Faculty of Arts & Science 2012-2013 Calendar

Calendar Home | Course Timetables

Anthropology

Faculty

Anthropology Programs

PLEASE NOTE THAT NOT ALL COURSES ARE OFFERED EVERY YEAR. CONSULT THE CURRENT TIMETABLE FOR COURSE OFFERINGS.

* Note: ANT courses are those offered with the following prefixes: ANT, ABS, ARH, HAJ, JAL and JGA.

This is a limited enrolment program.  All students who request the program and obtain at least the specified mark(s) in the required course(s) will be eligible to enrol.

Courses for admission: ANT100Y1 with a final mark of at least 67% or ANT200Y1 or ANT203Y1 or
ANT204H1 or ANT207H1 with a final mark of at least 70%.

Major program:

(6.5 full courses or their equivalent)

First and/or Second Year

1. ANT100Y1

2. ANT207H1

3. 1.0 FCE from ANT200Y1, ANT203Y1

4. 0.5 from ANT204H1, ANT208H1, ANT253H1

Upper years

5. 2.5 FCE at the 300+-level from one of Groups A, B, or C, including at least 0.5 FCE at the 400-level.

6. 1.0 additional FCE from a Group other than that used to meet requirement #5

This is a limited enrolment program.  All students who request the program and obtain at least the specified mark(s) in the required course(s) will be eligible to enrol.

Courses for admission: ANT100Y1 with a final mark of at least 67% or ANT200Y1 or ANT203Y1 or ANT204H1 or ANT207H1 with a final mark of at least 70%.

Minor program:

(4 full courses or their equivalent including at least one 300-level course; excluding ANT497Y/ANT498H/ ANT499H)

First and/or Second Year
1. ANT100Y1
2. 2 FCE’s from ANT200Y1, ANT203Y1, ANT207H1, ANT253H1

Upper years
3. One full course equivalent at the 300-level from Groups A, B, or C

This is a limited enrolment program.  All students who request the program and obtain at least the specified mark(s) in the required course(s) will be eligible to enrol.

Courses for admission: ANT100Y1 with a final mark of at least 67% or ANT203Y1 with a final mark of at least 70%.

(7.5 full courses or their equivalent, including at least 2 FCE at the 300+ level, 0.5 FCE of which must be at the 400-level)

First Year and/or Second Year:
1. BIO120H1
2. ANT100Y1 or BIO220H1. If BIO220H1 is taken, students must take an additional 0.5 FCE in ANT
3. ANT203Y1

Upper Years:
4. 2.0 FCE from ANT208H1, ANT333Y1, ANT334H1, ANT335Y1, ANT336H1
5. 2.5 additional FCE from: Group B and/or ANT406H1, ANT415Y1, ARH312Y1
6. 0.5 FCE at the 400-level from Group B

This is a limited enrolment program.  All students who request the program and obtain at least the specified mark(s) in the required course(s) will be eligible to enrol.

Courses for admission: ANT207H1 with a final mark of at least 70%.

(10 full courses or their equivalent, including at least 2 FCE at the 400 level)

First and/or Second Year
1. ANT204H1 and ANT207H1

Upper years
2. ANT370H1 and ANT380H1
3. 6 FCE from Group C including at least 0.5 FCE course from Subgroup C(i)
4. ANT475H1 and an additional 1.5 FCE at the 400-level

Note: Students who enrolled in the Specialist in Anthropology (Social/Cultural) in 2009-10 or 2010-11 and who did not take ANT210H1 are strongly encouraged to take ANT380H1, but may instead take an additional half course from Group C

This is a limited enrolment program.  All students who request the program and obtain at least the specified mark(s) in the required course(s) will be eligible to enrol.

Courses for admission: ANT100Y1 with a final mark of at least 67% or ANT207H1 with a final mark of at least 70%.

