ANT 3451 Anthropology of Race and Ethnicity Spring 2015 Professor: Andrea Queeley Department: GSS & AADS Email:
[email protected] Phone: 305-348-6289 Office: LC 303B Office Hours: TU 3-5 or by appt.
Course Hours: TU/THU 12:30-1:45 PM Rm: Ziff Ed Bldg 150
T.A.: Abby Gondek Email:
[email protected] Phone: 781-248-7548 Office Hours: Monday 4-5 Office: Starbucks in Green Library COURSE DESCRIPTION Has the U.S. entered a post-racial society or does race continue to have an influence on our daily lives? Are race and ethnicity meaningful social categories across different national contexts? What is the difference between “tribal warfare”, “ethnic conflict”, and a “race riot”? What are the connections between race, ethnicity, and social inequality in the U.S. and the rest of the world? As an academic discipline devoted to the study of human origins and diversity, anthropology has played a key role in producing ideas about race and ethnicity. In this course, we will examine how anthropological inquiry helps us to answer these questions and more, shedding light on when, why, and to whom identity matters. The course will allow students to think through their own identities, experiences, and beliefs in a safe environment in the process of learning how to approach the subject of race and ethnicity from a critical perspective. After first exploring key concepts in the study of race, culture, and ethnicity, we will spend the remainder of the course examining how these social constructs function across time and space primarily as revealed by anthropological research. The final project will give students the opportunity to apply what they learn about the significance of race and ethnicity as well as the methods anthropologists use in researching socio-cultural phenomena. LEARNING OUTCOMES By the end of this course, students will: 1) Be able to explain the meanings of race and ethnicity in the United States and other places around the world. 2) Be able to think critically about their own experiences of race and ethnicity, situating them within a larger social and cultural context. 3) Recognize and apply an anthropological approach to the study of race and ethnicity. 4) Improve upon their written and oral communication skills.
COURSE REQUIREMENTS Attendance and Class Participation Attendance is mandatory. More than 3 unexcused absences will result in a lower score. There will be active class discussion as well as in-class small group activities during many of the classes this semester. Your participation in these activities is mandatory and contributes to your grade in the course. Quizzes There will be four (4) quizzes that test students’ comprehension of the content and key concepts explored in the course materials. Quizzes will consist of one essay question that requires students to draw upon the readings, videos, and films. The quizzes are given in class and students have 30 minutes to answer the essay question. Midterm Exam There will be one midterm essay exam. Students will receive a list of potential exam questions one week prior to the midterm, two of which will appear on the exam. Final Project and Presentation For the final project, students will conduct an ethnographic study on a dimension of racial dynamics that they choose and that is approved of by the professor. Students will write a 10-pg double-spaced paper that contains a description of the study and an analysis of its results. The description and analysis include the specific topic of research, the methods that students used in order to collect the data, the findings, and a discussion relating those findings to key concepts and cases discussed in the course. Students will be expected to present their project on the last day of the class. GRADING Class Participation: 15 pts Quizzes: 20 pts (5 pts EACH) Midterm Exam: 30 pts Final Project: 35 pts 100-94 A 93-90 A-
89-87 86-84 83-80
B+ B B-
79-77 76-74 73-70
C+ C C-
69-67 D+ 66-64 D 63-60 D-
< 60
F
GROUND RULES 1) Be respectful of the opinions and experiences of your classmates. 2) Turn your cell phones OFF. If you have an emergency and have to use it, leave the room so that I do not have to request that you do so. 3) Use laptops ONLY for course related activity (ie: taking notes) 4) Arrive to class ON TIME. We will have one 15-minute break during the class. Return on time. Persistent lateness will result in a lower grade.
