Postgraduate Course: Southeast Asia (PGSP11044)
Course Outline
| School | School of Social and Political Science |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Course type | Standard |
Availability | Available to all students |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Credits | 20 |
| Home subject area | Postgrad (School of Social and Political Studies) |
Other subject area | None |
| Course website |
None |
Taught in Gaelic? | No |
| Course description | Southeast Asia has often been characterised by anthropologists and historians as a region of great cultural diversity, but it also appears to have an underlying cultural unity. The themes of diversity and unity can be discerned through the lens of some classic topics of anthropological analysis across the region - including ecology, religion, kinship, and politics. Through careful readings of classic and contemporary ethnographies of Southeast Asia together with films and fictional writing, this course will consider both locally salient social issues and the changing anthropological engagement with Southeast Asia over time. |
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
|
Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
| Additional Costs | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| Displayed in Visiting Students Prospectus? | Yes |
Course Delivery Information
|
| Delivery period: 2011/12 Semester 2, Available to all students (SV1)
|
WebCT enabled: Yes |
Quota: None |
| Location |
Activity |
Description |
Weeks |
Monday |
Tuesday |
Wednesday |
Thursday |
Friday |
| Central | Lecture | Seminar Room 6, Chrystal Macmillan Building | 1-11 | | | | 14:00 - 15:50 | |
| First Class |
First class information not currently available |
| No Exam Information |
Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes
The overall aims of the course can be summarized as follows:
- to contribute to preparing students to participate in an effective and informed way in debates regarding the history and cultures of Southeast Asia, issues regarding regional cultural difference, and the relation between the anthropology of Southeast Asia and the work of social anthropology more generally;
- to enable students to identify and characterise key approaches from social anthropology, from other social science disciplines, and from some interdisciplinary materials such as films and novels in understanding and evaluating issues concerning Southeast Asia;
- to allow for critical evaluation of contributions to academic and public debates regarding regional issues and make links between Southeast Asia and the wider world;
- to make it possible for students to identify and evaluate a selection of approaches and debates within the anthropology of Southeast Asia. |
Assessment Information
| The course will be assessed by a single essay (word-limit: 4,000). |
Special Arrangements
| None |
Additional Information
| Academic description |
Not entered |
| Syllabus |
Course Outline: Indicative Topics
Introduction to Southeast Asia as a region
Agriculture and economy
Power and politics
Colonial Encounters
Religion
Kinship, the person, and the everyday
Violence and warfare
Law and ethics
The urban and other emergent forms of life |
| Transferable skills |
Not entered |
| Reading list |
Indicative Readings
Richard Baxstrom 2008 Houses in Motion: The Experience of Place and the Problem of Belief in Urban Malaysia. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Andrew Beatty 1999 Varieties of Javanese Religion: An Anthropological Account. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Fenella Cannell 1999 Power and Intimacy in the Christian Philippines. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Janet Carsten 1997 The Heat of the Hearth: The Process of Kinship in a Malay Fishing Community. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Clifford Geertz 1960 The Religion of Java. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Clifford Geertz 1963 Agricultural Involution: The Procesess of Ecological Change in Indonesia. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Thomas Gibson 1986 Sacrifice and Sharing in the Philippine Highlands. London: Athlone Press.
Janet Hoskins 1998 Biographical Objects: How Things Tell the Stories of People's Lives. New York: Routledge.
Edmund Leach 1964 [1954] Political Systems of Highland Burma: A Study of Kachin Social Structure. London: Athlone Press.
James C. Scott 2009 The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. New Haven and London; Yale University Press
James Siegel (1986) Solo in the New Order. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Mary Margaret Steedly 1993 Hanging without a Rope: Narrative Experience in Colonial and Postcolonial Karoland. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. |
| Study Abroad |
Not entered |
| Study Pattern |
This course will be taught through a combination of short lectures delivered by the course conveners and invited guest lecturers and smaller in-class discussion led by the conveners. Meetings will take place weekly and will last for two hours. In addition, there will be fortnightly one-hour tutorials led by one of the conveners. |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Prof Janet Carsten
Tel: (0131 6)50 3935
Email: J.Carsten@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Ms Clare Nisbet
Tel:
Email: Clare.Nisbet@ed.ac.uk |
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© Copyright 2011 The University of Edinburgh - 16 January 2012 6:36 am
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