Type of course

Admission requirements

RECOMMENDED PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE:

SVF-3101 Approaching social realities: Understanding other people's life-worlds, SVF-3102 Conveying social realities: Exploring audio-visual narrative strategies and SVF- 3108 Qualitative research methods and audio-visual approaches

Course content

The course will give students an overview of anthropological theory and epistemological issues in the social sciences, forming a background and theoretical foundation to their writing of a project description in which they identify research questions which are feasible and manageable within the limits of the fieldwork. It also implies clarifying how the research questions are related to existing literature. Regional ethnographic literature, social science literature addressing the topic of research, and social science theory in general should be used.

Apart from lectures, the course consists of seminars in which the students` project descriptions for the master`s research project are further developed.  

Recommended prerequisites

Objectives of the course

Students who successfully complete this course should have achieved the following learning outcomes:

Knowledge

• know how to prepare and present a social scientific research project
• have solid knowledge of literature relevant to their Master¿s project, thematically.
• know what differentiates a research problematic from everyday problematic
• know how to prepare and present a film project

Skills

• be able to develop manageable research questions, and methodological and theoretical approaches for their master¿s project, and the chosen field of research.
• assess how their personal commitment relates to the chosen project.
• be able to demonstrate how the camera is going to be used in discovery of the cultural conventions of their research partners
• be able to demonstrate how they are going to create a film narrative rooted in their overall project

General competence

• be able to demonstrate how they are going to pursue their objectives and research questions through the choices of research partners and research settings.
• be able to demonstrate how the textual  and filmic representations are going to be related to each other.
• be able to identify and discuss the relevance of their project to; research partners, cultural diversity globally, development of methodological and theoretical refinement.

Language of instruction and examination

Teaching methods

Assessment

Course attendance is compulsory, i.e. only valid absences will be approved. A minimum presence of 80 % is required.

The course has a portfolio evaluation, and the following is required during the preparation of the individual portfolio.

Students must participate to the safety and security course in the field and submit the risk assessment form.

Students must submit two drafts of their project description.

Students must submit the notification form to NSD.

The final portfolio must include the following:

• Project description for the Master¿s project with a special focus on the formulation and discussion of research question(s) and the theoretical and epistemological context.
• Approved risk assessment form.

Students are not admitted access to camera equipment and allowed to start fieldwork before the project description and the risk assessment are approved.

Marking is made according to a grading scale with ¿pass¿ / ¿fail¿. A re-sit exam will be arranged for this course.

Recommended reading/syllabus

* Emerson, R., Fretz, R. and Shaw,L. (1995) Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago (1-105)

Epistemology:

* Abu-Lughod, L. (1991) Writing Against Culture. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (466-479)

* Appadurai, A, (2000) Grassroots Globalization and the Research Imagination. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (622-633)

Ingold, T. (1992) Culture and the Perception of the Environment. In Croll, E. & D. Parkin (eds.), Bush Base: Forest Farm. Culture, Environment and Development, Routledge, London (39-55).

* Moore, H.L. (2003) Global Anxieties: Concept Metaphors and Pre-theoretical Commitments in Anthropology. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (443-456)

Moore, S.F. (1994) The Ethnography of the Present and the Analysis of Process. In Borofsky, R. (ed.) Assessing Cultural Anthropology. McGraw-Hill, New York. (362-37

Rudie, I. (1994) Making sense of new experience. In Hastrup, K. og Hervik, P. (eds.) Social Experience and Anthropological Knowledge. Routledge, London. (28-44)

* Spiro, M. (1996) Postmodernist Anthropology, Subjectivity, and Science : A Modernist Critique. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (523-536)

Gupta, A. and Ferguson, J. (1997) Discipline and Practice: `The Field¿ as Site, Method, and Location in Anthropology. In Gupta, A. and Ferguson, J. (eds.) Anthropological Locations. Boundaries and Grounds of a Field Science. University of California Press, London. (1-46)

Identity:

@ Goffman, E. (1956) The nature of deference and demeanor. In American Anthropologist. Volume 58, Issue 3, pages 473-502
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/aa.1956.58.3.02a00070/abstract

Jenkins, R. (2004) Social Identity. Routledge, London. (1-37)

Ethnicity:

Barth, F. (1969) Introduction. In F. Barth (ed.) Ethnic groups and Boundaries. Universitetsforlaget, Oslo. (9-38)

Eidheim, H. (1969) When Ethnic Identity becomes a Social Stigma. In F. Barth (ed) Ethnic groups and Boundaries. Universitetsforlaget, Oslo. (39-57)

Banks, M. (1996) Ethnicity: Anthropological Constructions. Routledge, London. (Ch. 1 & 2).(11-48)

Gender:

* Ortner, S. B. (1974) So Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (437-442)

* Oyèrónké, O. (1997) The invention of Women. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (540-545)

Globalization :

* Bourdieu, P. (1977) Structures and Habitus. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (407-41)

Long, N. (2000) Exploring local/global transformations. In Arce, A. and Long, N. (eds.) Anthropology, Development and Modernities. Exploring discourses, counter-tendencies and violence. Routledge, London. (184-201)

Grønhaug, R. (1978) Scale as a Variable in Analysis: Fields in Social Organization in Herat; Northwest Afghanistan. In Scale and Social Organization. Barth, F (ed.) Universitetsforlaget, Oslo (xx)

Grønhaug, R. (1975) Macro Factors in Local Life. Social organization in Antalya, Southern Turkey. Part of Magister dissertation in Social Anthropology, University of Bergen, pp. 1-36

* Wolf, E. R. (1982) Europe and the people without history. In Moore, H.L. and Sanders, T. (eds.) (2006) Anthropology in Theory. Issues in Epistemology. Blackwell Publishing, London. (367-381)

* Books that must be bought (available at Akademisk kvarter). @ Available on internet

Others in the compendium for SVF-3104 (available at Akademisk kvarter).