5) Plagiarism is a serious offense. This includes copying passages found on websites as well as in hard copies of books, articles, etc. It is imperative that you properly cite any source that you use. If you use the work of other authors without giving them credit, you will receive a ‘0’ for the assignment and be subject to failing the course and possible disciplinary action. COURSE MATERIALS Articles and Book Chapters See Schedule of Classes. All materials will be posted on Blackboard under “Course Content” Films, Videos, and Interactive Website See Schedule of Classes. Films and videos will be viewed in class unless otherwise indicated. SCHEDULE OF CLASSES AND ASSIGNMENTS ***Be sure to check syllabus frequently for any minor adjustments*** Week 1: January 13-15
Introduction and Key Concepts
Tuesday What Are You?: Census and Interview Exercise Introduction to Understandingrace.org Review of Course Requirements Thursday Understandingrace.org Human Variation quiz The American Anthropological Association (AAA)’s statement on “race” http://www.aaanet.org/stmts/racepp.htm Graves, Joseph 2004. “How Biology Refutes Our Racial Myths” in The Race Myth: Why We Pretend Race Exists in America. New York: Penguin Books, pp. 1-18. Week 2: January 20-22
Race and Ethnicity Through the Lens of Anthropology
Tuesday 1) Baker, Lee. 1998. “History and Theory of a Racialized Worldview” in From Savage to Negro: Anthropology and the Construction of Race 1896-1954. Pp. 11-25. Thursday 1) Mullings, Leith 2005. Interrogating Racism: Towards an antiracist anthropology. Annual Review of Anthropology 34: 667-693.
2) Mullings, Leith 2012. “Trayvon Martin, Race, and Anthropology” http://www.anthropology-news.org/index.php/2013/07/19/trayvonmartin-race-and-anthropology/ Week 3: January 27-29
Learning Race: It’s a Cultural Thang
Tuesday Wolf, Eric 1994. “Perilous Ideas: Race, Culture, People.” Current Anthropology 35(1): 1-12 Hall, Stuart 1990. “Cultural Identity and Diaspora” in Identity, Community, Cultural Difference. Jonathan Rutherford, ed. Pp. 222-237. Thursday Guest Lecturer: Dr. Sarah Mahler, author of Culture as Comfort Mahler, Sarah 2012. “Encountering Others” in Culture as Comfort. Pp. 75-101 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i20d11fGz-0 (VIEW BEFORE CLASS) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hqp6GnYqIjQ (VIEW BEFORE CLASS) https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/ (TAKE RACE BIAS TEST AND BRING RESULTS TO CLASS) Week 4: February 3-5
Centering Whiteness
QUIZ #1 ON WEEKS 1-3 Tuesday “Who is White?” (understandingrace.org) Wise, Tim 2012. “White Like Me” (video) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oV-EDWzJuzk Thursday Karen Brodkin 1998. “Introduction” in How Jews Became White Folks and What That Says About Race in America. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press. Week 5: February 10-12
Race, Culture, Language
Tuesday Bucholtz, Mary 2001. The Whiteness of Nerds: Superstandard English and Racial Markedness. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 11(1): 84-100. McElhinny, Bonnie 2001. See No Evil, Speak No Evil: White Police Officers’ Talk about Race and Affirmative Action. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 11(1): 65-78.
