The concepts, methods and practice of anthropological archaeology.
View Classes »2502. Human Evolution
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The processes and events leading to the origin of human beings. Human physical and cultural development from its beginning to the dawn of settled life, through the approaches of physical anthropology and archaeology.
View Classes »2510. Methods in Maritime Archaeology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Methods and techniques in underwater archaeology covering both maritime (ships, ports, etc.) and submerged settlements archaeology. Overview of the aqueous environment, underwater archaeological methods, geophysical/geotechnical surveying and data interpretation, diver and ROV-based documentation and excavation techniques survey methods.
View Classes »2511. Anthropology of Museums
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Museums as locales for intersecting issues of identity, memory, place, power, ethnicity, history, representation, and ownership. Special focus on collectors, theories, and methods for the collection and display of Native American bodies, histories, art, and artifacts. Four museum field trips and related field research required. SM-10/12/09
View Classes »2600. Microscopy in Applied Archaeobotany Research
4.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Introduction to research trends in archaeobotany and use of microscopy tools. Design and execution of a research project. CA 3-LAB.
View Classes »3003. Field Research in Social Settings
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Methods and techniques of field research in social settings, including observational procedures, interviewing, and the construction and use of questionnaires.
View Classes »3004. Cultural Research
1.00 - 3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The theoretical foundations and basic methods used to collect and analyze cultural data.
View Classes »3021. Contemporary Latin America
Survey of anthropological contributions to the study of contemporary Mexico, Central America, South America, and the Hispanic Caribbean. Special focus on the comparative analysis of recent ethnographic case studies and local/regional/national/international linkages.
View Classes »3025. Contemporary Africa
Africa since its partition in 1884. Urbanization, social stratification, racial and ethnic conflict.
View Classes »3026. Peoples and Cultures of North America
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
A survey of representative Native American cultures as they existed prior to the twentieth century, together with a view of the changing life of modern Native Americans.
View Classes »3027. Contemporary Native Americans
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Analysis of Native American reservations and urban communities and their relationship to the larger U.S. society. Special focus on federal policy and economic development, cultural identity, and politics of Native Americans.
View Classes »3028. Indigenous Rights and Aboriginal Australia
An introduction to the study and understanding of Aboriginal ways of life and thought. An exploration of the complexity of contemporary indigenous social orders and land rights issues. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »3028W. Indigenous Rights and Aboriginal Australia
An introduction to the study and understanding of Aboriginal ways of life and thought. An exploration of the complexity of contemporary indigenous social orders and land rights issues. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »3029. The Caribbean
Comparative perspectives on the cultural formation of Caribbean societies; the region's demographic, economic and political links with the wider world.
View Classes »3030E. Peoples of the Pacific Islands
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Survey of the indigenous societies and cultures of the Pacific Islands, from the first settlement to the postcolonial period. Topics include prehistoric canoe voyaging, modes of subsistence, political forms, ritual and religion, ceremonial exchange, gender ideologies, European colonization, and modern indigenous nationalism. Ethnographic examples will be drawn from Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »3041. Latin American Minorities in the United States
Emphasis on groups of Mexican, Puerto Rican and Cuban origin, including treatment and historical background, social stratification, informal social relations, ethnic perceptions, relations and the concept of Latino identity.
View Classes »3050. Anthropology of Jews and Jewishness
Survey of the rich and growing ethnographic literature on Jews and Jewishness around the globe. Course materials include ethnographic texts, music, and videos/films.
View Classes »3050W. Anthropology of Jews and Jewishness
Survey of the rich and growing ethnographic literature on Jews and Jewishness around the globe. Course materials include ethnographic texts, music, and videos/films.
View Classes »3081. Internship in Anthropology
1.00 - 6.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory
Practical experience, knowledge, and professional skills in a work environment related to anthropology. Based on a contract and learning experience syllabus. Students taking this course will be assigned a final grade of S (satisfactory) or U (unsatisfactory).