(6.5 full courses or their equivalent including at least 2.0 FCE at the 300+ level and 1 FCE at the 400 level)

First and/or Second Year
1. ANT207H1
2. ANT204H1 or ANT253H1

Upper years
3. ANT370H1 or ANT325H1
4. Five additional FCE from Group C including at least 1 FCE at the 400 level. Students who want to focus more specifically on the role of language in culture and society should take ANT253H1, ANT325H1, and courses in the C (ii) Subgroup

Group A: (Archaeology)
ANT200Y1, ANT299Y1, ANT311Y1, ANT314H1, ANT315H1, ANT316H1, ANT317H1, ANT318H1, ANT319Y1, ANT320H1, ANT406H1, ANT407H1, ANT409H1, ANT410H1, ANT411H1, ANT412H1, ANT415Y1,  ANT416H1, ANT419H1, ANT420H1, ANT497Y1/ANT498H1/ANT499H1; ARH305H1, ARH306Y1, ARH309H1, ARH312Y1, ARH360H1, ARH361H1, ARH482H1, ARH495H1

Group B: (Biological)
ANT203Y1, ANT208H1, ANT299Y1, ANT330Y1, ANT333Y1, ANT334H1, ANT335Y1, ANT336H1, ANT371H1, ANT430H1, ANT432H1, ANT433H1, ANT434H1, ANT435H1, ANT436H1, ANT481H1, ANT497Y1/ANT498H1/ANT499H1

Group C: (Society, Culture, and Language)
ANT110H1, ANT204H1, ANT207H1, ANT208H1, ANT299Y1, ANT322H1, ANT323Y1, ANT324H1, ANT343H1, ANT345H1, ANT346H1, ANT347Y1, ANT348H1, ANT350H1, ANT351H1, ANT353H1, ANT356H1, ANT358H1, ANT363Y1, ANT364Y1, ANT366H1, ANT367Y1, ANT369H1, ANT370H1, ANT371H1, ANT373H1, ANT374H1, ANT376H1, ANT378H1, ANT380H1, ANT435H1, ANT440H1, ANT441H1, ANT442H1, ANT444Y1, ANT445H1, ANT450H1, ANT451H1, ANT452H1, ANT454H1, ANT456H1, ANT457H1, ANT460H1, ANT462H1, ANT465H1, ANT469H1, ANT475H1, ANT480H1, ANT484H1, ANT490Y1, ANT497Y1/ANT498H1/ANT499H1; HAJ453H1; JNH 350H1; NEW250Y1

Subgroup C (i): (Society, Culture and Language-Area)
ANT340H1, ANT341H1, ANT352H1, ANT354H1, ANT365H1, ANT377H1, ANT446H1, ANT467H1, ANT468H1

Subgroup C(ii): (Society, Culture and Language – Linguistic)
ANT253H1, ANT325H1, ANT329H1, ANT427H1, ANT444Y1, ANT483H1, ANT497Y1/ANT498H1/ANT499H1; JAL328H1, JAL353H1, JAL355H1, JAL401H1

Aboriginal Studies - See Aboriginal Studies

Archaeology - See Archaeology

Environmental Anthropology Minor- See Centre for Environment

A program focused on understanding the diverse nature of interactions between humans and their environments, both in the past and in modern global society.

Anthropology Courses

The 199Y1 and 199H1 seminars are designed to provide the opportunity to work closely with an instructor in a class of no more than twenty-four students. These interactive seminars are intended to stimulate the students’ curiosity and provide an opportunity to get to know a member of the professorial staff in a seminar environment during the first year of study. Details here.

Society and culture from various anthropological perspectives: socio-cultural, biological, archaeological, and linguistic.

The distinction between nature and culture is often described as a central feature of "modernity" and it certainly remains relevant to many current debates about ecology and environment. This course explores various approaches to "nature" through a variety of written and visual texts, and focuses on representations of the nature/culture dualism. The course's main objectives are 1) to engender discussion and debate about "nature" and how it is represented in a variety of contemporary texts; 2) introduce students to some of the key positions on "nature" among classical and contemporary social theorists; and 3) expose students to pressing ecological issues in a way that fosters their critical engagement with "nature frameworks."