Thursday Negrón Goldbarg and Wilneida Negrón 2009. “Negotiating Latina/o Ethnicity in NYC: Social Interactions and Ethnic Self-Presentation.” Diálogos Latinoamericanos, núm. 16: 35-57. Week 6: Feb 17-19
Race, Culture, and Immigration I
Tuesday QUIZ #2 ON WEEKS 4-5
Pierre, Jemima 2004. Black Immigrants in the United States and the “Cultural Narratives” of Ethnicity. Identities 11(2): 141-170 Thursday Duany, Jorge 1998. Reconstructing Racial Identity: Ethnicity, Color, and Class Among Dominicans in the United States and Puerto Rico. Latin American Perspectives 25(3): 147-72. Thangaraj, Stanley 2012. Playing Through Differences: Black-White Logic and Interrogating South Asian American Identity. Racial and Ethnic Studies 35(6): 988-1006. ASSIGNMENT DUE: One paragraph description of ethnographic project. Bring to class and submit on Blackboard. Week 7: Feb 24-26
Race, Culture, and Immigration II
Tuesday Guest Lecture Dr. Jean Rahier Rahier, Jean Muteba 2003. Metis, Mulatre, Mulato, Mulatto, Negro, Moreno, Mundele, Kaki, Black: The Wanderings and Meanderings of Identity. Thursday Guest Lecture Dr. Martin Tsang Lo, Emily, “A Cuban Chinese Familia” CUBAN RESEARCH INSTITUTE CONFERENCE: RACE IN THE AMERICAS Attend one session between Thursday, February 26th and 28th Week 8: March 3-5 Tuesday
Race, Ethnicity, and the War on Terror
Naber, Nadine 2008. “Look, Muhammed the Terrorist is Coming?: Cultural Racism, Nation-Based Racism, and the Intersectionality of Oppressions after 9/11” in Amaney Jamal and Nadine Naber, eds. Race and Arab Americans Before and After 9/11: From Invisible Citizens to Visible Subjects. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 276-304
QUIZ #3 ON WEEKS 6-8 Thursday MIDTERM EXAM Week 9: March 10-12
SPRING BREAK
Week 10: Representing Culture, Representing Race I March 17-19 Tuesday Riggs, Marlon. Ethnic Notions http://aal.ucsd.edu/reserves/dmr/public/films/ethnicnotions.html ASSIGMENT DUE: SUMMARY OF PROGRESS FOR ETHNOGRAPHIC PROJECT Thursday
Jackson, Ronald L. 2006. “Origins of Black Body Politics” and “Scripting the Black Body in Popular Media” in Scripting the Black Masculine Body: Identity, Discourse, and Racial Politics in Popular Media. Albany: State University of New York Press, pp. 1-72.
IN-CLASS ASSIGNMENT: CRITIQUE ETHNOGRAPHIC RESEARCH PAPER Week 11: March 24-26
Representing Culture, Representing Race II
Tuesday “Proud to Be” Video Moreton-Robinson, A. (2004). Whiteness, epistemology and indigenous representation. Whitening Race: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism (1): 75-88. Thursday
Guzmán, Isabel Molina and Valdivia, Angharadn. 2004. Brain, Brow, and Booty: Latina Iconicity in U.S. Popular Culture. The Communication Review 7(2): 205-221.
Week 12: March 31-April 2
Whitening, Lightening, and the Politics of Beauty
Tuesday Film: Dark Girls: A Look At Colorism in the Black Community: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d11vJnqGzyk (WATCH BEFORE CLASS) Badillo, Cassandra “Only My Hairdresser Knows: Stories of Race, Gender and Hair” Rahier, Jean Muteba 1998. Blackness, the Racial/Spatial Order, Migrations, and Miss Ecuador 1995-96. American Anthropologist 100(2): 421-430. Thursday Understandingrace.org: A Girl Like Me Pierre, Jemima 2008. ‘I Like Your Colour!’: Skin Bleaching and Geographies of Race in Urban Ghana. Feminist Review 90: 9-29. ASSIGNMENT DUE: Ethnographic Project: Submit Draft of Methodology Week 13: April 7-9
Race, Ethnicity, and State Sanctioned Violence I
Tuesday QUIZ #4 ON WEEKS 10-12
Video and Discussion: “The Last Nazis: Three Children of the Master Race” (58 minutes) Reading TBA Thursday Film: Children of the Camps (Japanese American internment) Reading TBA Week 14: April 14-16
Race, Ethnicity and State Sanctioned Violence II
Tuesday AAA and ABA Statement Against Police Violence and Anti-Black Practices: http://savageminds.org/2014/12/09/blacklivesmatter-and-aaa2014-die-insection-assembly-motion-and-the-aba-statement-against-police-violenceand-anti-black-practices/
Rocha, Luciane de Oliveira 2012. Black Mothers’ Experience of Violence in Rio de Janeiro. Cultural Dynamics 24(1): 59-73. Thursday Linke, Uli 2010. Fortress Europe: Globalization, Militarization and the Policing of Interior Borderlands. Topia 23-24: 100-120.
Week 15: April 21-23
Student Ethnographic Project Presentations
Week 16: EXAM WEEK April 29-31 FINAL PROJECT DUE ON TUESDAY, APRIL 29th by 11:59PM