36 courses with the subject ANT, each shown exactly as we captured it from the college's catalog, with every element we hold. Where the wording looks broken, that is our reading of the catalog, not the college's text.
ANT 130Introduction to Cultural Anthropology4
What does it mean to be human? What is culture, and how does it shape the way humans see the world? Why are some forms of cultural difference tolerated, while others are not? As the holistic study of the human experience, cultural anthropology addresses these questions in a world shaped by human migration, climate change, capitalist extraction and global inequality. This course provides an overview of the discipline’s history, its distinctive method of ethnography and the breadth of topics it addresses, including public health, race, the environment, gender, language, nationalism, software design, the body, music, cities, government and more. Restrictions: First-years and sophomores only. Enrollment limited to 25. {S}
ANT 200Colloquium: Research Methods in Anthropology4
This course introduces students to the variety of methods of inquiry used for research in anthropology. Throughout the semester, students are introduced to methods of locating and analyzing information and sources, developing research questions and writing. Normally taken in the sophomore or junior year. Prerequisite: ANT 130. Restrictions: Anthropology majors only. Enrollment limited to 20. Instructor permission required. {S}
There are many ways to love plants. Home gardeners design with them, healers study their properties to treat patients with them, field botanists learn ornate vocabularies to identify them, poets sound their symbolic depths. What do these different forms of botanophilia say about the human condition and its interspecies intimacies? Living amidst our planet’s sixth mass extinction event, more botanophilia is needed and needed yesterday. Putting love, joy and community forward as urgent political affairs, this course asks how students might go about cultivating plant love for earthly survival. {S}
ANT 221Global Archaeology: Method, Theory, and Practice4
This course features case studies from across the globe to explore the diversity of theoretical approaches to studying the past, the field, and lab methods used to analyze material culture, and the ethical considerations of archaeological practice. Students develop a solid foundation for evaluating and contextualizing archaeological research using insights from the humanities, social sciences, and STEM fields. Discussions of global archaeological practice address the roles and responsibilities of archaeologists in global heritage management, museum development, collaborative research with stakeholder groups, and public outreach.
This course surveys the social and cultural contexts of languages throughout the world. It examines the ways in which a human language reflects the ways of life and beliefs of its speakers, contrasted with the extent of language's influence on culture. The course focuses on topics such as identity, social factors of language use, language vitality, language politics and issues of globalization. Each language is a repository of history and knowledge, as well as the culture, of a group of speakers. Languages and cultures from around the world are discussed, with special focus on endangered languages. Enrollment limited to 40. {S}
This course explores (1) how and why humans across the globe began to domesticate plant and animal resources approximately 10,000 years ago, and (2) new directions in the archaeology of food across time and space. The first part of the semester focuses on the types of archaeological data and analytical methods used to understand the agricultural revolution. Case studies from both centers and noncenters of domestication are used to investigate the biological, economic and social implications of changing foodways. During the remainder of the semester, emphasis is placed on exploring a number of food-related topics within archaeology, such as the relationship between agriculture and sedentism, food and gender, the politics of feasting, and methods for integrating archaeological and ethnographic approaches to the study of food across the globe. Enrollment limited to 30. {S}
In Western discourses, African environments are defined by violence, famine and degradation. These characteristics are depicted as symptoms of an African resistance to Western values such as private property, democracy and environmentalism. This course encourages students to think critically about such portrayals by learning about specific environments in Africa and how humans have interacted with them across time. The syllabus is anchored in cultural anthropology, but includes units on human evolution, the origins and spread of pastoralism, the history of colonial conservation science and more. Discussions covered include gender, race, land grabbing, indigenous knowledge, the commons, the cattle complex, desertification, oil, dams and nationalism. {H}{N}{S}
This course reviews the major theoretical approaches and directions in cultural anthropology from the late 19th century to the present. These approaches include social organization and individual agency; adaptation and evolution of human culture; culture and personality, economic behavior, human ecology; the anthropology of development and change; and postmodern interpretation. The works of major anthropologists are explored, including Franz Boas, Bronislaw Malinowski, Margaret Mead, Evans-Pritchard, Claude Levi-Strauss, Marvin Harris, Eric Wolf, Clifford Geertz, Sherry Ortner and others. Prerequisite: ANT 130 or equivalent. Restrictions: Not open to first-years. {S}