How did art and technology develop in the course of human evolution?  What led to the development of agriculture and settled village life?  How did social inequality and urbanism emerge?  This course takes a global perspective to explore the archaeological evidence that sheds light on these questions and other aspects of prehistory and early history.  Students will engage with the challenges posed by new discoveries and also with recent developments in archaeological method and theory.  The goal of the course is to involve students with the current state of archaeological research and some of the major issues archaeologists work to address.

A course focused on recent anthropological scholarship that seeks to understand and explain the transformation of contemporary societies and cultures. Topics may include some of the following: new patterns of global inequality, war and neo-colonialism, health and globalization, social justice and indigeneity, religious fundamentalism, gender inequalities, biotechnologies and society etc.

Society, culture, kinship, exchange, community, identity, politics, belief: these and other core concepts are explored in this course, which lays the foundation for advanced courses in social and cultural anthropology.

Introduction to applied evolutionary medical anthropology. It explores evidence for the evolution of human vulnerability to disease across the life cycle (conception to death) and implications for health of contemporary populations in gendered cross-cultural perspective.

This course introduces linguistic analysis with a view towards its application to the study of the relation between culture and social structure. The interplay of pronunciation, grammar, semantics, and discourse with rituals, ideologies, and constructions of social meaning and worldview are discussed in tandem with the traditional branches of linguistic analysisphonology, morphology, grammar, syntax, and semantics. The objective of the course is to provide a broad framework for understanding the role of language in society.

Credit course for supervised participation in faculty research project. Details here.

Transforming archaeological results into statements about people and their life ways. Covers basic archaeological theory, including research design, sampling, stratigraphy, seriation, formation and testing or evaluation of hypotheses, regional analyses. Introduces some of the major schools of archaeological theory, including New Archaeology and Post-Processual Archaeology.

Intensive instruction in archaeological field methods and acquisition of field skills, including archaeological search and survey, site mapping, laying out excavation grids, use of theodolites, total station, and GPS, stratigraphic excavation, stratigraphy, field recording, screening sediment, Ontario license and reporting requirements. Normally this course would take place on campus or at Joker’s Hill, in summer.

An analysis of ethics in contemporary archaeology that covers reburial and repatriation, interpretation of the archaeological record in the context of historically oppressed groups, ethnic minorities, and non-western societies, the ethics of collecting and managing cultural property, relationships with the media, the debates surrounding looting, and other issues.

Practical field training through six weeks of excavation on an archaeological site. Basic principles of artifact handling and classification. (Offered only in Summer Session)

Techniques for making archaeological data meaningful after excavation or survey. Archaeological measurements, compilation of data, database design, archaeological systematics, and sampling theory in the context of lithics, pottery, floral, faunal and other archaeological remains. 

An archaeological survey of the human prehistory of northwestern North America from the late Pleistocene to the time of early European contact. Geographical coverage will include the Northwest Coast, California, and the Intermontane Plateau.

Archaeology and ethnohistory of Arctic cultures. Emphasis is on variation in social organization, settlement pattern, economy, ideology, and interaction with the expanding European world-system.

This course provides an introduction to the cultures of Mesoamerica, from the first arrival of indigenous peoples to the appearance of the Spaniards in the sixteenth century. Students will become acquainted with cultures including Olmec, Zapotec, Teotihuacan, Maya, and Aztec, while also considering issues of method and evidence.

This course examines the precontact and early contact period culture history of eastern North America, including Ontario, through archaeological evidence. Topics covered include the earliest peopling of the region at the end of the Ice Age, diversity of hunter-gatherer societies, introduction of agriculture, and the development of the dynamic First Nations societies who eventually met and interacted with Europeans.

This course offers a comparative examination of the rise and organization of ancient cities through a detailed investigation of urban social theory. We will explore competing anthropological interpretations of urban process while probing the political, ideological, and economic structures of the worlds earliest cities. Students will have the opportunity to consider a broad range of subjects, including mechanisms of city genesis; urban-rural relations; the intersections of city and state; and historical variation in urban landscapes, ideologies, and political economies.

This course examines human prehistory in North America, North of Mexico, from the time of earliest occupation to European contact. Special topics include Paleoindian and Archaic adaptations, the rise of complex hunter-gatherers, origins of farming and the evolution of complex chiefdoms.