View Classes »3090. Directed Field Research in Anthropology
1.00 - 12.00 credits | May be repeated for a total of 12 credits.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The investigation of a sociocultural and/or archaeological problem in some domestic or foreign field location. May be repeated for a maximum of 12 credits.
View Classes »3091. Internship in Anthropology: Directed Study
1.00 credits | May be repeated for a total of 2 credits.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Directed study, analysis, and reflection on internship experience.
View Classes »3093. Foreign Study
1.00 - 6.00 credits | May be repeated for credit.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Special topics taken in a foreign study program. May count toward the major with consent of the advisor. May be repeated for credit.
View Classes »3095. Special Topics
1.00 - 6.00 credits | May be repeated for credit.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
With a change of content, may be repeated for credit.
View Classes »3096. Directed Research in Anthropology
1.00 - 6.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The investigation of a sociocultural and/or archaeological problem in a non field-based setting. Hours by arrangement.
View Classes »3098. Variable Topics
3.00 credits | May be repeated for credit.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Prerequisites, required preparation, and recommended preparation vary. With a change of topic, may be repeated for credit.
View Classes »3099. Independent Study
1.00 - 6.00 credits | May be repeated for credit.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
With a change of content, may be repeated for credit.
View Classes »3120. Anthropology of Capitalism
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Ethnographic approaches to classic and contemporary debates about capitalism's transformation of sociocultural dynamics.
View Classes »3150. Migration
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The social, cultural and economic causes and consequences of internal and international migration in the modern era. Topics include migrant selection, social adaptation, effects on home and host societies, and cultural identity. CA 4.
View Classes »3150W. Migration
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The social, cultural and economic causes and consequences of internal and international migration in the modern era. Topics include migrant selection, social adaptation, effects on home and host societies, and cultural identity. CA 4.
View Classes »3152. Race, Ethnicity, and Nationalism
Popular and scholarly theories of human group identity and diversity, in cross-cultural and historical perspective. Topics include: an overview of 'race' and 'ethnicity' in Western thought, ethnic group formation and transformation, political mobilizations of group identity, and systems of inequality. CA 2. CA 4.
View Classes »3155. Anthropology of the African Diaspora
An exploration of the racial, political, and social similarities and differences within and between the communities constituting the African Diaspora from an anthropological perspective.
View Classes »3200. Human Behavioral Ecology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The application of the theory of natural selection to the study of human culture and behavior, with emphasis on the interaction between humans and their environment.
View Classes »3202W. Illness and Curing
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Cross-cultural analysis of ethnomedicine, major medical systems, alternative medical systems, curing and healing illness and social control, gender and healing, and the role of traditional and cosmopolitan medical systems in international health. CA 4.
View Classes »3230. Propaganda, Disinformation, and Hate Speech
Draws on current social science research to understand the effects of false information and hate speech on our politics and culture and to evaluate various private and public initiatives to regulate speech. CA 2.
View Classes »3250. Cognitive Anthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The study of how the content of thought or knowledge is created, organized, and distributed in human communities. Topics include cultural models of the mind, emotions, personality, and relationships.
View Classes »3251. Psychological Anthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Cross-cultural overview of critical issues regarding the relationship between individual personality and sociocultural systems, and mental health and illness.
View Classes »3300. Medical Anthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
An introduction to the theory, method, and content of medical anthropology.
View Classes »3302. Medical Ecology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Anthropological perspectives on the interrelationships among culture, biology, environment, and disease. Major topics include ecology and adaptation, population dynamics, nutrition, reproduction, disease in sociological context, health seeking behavior, and the complexity of the interaction of western and non-western medical systems.
View Classes »3303. Parent Child Relations in Cross-Cultural Perspective
Theory and research on major dimensions of parenting in the U.S.A. and cross-culturally, parental warmth, control and punishment.
View Classes »3304. Anthropology of Drug Use
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Uses the anthropological lens to examine the intersection of societies, cultures and psychoactive substances based on a historically informed, cross-cultural, ethnographic and political economic perspective on drug use and related behaviors.
