Ivan Brady, Ph.D., Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus

brady@oswego.edu 

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By applying the basic concepts and premises of contemporary cultural anthropology and related disciplinary interests (semiotics, literary criticism, textualism, etc.) to the problems of ethnographic representation—the ways in which we attempt to represent and interpret the Others of our past and present through various media—this course seeks answers to questions on the common theme of what constitutes shared humanity in the long run: What is culture? What sense does it make to speak of "a" culture? How do we account for our cultural similarities and differences? How do other people "see" us? Why is interpretation as necessary to human life as breathing? What constitutes the grounds of interpretation for all of us? How do myth, history, and the need to find the truth we want to find figure into this? Pursuing the answers to these questions teaches us to catch ourselves in the act of jumping to conclusions and to start asking more appropriate questions about the nature of the world and our place in it. The idea is to show us what we are by exploring what we are not, or think we are not, relative to who or what we want to be, and to map out the various ways that knowledge is produced. The result is an unusual exercise in critical thinking that has great practical value today, given our increasingly multicultural and ever-expanding global connections. Non-majors are encouraged to participate.

PREREQUISITES: Nine hours social and behavioral sciences and upper division standing. Note as well that this course is writing intensive. Online discussion is weighted heavily and several projects requiring rich personal interpretations will be assigned. Literacy counts in all cases. This is not a course in remedial writing. It requires mastery of fundamental writing skills (basic English grammar, college level vocabulary, etc.). If you have trouble putting one word in front of the other and actually getting somewhere with clarity and insight, do not take this course! Help with writing is available elsewhere, not here. You should also avoid this course like the plague if you harbor any thoughts that online courses should be easier—have lower standards, require less attention, less work—than "in-person," brick and mortar classes. Nothing could be farther from the truth in this case. You cannot succeed in this course if you make these mistakes. Forewarned is forearmed. On the other hand, if you meet the prerequisites, are confident in your ability to cover this ground, and are eager to share a broadly-based intellectual experience with a group of like-minded citizens, welcome aboard!

TEXTS:
Brady, Ivan. The Time at Darwin’s Reef: Poetic Explorations in Anthropology and History. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira, 2003.

DeVita, Philip and James D. Armstrong (eds.). America as a Foreign Culture. 3rd ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2002.

Kottak, Conrad Phillip. Mirror for Humanity: A Concise Introduction to Cultural Anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2003.

Lavenda, Robert H. and Emily A. Schultz. Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology. 2nd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2003.

Wolf, Margery. A Thrice-Told Tale: Feminism, Postmodernism, and Ethnographic Responsibility. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992.