This class offers intensive study of the archaeology and culture history of the Andean region prior to the Spanish conquest.  The complexity and distinctiveness of Andean social organization, political institutions, religious ideologies, and economic practices have long fascinated anthropologists.  Ultimately, the course will explore Andean cultures over a 10,000 year period, highlighting key debates, current research projects, and innovative theoretical approaches shaping contemporary archeological scholarship in South America and beyond.      

This course will present various perspectives on the nature and dynamics of youth culture. It will discuss the research accumulated over the past quarter century on youth lifestyles, from fashion and music to the formation and spread of slang. It will also look at the various critical and controversial aspects of adolescence in contemporary culture.

Theories of culture and society, with examples from ordinary life and fantasy and their popular expressions.

The course uses tourism as a lens to examine global connections. Particular focus will be on the politics of cultural encounters. Drawing examples from diverse ethnographic materials, the course explores how different visions of the world come into contact, negotiated and transformed, and how tourist encounters shape peoples everyday lives.

How ideas about language fit into the overall views of humankind as expressed by selected anthropologists, linguists, sociologists, and philosophers.

Introduction to writing systems; their historical development, their relationship to language, and their role in culture and society. (Given by the Departments of Anthropology and Linguistics) (Not offered every year)

The role of language and symbolism in the representation and manipulation of ideology and power structure. Case materials drawn from the study of verbal arts, gender, law, advertising, and politics with a focus on North America.

Provides a framework for understanding current anthropological issues in the different geo-political regions of Latin America. Special attention will be paid to historical/conceptual development of the discipline in the region, and the course will introduce a debate about the dealth and resurgence of area studies.

This course offers a general introduction to contemporary China in a global context from an anthropological perspective. It covers four major aspects of Chinese culture and society: Political Economy, Social Relations, Modernities and Modernization, and Overseas Chinese.

Social anthropological perspectives on variations in gender roles and systems. Examines, through comparison of ethnography, the relationship of gender to social organization, economic and political processes, belief systems and social change.

This course examines medical anthropologys contributions to, and critiques of, global health policies and programs. Topics covered include: colonialism and health, the political ecology of disease, indigenous constructions of illness and healing, medical pluralism, the politics of primary health care, population policies, reproductive health, and AIDS.

Social anthropological perspective on the nature and meaning of food production, culinary cultures, industrial food, food as metaphor, and famine and hunger.

The role of culture, cultural diversity, space and performance in urban institutions and settings. The cultural context and consequence of urbanization.

Aspects of health and disease in cross-cultural perspective. Critical views on the interface between conventional western medicine and alternative, indigenous, and traditional therapeutic systems.

The course uses ethnographic material to examine the ways in which global forces have changed the nature of work in different sites since World War Two - North America, Europe, and the countries of the South are selectively included.

This course utilizes a social movements perspective to examine the various kinds of conflicts emerging over environment, including disputes over food, animal rights, parks, wilderness, energy, and water. Building on the anthropological literature on landscape and political ecology, this course explores the various ways in which social movement constituencies are responding to and engaging with the uncertain and uneven nature of environmental change.

This course examines key themes in the constitution of South Asia as an area for ethnographic analysis. Lectures and discussions will focus on classic works in the anthropology of South Asia, examining the rise of gatekeeping concepts such as caste, the village, collectivity, and the oppression of women. The course provides theoretical and historical perspectives for the anthropological study of contemporary South Asia.

The course will focus on the dynamic interplay between developments in Canadian Indigenous rights, contested understandings of the environment and primary resource exploration/development in mining, forestry and hydro. The changing relationship is challenging industry to re-think social/environmental responsibility, local vs national equity with implications beyond the Aboriginal community.

An introduction to the detailed observation of ordinary conversational interaction, and to some of the main ways in which such interaction is organized. The focus is on developing the capacity to discern orderliness in the details of everyday interaction, and beginning independent research in this area. (Given by the Departments of Anthropology and Linguistics)

This course examines how what we know as Japan and its culture has been constructed through global interactions. Topics include gender and sexuality, race and ethnicity, social and family life, work and leisure, and Japanese identity amid changing global power relations.