View Classes »3309. Violence and Human Rights
Violence and human rights as cultural constructs; human rights claims; war, genocide, terrorism, street crime, domestic violence; deterrence and intervention policy.
View Classes »3320. Race, Culture, and Reproductive Health
An examination of the reproductive health experiences of women in the United States, including those focused on sexuality, birth, and motherhood. An exploration of the complex relationship between women’s reproductive experiences and their contemporary racial and socioeconomic locations in American society.
View Classes »3325. Introduction to Global Health
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Anthropological perspectives on public health in a globalized world, health inequalities within and across countries; diverse social, cultural, and other determinants of global health; pressing global health issues; organizational players involved in addressing global health issues.
View Classes »3326. Global Health and Human Rights
Theories, methods and controversies in the interconnected fields of global health and human rights.
View Classes »3327. Power and Health in Latin America and the Caribbean
History, theories, and concepts about the human right to health and structural inequalities in the region.
View Classes »3340E. Culture and Conservation
Interdisciplinary analysis of conservation and the human-environment relationship from a cross-cultural perspective. Major topics include sustainability, environmental ethics, climate change, natural disasters, health, and environmental justice. CA2. CA4-INT.
View Classes »3342. Political and Legal Anthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Anthropological analysis of the state, nation, and human rights from a cross-cultural perspective.
View Classes »3350. Anthropological Perspectives on Women
Major conceptual and historical problems in the study of gender in anthropology. Women's roles in different historical and contemporary settings, and new understandings of family, kinship, power, and cultural ideologies.
View Classes »3351. Sex and Gender
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Cross-cultural and interdisciplinary analysis of biological sex, gender, sex roles, and sexuality.
View Classes »3400. Culture and Religion
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Major theories and approaches in the study of religion as a social institution and cultural system. Topics include myth, ritual, taboos and pollution beliefs, shamanism, magical practices, fundamentalism and religion in modern society.
View Classes »3401. World Religions
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
A survey of religious belief systems, both polytheistic and monotheistic, from around the world. CA 1. CA 4-INT.
View Classes »3402. Women in the Bible
An introduction to Biblical interpretation from a feminist perspective, examining how women are represented in the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. Issues of authorship, translation, point of view, cultural context and language.
View Classes »3403. Women and Religion
Gender issues in the world's religions. Survey of women's theological standing, ritual activities and participation in a cross-cultural sample of religions, both monotheistic and polytheistic.
View Classes »3405. Religion and Mind
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Cognitive and evolutionary anthropological perspectives on the mental underpinnings of religious thought and behavior.
View Classes »3420. Archaeology of Psychoactive Substances
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Survey of psychoactive substances and altered states of consciousness in both past and present cultural practice.
View Classes »3450W. Anthropological Perspectives on Art
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Approaches to cultural creativity and aesthetics in the graphic and plastic arts of prestate societies. Examples from North America, Oceania, and Africa. CA 1.
View Classes »3503. Old World Prehistory
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The origin of humanity in Africa, hunters and gatherers of the Paleolithic, the origins of agriculture and the transition to settled life, and the emergence of civilizations in Africa, Asia and the Near East.
View Classes »3506W. Laboratory Techniques in Archaeology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The analysis, interpretation, and presentation of archaeological data sets including lithics, ceramics, floral and faunal remains and spatial information from excavated sites.
View Classes »3512. African Archaeology
An archaeological perspective on more than three million years of human social and behavioral change in Africa, from Stone Age societies that are the earliest in the world to sweeping changes brought about by the development and spread of cattle and crops, sophisticated metallurgy, and the later rise of kingdoms and complex polities situated at a global crossroads of trade and interaction.
View Classes »3513. Near Eastern Prehistory
From the earliest hunter-gatherers to the rise of the state: the transition from food-gathering to food-production and the development of complex societies in the Near East.
View Classes »3514. European Prehistory
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Interdisciplinary survey of the archaeological, biological, cultural, and behavioral evolution of prehistoric humans and their societies across Europe and portions of western Asia.
