Unit name | Advanced Issues in Archaeology and Anthropology |
---|---|
Unit code | ARCH35013 |
Credit points | 20 |
Level of study | H/6 |
Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
Unit director | Professor. Alex Bentley |
Open unit status | Not open |
Pre-requisites |
None |
Co-requisites |
None |
School/department | Department of Anthropology and Archaeology |
Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
The aim of this unit is to introduce third year students in the Archaeology and Anthropology SH degree programme to advanced issues in Archaeology and Anthropology, with particular emphasis on illustrating how the two disciplines may be combined. The course is both historical, in that it introduces the way that the two disciplines have pursued parallel, but often intersecting paths over the last century, and also thematic, in that it demonstrates the way that these themes may be considered through specific examples, such as the study of the body; material culture; heritage and nationalism; kinship and genetics; societal organisation and the emergence of states.
Aims:
At the end of the unit, a successful student will be able to:
1) Discuss the recent history of both archaeology and anthropology, and areas where they may overlap.
2) Identify key thinkers and a number of cases which bring the disciplines together.
3) Analyse current trends in data collection and analysis (including those dependant upon technological advancement), and the implications that these recent developments may have for the way that the disciplines may come together.
4)Conceptualise and articulate these issues with reference to the current, and possible future practise of the discipline.
Course will be taught through lectures (10) and seminars (10), making 20 hours contact time in all.
One 3000 word essay (50%). Assesses ILOs 1-4
One 2 hour written examinsation (50%). Assesses ILOs 1, 3 and 4.
Antiquity (1998) On Clarke's 'Archaeology: the loss of innocence' (1973) 25 years after Antiquity 72, Issue 277.
Bentley, R. A. (2013). Mobility and the diversity of Early Neolithic lives. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, in press.
Bentley, R. A. and Maschner, H. D. G. (2007) Complexity theory. In (R.A Bentley et al., eds) Handbook of Archaeological Theories: 245-268. AltaMira Press.
Fortunato, L. and Jordan, F. (2010). Your place or mind? Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society 365:3913-3922.
Hayden, B. (1996). Feasting in prehistoric and traditional societies. In (P. Wiessner and W. Schiefenhovel, eds) Food and the Status Quest, pp.127-147. Berghahn.
Hodos, T. (2009). Colonial Engagements in the Global Mediterranean Iron Age. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 19.2: 221-241.
Monroe, J. C (2011). Urbanisation on West Africa's Slave Coast. American Scientist 99: 400-409.