An introduction to some of the principal questions of feminist theory, as viewed from sociolinguistics. Topics include: socialization into gendered discourse patterns, cultural and ethnic differences in gendered interactions; the role of language and gender in legal, medical and labour settings; multilingualism, migration, imperialism and nationalism; sexuality, desire and queer linguistics, language, gender and globalization.

This course introduces anthropological definitions of religion; debates on rituals and rites of passage; rationality, religion and modernity; belief and body; religion and the media. It also engages with studies in the anthropology of popular and transnational religion, and the politics of religious movements.

It is widely acknowledged that sharp disparities in disease burden and access to medical care characterize global patterns in health. These disparities affect the life chances of much of the worlds population, based on class position, gender, and geographical region.

From earliest times through the rise of complex hunter-gatherers, and the food producing revolution to politically complex societies in Southwest Asia.

Opportunity for students participating in non-degree credit archaeological digs to submit reports, field notes and term papers for degree credit.

Origins, history and internal dynamics of early and modern state societies, examined with a view to placing our own system in an historical and comparative perspective. Case studies include material from Africa, Asia, the Americas and Europe.

This course will examine the relationships between humans and the environment in the context of contemporary efforts to develop within or in opposition to the political economy of neoliberal globalization. We will critically examine the discourses of progress and environment within a broader theoretical inquiry of structure/agency and power.

Prerequisite: ANT204H1/ANT207H1
Distribution Requirement Status: This is a Social Science course
Breadth Requirement: Society and its Institutions (3)

ANT365H1    Native America and the State (formerly ANT365Y1)[24L]

Culture areas and types existing in precontact and early contact times in North America; problems arising out of contacts between North American Indians and Euroamericans.

Explores how anthropologists have traditionally studied social movements and how new social movements have challenged anthropologists to rethink some of their ethnographic methods and approaches. Some specific movements covered include those related to indigenous rights, environmentalism, refugees, gay and lesbian issues, biotechnology, new religions, and globalization.

This course focuses upon religion and spirituality amongst peoples with a direct, experiential relationship to the world. The first term examines case studies from Australia, Native North America and Africa; the second term examines aspects of the world religions.

This course highlights the diverse ways that social/cultural anthropologists engage with the world beyond the university. Students learn about the many practical applications of anthropological methods and theory. As well, the ethical and political complexities of applied anthropology and activism in anthropology are considered.

An in-depth critical review of foundational ideas in the development of the practice of Anthropology. Topics may include questioning fieldwork, origins and legacies of functionalism, cultural materialism, politics of culture, power and political economy, globalization and post modernism, gender and post-structuralism.

A detailed review of human dietary adaptations, subsistence strategies and the suite of cognitive, cultural and life history traits that make humans so adaptable. Focus is on the relevance of the past to understanding the modern world food system and finding solutions to contemporary problems in population, food, and health.

This course focuses on the role of formal education in contemporary societies around the world. Education and schooling have come to be accepted as essential for social development and economic growth. This claim is critically assessed in terms of how education systems reflect and shape society, economy and politics at local, national and global levels.

Development, or deliberate intervention to improve the lives of people deemed to be lacking, or left behind, has shaped the modern world for at least a century. Drawing on historical and ethnographic studies, this course examines the trajectory of development as a concept and practice, and traces its effects.

The relationship between humans and other animals is one of the most hotly debated topics of our times. Through key classic and contemporary writings, this course introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of animal studies, and explores how anthropologists and other theorists have critically engaged in debates about animal and human distinctions.

This course addresses reading ethnography as a tool to understand compressed and complex modernity such as Korean societies, both in and outside of the Korean peninsula. In particular, this course aims to develop students’ critical thinking on class, ethnicity, gender, family, and migration in Korea and diasporic societies of Koreans in Canada, China, Japan, and US.