View Classes »3522. Ecological Anthropology Seminar
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Interdisciplinary study of the ecology of humans, integrating ecological and anthropological theory with archaeological, historical, and contemporary case-studies.
View Classes »3523E. The Origins of Agriculture
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The origins and spread of agriculture worldwide. Economic, social and ideological ramifications of the agricultural transition. Processes of plant and animal domestication.
View Classes »3531. Maritime Archaeology of the Americas
Archaeological and historical sources to examine the development of seafaring practices, exploration, waterborne trade and economic systems, naval warfare and shipbuilding in the Americas from the fifteenth to the beginning of the twentieth century.
View Classes »3532. Archaeology of the Age of Sail
Overview of archaeological and historical sources on the development of seafaring and navigation, exploration, waterborne trade and economic systems, colonialism and empire building, naval warfare and shipbuilding in Europe, Asia and Australia from the fifteenth to the beginning of the twentieth century.
View Classes »3555. Archaeological Science
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Survey of scientific methods used to answer archaeological questions. Methods, applications and lab demonstrations.
View Classes »3560. The Evolution of Human Diet
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Investigation of ecological, anatomical, and physiological aspects that shaped the biological and cultural evolution of humans from the Pliocene to the Anthropocene.
View Classes »3701. Lithic Technology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
The properties of stone tools - the primary evidence of human behavior for humanity's first 2.5 million years - and the processes of their manufacture. Analysis of prehistoric tools and tool replication.
View Classes »3703. Zooarchaeological Method and Theory
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Method and theory of archaeological faunal analysis, including training in the identification of skeletal materials, the formation of the zooarchaeological record, and the interpretation of zooarchaeological data.
View Classes »3704. Experimental Archaeology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Method and theory of experimental archaeology, including hands-on study of past human behavior through experimentation with modern material culture, and the execution of an experimental research project addressing an archaeological question.
View Classes »3705. Paleoanthropology
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Fossil evidence for the evolution of the human family, Hominidae. Anatomical features, behavior, and evolutionary relationships of extinct hominids; the use of biological, geological, and archaeological evidence to reconstruct past hominid adaptations.
View Classes »3706. Archaeobotany
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Method and theory of studying archaeological plant remains in the laboratory, including sampling, identification, and interpretation of data.
View Classes »3710. Technology and Society: Archaeological Perspectives
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Using a hands-on and field-based approach and the study of museum-based collections, an examination of archaeological approaches to understanding the ways in which various technologies are used by human societies in the present and past, how new technologies arise and spread, the impacts of technological changes, and how to study social choices in the implementation of various technologies as varied as stone tools, pottery, footwear, gravestones, and industrial-era mill sites.
View Classes »3720. Lab Methods in Archaeological and Forensic Science
1.00 credits | May be repeated for a total of 3 credits.
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Introduction to scientific lab methods used in archaeology and forensics. Includes three stand alone modules, each dedicated to a different method. Each module consists of 15 contact hours comprised of labs and lectures and takes place during a single weekend. Repeatable to a maximum of three credits.
View Classes »3902. North American Prehistory
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Prehistoric cultures of North America from the earliest traces to European contact, with emphasis on the region east of the Mississippi. CA 4.
View Classes »3904. Ethnohistory of Native New England
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Combines archaeological and ethnohistorical data to reconstruct the lifeways of the Native Americans of New England from the prehistoric period to the present. CA 4.
View Classes »3990. Field Work in Archaeology
1.00 - 6.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
Training in the techniques of archaeological site excavation; mapping; recording; field conservation, and preliminary analysis of materials.
View Classes »4097W. Honors Thesis
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Honors Credit
Research and writing of major project exploring a topic within anthropology, with close supervision and production of multiple written drafts.
View Classes »4510. The Neanderthals
3.00 credits
Prerequisites:
Grading Basis: Graded
An interdisciplinary consideration of the biological, cultural, technological, and behavioral evolution of the Neanderthals and their societies.
View Classes »