Unit CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY
- Course
- Philosophy and ethics of relationships
- Study-unit Code
- 35080606
- Curriculum
- Filosofia e storia
- Teacher
- Pietro Meloni
- Teachers
-
- Pietro Meloni
- Hours
- 36 ore - Pietro Meloni
- CFU
- 6
- Course Regulation
- Coorte 2020
- Offered
- 2021/22
- Learning activities
- Caratterizzante
- Area
- Discipline classiche, storiche, antropologiche e politico-sociali
- Academic discipline
- M-DEA/01
- Type of study-unit
- Opzionale (Optional)
- Type of learning activities
- Attività formativa monodisciplinare
- Language of instruction
- Italian
- Contents
- In the first part of the course, the theoretical foundations and the main concepts of the discipline, with brief notes on the history of Anthropology – as well as classic and contemporary ethnographic cases – will be illustrated. In the second part, referring to the key concepts of the scientific debate, we will try to reflect – opening the discussion in the classroom – on complex issues such as: culture, economy, religion, family, gender, tradition, transmission of knowledge, heritage. In the third part attention will be paid to studies on everyday life and consumption.
- Reference texts
- 1. Ugo Fabietti, Elementi di antropologia culturale (terza edizione), Milano, Mondadori, 2015.
2. Pietro Meloni, Antropologia del consumo. Doni, merci, simboli, Carocci, Roma, 2018. - Educational objectives
- Expected learning outcomes: knowledge and comprehension skills; analysis, synthesis and argumentation skills; critical and interdisciplinary connecting skills; autonomy of judgment; ability of diachronic data organization, personal evaluation and synchronic use of the acquired skills. Communication skills: ability to communicate knowledge in an appropriate anthropological language.
Learning skills: acquisition of a critical learning method. - Prerequisites
- No
- Teaching methods
- Lectures
- Other information
- No
- Learning verification modality
- oral verification and/or test
- Extended program
- In the first part of the course, the theoretical foundations and the main concepts of the discipline, with brief notes on the history of Anthropology – as well as classic and contemporary ethnographic cases – will be illustrated.
Specifically we will address the following topics:
- Introduction to the anthropological perspective
- cultural anthropology in the frame of human sciences
- Origins of Anthropology
- The anthropological definition of the “concept of culture”.
In the second part, referring to the key concepts of the scientific debate, we will try to reflect – opening the discussion in the classroom – on complex issues such as: culture, economy, religion, family, gender, tradition, transmission of knowledge, heritage.
Specifically we will address the following topics:
- The construction of “race” concept.
- The deconstruction of the concept of “race”.
- The notion of relativity: questions of method and ethics.
- The concept of culture: definitions and etymology. Essentialist conceptions and processual conceptions. Some anthropological definitions of the concept of culture.
- The relational notion of “identity”: “us” and “them”.
- New forms of separation. Forms of racism. Institutional racisms. Cultural relativism and ethnocentrism. Critical ethnocentrism.
- “Biological” and “socio-cultural”: gender, gender and sexuality. Family-families. Contextualization of the family concept.
Specifically we will address the following topics:
- Ethnography; anthropological research methodologies and looks on the world.
- The relationship between food and culture.
- The common sense.
- Theories of consumption.
- Media and digital culture.