This course introduces dialogue between anthropological literature and other disciplinary studies in regards to the economy and culture of gift and money transaction as a key aspect of human society. Studying the history of gift and money economy from agricultural societies and diverse developments of finance market culture in recent era through various perspectives (e.g., ethnographic, sociological, politico-economic, and historical views), this course aims to train students developing a critical understanding of capitalism.

This is an interactive course in which students conduct small ethnographic and library research projects, write up their results, and present their work to the class. By "doing anthropology" students will learn to think critically about the social theories underpinning ethnographic research, as well as the challenges of representing human practice.

Studies in anthropology taken abroad. Areas of concentration vary depending on the instructor and year offered.

Studies in anthropology taken abroad. Areas of concentration vary depending on the instructor and year offered.

An instructor-supervised group project in an off-campus setting. Details here.

An instructor-supervised group project in an off-campus setting. Details here.

Practice in language analysis based on elicited data from a native speaker of a foreign language, emphasizing procedures and techniques. (Given by the Departments of Anthropology and Linguistics)

Core reduction strategies, replication, experimental archaeology, use-wear, design approaches, ground stone, inferring behaviour from lithic artifacts.

This course provides a comparative study of the emergence, organization, and transformation of the two historically-documented states of the native Americas: the Inka and the Aztec. Students will have the opportunity to analyze ethnohistorical and archaeological data in order to critically evaluate models of the pre-industrial state while gauging the anthropological significance of either convergence or particularity in the historical development of centralized political formations.

Archaeological survey, spatial analysis of archaeological evidence over landscapes and territories, and ways archaeologists attempt to interpret landscapes, regional settlement systems, agricultural land use, regional exchange and communication, and past people's perceptions of or ideas about landscape.

Examines the diversity of recent hunter-gatherer societies, as a source of analogues for understanding the archaeological record of past foraging peoples.

Seminar in the critical examination of major schools of archaeological thought.

Introduces the problems, methods and some of the material culture of colonial and industrial archaeology with emphasis on Canada and colonial America. Covers the use of documentary evidence, maps, architecture, and a variety of artifact classes.

Examination and interpretation of faunal material from archaeological sites as evidence for culture.

This course offers a comparative survey of archaeological approaches to ritual practice as it relates to identity politics, personhood, and the negotiation of power relations in past societies.  An important goal of the seminar is to introduce students to social theories on the inherent materiality of ritual performance, whether orchestrated in everyday practice or in elaborate religious and political spectacles.  

Current research in Palaeolithic Archaeology reflecting emerging issues.

How social complexity is manifested in the archaeological record. Origins and evolution of prehistoric complex societies, from small-scale chiefdoms to large-scale states.

Theoretical and empirical studies on the role of language in the reproduction and transformation of ideology, hegemony and political economy. Topics may include language & colonialism, imperialism, globalization, nationalism, racism, sexism, bureaucratic interactions, environmentalism, migration, gentrification. Compares and contrasts critical discourse analytic and linguistic anthropological approaches to method and politics.

A detailed review of the classic and recently emerging literature on the anthropology of children, childhood, and childcare. Focus is on theories for evolution of human parenting adaptations, challenges in research methodology and implications for contemporary research, practice and policy in the area of care and nutrition of infants and children.

An exploration of the conceptual tools used to understand reflexive modernity. Focus on the articulated web of global and local networks that produce simultaneously inequalities and potentially new identities and collectivities.

Beginning with anthropologys early work on kinship, and ending with recent analyses of sex work and the globalization of ideologies of romantic love and companionate marriage, this course will investigate how emotional and sexual relationships are produced, used, conceptualized, and experienced both within particular societies and transnationally.

The relationship between technology and culture through a focus on reproductive, genetic and communications technologies.

Social and linguistic anthropological approaches to research in urban settings. Methodology, field techniques and research ethics. Students must formulate and complete a field research project.

This course examines science and technology from an anthropological perspective. Throughout the course, in addition to introducing major concepts of science studies, we will examine multiple concrete things, like computers as cultural artifacts, connected to wider social, political, economic, ideological, and cultural contexts.

