SOAN 291 - Special Topics in Anthropology

Credits: 3-4

Spring 2022, SOAN 291A-01: Special Topics in Anthropology: Ethnohistory of W&L’s Past (3). In this course we will apply interdisciplinary methods to study four centuries of W&L material culture and historic records. These items will be used to uncover overlooked stories about W&L founders, its evolving curriculum, and the historic campus. During the term we will visit multiple collections of art, ceramics, artifacts, and documents on campus. We will also explore on and off-campus historic landscapes, including local graveyards. Students will synthesize this material and produce several deliverables: (1) three essays (worth 10% each), (2) a poster for the Spring Term Showcase that analyzes the past social networks of our community (worth 20%), and (3) ten assignments (worth a total of 30%) on a range of ethno-historic topics. The final 20% of your grade will be based on participatory activities during class. Rainville.

Spring 2022, SOAN 291B-02: Special Topics in Anthropology: Social Media Analytics (3). In this course, students will learn a number of analytics tools that can be used to leverage social media data, with an emphasis on using these data to examine anthropological questions.  In particular, the course will introduce tools such as sentiment analysis, topic modeling, and social network analysis, implementing these in Python, and will include a number of hands-on exercises.  No previous exposure to Python is assumed.  We will use these tools to explore questions about topics like public opinion about migration, pandemics, and politics of race and gender. Dogan.

Spring 2022, SOAN 291C-01: Special Topics in Anthropology: Indigenous Healing Systems and the Lakotas (3). Despite radical differences in theory and procedure, the diagnosis and treatment of illnesses are human cultural universals. In this seminar we will first overview the various types of medical anthropology that describe and analyze the cross-cultural healing systems found throughout the world. We will next investigate the variations in beliefs that different human communities hold concerning the causation (etiology) of illnesses. With this as our background we will begin our examination of the Lakotas’ (Western “Sioux”) medical system, commencing with the spiritual foundations upon which its ideas and practices of curing rest. The traditional ceremonies through which Lakotas have sought and continue to seek curing will be our next subject, and will entail descriptions of how these rites are performed and the types of healers who carry them out. The seminar will close by probing the complicated history of biomedicine among the Lakotas and some of the reasons behind these difficulties. Markowitz.