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DEGREE REGULATIONS & PROGRAMMES OF STUDY 2013/2014
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DRPS : Course Catalogue : School of Social and Political Science : Social Anthropology

Undergraduate Course: Ethnography of the USA (SCAN10059)

Course Outline
SchoolSchool of Social and Political Science CollegeCollege of Humanities and Social Science
Course typeStandard AvailabilityAvailable to all students
Credit level (Normal year taken)SCQF Level 10 (Year 3 Undergraduate) Credits20
Home subject areaSocial Anthropology Other subject areaNone
Course website http://www.sps.ed.ac.uk/undergrad/subject_and_programme_specific_information/social_anthropology/honours Taught in Gaelic?No
Course descriptionNorth America as an anthropological region is marked by diversity, not simply from the First Nations indigenous inhabitants, but from the settler societies that have been arriving in waves for now over five hundred years. Despite this seemingly fractured and fractious constitution, early sociological writings by authors such as Weber and Alexis de Tocqueville emphasized modes of constructing collective sociality through a host of associations, organizations, and denominations.

This balance of centripetal and centrifugal forces, always tested, has been given particular shocks during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. During that time accelerations in the flow of capital, shifts in the inter- and intra-American circuits of human movement, new technological capacities, and religious revivals and mutations all catalyzed each other, transforming some modes of sociality, while intensifying others. And this concatenation of forces has had effects that have played out well beyond the North American borders.

This course will attempt to trace out this phenomenon, using the above-mentioned four aspects (capital flows; population movement; technology; and religious change) as unifying thematics to guide the selections from the series of ethnographic texts that will be covered.
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites Co-requisites
Prohibited Combinations Other requirements None
Additional Costs None
Information for Visiting Students
Pre-requisitesVisiting students should have at least 3 Anthropology courses at grade B or above (or be predicted to obtain this). We will only consider University/College level courses.
Displayed in Visiting Students Prospectus?Yes
Course Delivery Information
Delivery period: 2013/14 Semester 1, Available to all students (SV1) Learn enabled:  Yes Quota:  None
Web Timetable Web Timetable
Course Start Date 16/09/2013
Breakdown of Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) Total Hours: 200 ( Lecture Hours 20, Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4, Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours 176 )
Additional Notes
Breakdown of Assessment Methods (Further Info) Written Exam 0 %, Coursework 100 %, Practical Exam 0 %
No Exam Information
Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course students should have extensive and specialist knowledge of the ethnography of the United States of America, of the current set of debates animating this sub-field, and of the methodology and the evidential and representational conventions found in contemporary American ethnography as a subfield.
Assessment Information
This course will be assessed by a combination of (i) a short essay (word-limit: 1,500) and (ii) a long essay (word-limit: 2,500).

The short essay carries a weighting of 20% towards the final overall mark for the course as a whole, and the long essay carries a weighting of 80%.
Special Arrangements
None
Additional Information
Academic description Not entered
Syllabus Not entered
Transferable skills Not entered
Reading list Not entered
Study Abroad Not entered
Study Pattern Not entered
KeywordsNot entered
Contacts
Course organiserDr Jon Bialecki
Tel: (0131 6)51 5534
Email: Jon.Bialecki@ed.ac.uk
Course secretaryMr Ewen Miller
Tel: (0131 6)50 3925
Email: Ewen.Miller@ed.ac.uk
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