Europe is a, landmass and a (transnational) collection of people in both cases rather vaguely defined. Europe is also an idea, one often closely associated with western civilization. So if anthropology is a combination of the ethnographic study of a place and its people, and also the critical study of a culture, then certainly both of these perspectives could usefully be applied to a course on Europe. Both of these dimensions are also of pressing concern to within Europe today.

Comparative examination of human ecological adaptations, livelihood strategies, spiritual and cultural values and their relation to environmental maintenance or degradation. Explores contemporary grass roots environmental movements and ideologies.

This course concentrates on original late 19th Century to mid-20th Century works by Lewis Henry Morgan, Emile Durkheim, Arnold van Gennep, Marcel Mauss, Claude Levi-Stauss and others who tried to established universal principles of social and cultural life as classificatory kinship, sacred and profane, rites of passage, reciprocity, and structuralism.

The concept of human rights in its universal claims rises fundamental questions for anthropology as it challenges a central value of the discipline: cultural relativism. Students are asked to consider epistemological and theoretical questions and case studies (e.g. claims of rights by ethnic collectivities).

This course investigates the connection between religion, music and society from an anthropological point of view. The primary focus is on societies where music is seen by people as the principal vehicle for religious expression. Examination of religions and musics of Australian aboriginal, Melanesian, Native North America, African societies, others.

This course explores, first, how and where forms of desire and sexual practice have become sites of anthropological inquiry and exemplars of particular cultural logics. Tracing, then, the transnational turn in the anthropology of sexuality, the course engages important debates about culture, locality, and globalization. By focusing on the transnational movement of desires, practices, and pleasures through activisms, mass media, and tourism, the course asks how sex is global and how globalization is thoroughly sexed. Course material will stress, but not be limited to, forms of same-sex or otherwise queer sexualities.

The course addresses the cultural and social significance of material culture in specific cultural settings, and the role that artifacts have played in the history of anthropological thought from early typological displays to the most recent developments of material culture studies.

This fourth-year seminar examines how female gender shapes health and illness. Using case studies of sexual health, fertility and its management, substance use/abuse, mental health, and occupational/labor health risks, the course investigates the material, political, and socio-cultural factors that can put women at risk for a range of illness conditions.

This course examines how anthropologists have studied the way that people hope, imagine, love, and despise. Ethnography of the intimate realms of affect raises important questions about knowledge production and methodology as well as offering insight into how people come to act upon the world and what the human consequences of such action are. The course will also examine how the intimate is socially produced and harnessed in the service of politics and culture. Topics will include grief and its lack; dreams and activism; love and social change; memory and imperialism; sexuality and care; and violence and hope.

This course explores themes such as the emergence of political and religious imaginaries; the relationship between anthropology and psychoanalysis; anthropology of transnational and diasporic subjectivity; affect and violence; subjectivity and the state.

This seminar course explores critical issues in contemporary South Asia through ethnographies centering on popular culture, globalization, gender and sexuality, activism, and development.

Since “first contact” in the mid-20th Century, Highlands ethnographies have played a central role in debates about kinship, systems of exchange and relations between the sexes in small scale societies.  The course examines traditional warfare, sorcery, rites of passage, myths and ideologies of conception and “the person.”

Using historical and contemporary examples, this seminar course explores what happens when people with different cultural backgrounds meet and interact. A variety of anthropological analytics are used to provide students with the conceptual tools to understand such encounters in their own lives.

Students read several full-length ethnographies, both classical and contemporary, and debate what makes for sound ethnographic research and writing, as well as what ethnography is and "should" be as a genre of writing and representation.

Unique opportunity to explore a particular anthropological topic in-depth. Topics vary from year to year.

Unique opportunity to explore a particular archaeological topic in-depth. Topics vary from year to year.

This course will focus on an advanced topic in Linguistic Anthropology. Topic will vary from year- to-year.

Unique opportunity to explore a particular Social Cultural Anthropology topic in-depth. Topics vary from year to year.

An instructor-supervised experiential study project in social and cultural anthropology. Course takes place in an off-campus setting.

Laboratory or practical research on an archaeological project that emphasizes methods and research design in archaeology. Students must obtain the consent of a Supervisor before enrolling. Students are required to give an oral presentation of research results to an open meeting of the Archaeology Centre at the conclusion of the course. Application must be made to the Anthropology Department.

Supervised independent research on a topic agreed on by the student and supervisor before enrolment in the course. Open in exceptional circumstances to advanced students with a strong background in Anthropology. Course Supervisor must be a member of the Anthropology faculty. Application for enrolment should be made to the Department in the preceding term. A maximum of one year of Independent Research courses is allowed per program.

Supervised independent research on a topic agreed on by the student and supervisor before enrolment in the course. Open in exceptional circumstances to advanced students with a strong background in Anthropology. Course Supervisor must be a member of the Anthropology faculty. Application for enrolment should be made to the Department in the preceding term. A maximum of one year of Independent Research courses is allowed per program.

Supervised independent research on a topic agreed on by the student and supervisor before enrolment in the course. Open in exceptional circumstances to advanced students with a strong background in Anthropology. Course Supervisor must be a member of the Anthropology faculty. Application for enrolment should be made to the Department in the preceding term. A maximum of one year of Independent Research courses is allowed per program.

This course examines where humans fit in the fabric of the natural world. It explores the history of ideas about humans in nature, humans as primates, the story of human evolution and modern human physical and genetic diversity.

See description in Social Science courses above.

This course provides background in the practical and theoretical aspects of fieldwork in Paleoanthropology. Students are trained in the treatment and analysis of fossil vertebrates, plant macro- and micro-fossils and sediments. Excursions to paleoanthropological localities of Homo erectus and Homo sapiens, and excavation at a hominoid site. (Joint undergraduate-graduate)

A survey of living primates, this lab-oriented course describes and compares the diverse behavioural and anatomical adaptations that are characteristic to this order of mammals. The understanding of the biological diversity and evolutionary history of primates is important for further understanding of human adaptation and evolution.

Exploration of the development and maintenance of the human skeleton and dentition, with emphasis on application to archaeological, forensic and biomedical sciences.

This course takes the student on a survey of human evolution from our ape ancestors to modern humans.  Students will learn to identify skulls, teeth and limb bones, explore hundreds of casts, and learn how researchers understand human origins and trends in the development of human anatomy and behavior.

This course will explore the foundational and leading concepts in evolutionary anthropology. Historically important readings and current concepts will be presented and discussed in the context of research, especially in areas of human population biology, ecology and the evolution of Homo sapiens. Topics will include behavioral ecology and life history theory, as well as a critique of the adaptationist program.

See above (in social science section) for course description.

See above in Social Science section.

The focus of this course is on the science of primate conservation biology in an anthropological context. Topics will include primate biodiversity and biogeography, human impacts, and conservation strategies/policies. The effects of cultural and political considerations on primate conservation will also be discussed.

The comparative and functional anatomy of the human skull from an evolutionary perspective. Foci include cranial anatomy, the face, mastication, diet, brains and cognition. Includes an extensive lab component using a large collection of primate skeletons and fossil human casts.

The comparative and functional anatomy of the human body from the neck down from an evolutionary perspective. Foci include body size and proportions, human posture and movement, manual dexterity and bipedalism. Includes an extensive lab component using a large collection of primate skeletons and fossil human casts.

Advanced exploration of the life histories of past populations, through the application of palaeodietary analyses, palaeopathology and other appropriate research methods.

See above (in social science section) for course description.

Seminars explore the global AIDS crisis, adopting the medical-anthropological perspective of Paul Farmer's Infections and Inequalities. Varying epidemiological profiles of AIDS are placed in broader social, cultural, and political-economic frameworks. The impact of globalization and structural inequality on local cultures and lifestyles provides an essential backdrop to the discussions.

This course will provide an overview of the ecology and social behavior of extant nonhuman primates. Topics will include socioecology, conservation biology, biogeography, aggression and affiliation, community ecology, communication, and socio-sexual behavior. There will also be extensive discussions of methods used in collecting data on primates in the field.

Unique opportunity to explore in-depth a particular topic in Biological Anthropology. Topics vary from year to year.