This course is a general introduction to anthropological analysis of politics and the political. Through a broad survey of anthropological texts and theories, this course explores what an ethnographic perspective can offer to the understandings of power and government. Special emphasis is placed on the role of culture, symbols and social networks in the political life of local communities. Examples are drawn from a number of case studies in Africa, East Asia, Latin America and the United States, and range in scale from studies of local politics in small-scale societies to analyses of nationalism and political performance in modern nation-states. Enrollment limited to 30. {S}
What is a species? Where do species belong? These questions are central to nature conservation, and answering them has profound implications. For a few hundred million years since the supercontinent Pangea split, movement between continents was severely restricted. In just a few centuries, these oceanic barriers were all but erased by intercontinental trade and travel. Ecologists deem this reconnected world “New Pangea,” fearing that nonnative organisms might displace native ones, but anthropologists have long shown that belonging is rarely binary. This course contends that the moment demands interdisciplinary scrutiny to understand the politics of inclusion in the cosmopolitan multispecies communities. Corequisite: ANT 236L. Restrictions: Not open to first-years. Enrollment limited to 18. {N}{S}
A laboratory designed to facilitate student exploration of how species are defined and where they belong. Focus is on weedy plants from Earth’s most diverse and cosmopolitan plant family, the Compositae, beginning with the common dandelion. Students gain experience learning technical and descriptive skills from botany as well as critical thinking skills from the humanities and social sciences to interpret geographic patterns of diversity in a world of profound human disturbance. Activities include plant dissection under stereoscopes, fieldtrips to observe and collect plants, researching plant geographic histories, drawing and describing plants, writing a taxonomic description, and mounting herbarium specimens. Corequisite: ANT 236. Restrictions: Not open to first-years. Enrollment limited to 18. {N}{S}
ANT 237Monuments, Materials and Models: The Archaeology of South America4
This course offers an overview of the archaeology of South America, from the earliest traces of human occupation over 10,000 years ago to the material culture of the present. The course focuses on how archaeologists use data collected during settlement surveys, site excavations and artifact analysis to reconstruct households and foodways, social and political organization, and ritual and identity over the millennia. Discussions also include the relevance of the past in contemporary indigenous rights movements, heritage management strategies and nationalist projects. {N}{S}
Anthropology vitally understands bodies as socially meaningful, and as sites for the inculcation of ethical and political identities through processes of embodiment, which break down divides between body as natural and body as socially constituted. This course engages these anthropological understandings to read how bodies are invoked, disciplined and reshaped in prisons and classrooms, market economies and multicultural democracies, religious and ethical movements, and the performance of gender and sexuality, disease and disability. Through these accounts of the body as an object of social analysis and as a vehicle for politics, students learn fundamental social theoretical and anthropological tenets about the embodiment of power, contemporary politics as forms of "biopolitics" and the deconstruction of the normative body. {S}
Museums are dynamic sites of collecting, conserving, analyzing, interpreting, and displaying cultural objects, both ancient and contemporary. This course uses insights from cultural anthropology, archaeology, and heritage studies to explore the history of museums, their diverse formats and audiences, the ethical and legal frameworks guiding their operations, and ongoing debates about their roles as sites of cultural contact, conflict, reconciliation, and restitution. Students gain hands-on experience working with Five College museum collections–primarily archaeological materials from Latin America–and visit other area museums during the semester. Enrollment limited to 30. {S}
ANT 242Cook, Drink and Eat: The Anthropology of Food4
Drawing on a holistic, multidisciplinary perspective, this course considers food as a lens through which to examine issues of identity such as gender, family, community, nationality, religion and class. Food and drink are further considered in terms of how they sustain human life. The class explores the journey of food production, preparation, distribution and consumption as well as food scarcity, security and sovereignty. Local, national and global networks are examined in an attempt to better understand the cultural and nutritional importance of food and the role it plays in socioeconomic and political relationships. Ethnographic research is conducted in the local community. {S}
ANT 247History of Race Science and Scientific Racism4
Today there is a consensus in physical anthropology that there is no conclusive biological basis to the groupings commonly referred to as “races.” That is, “racial” categories are constituted socially, and naturalized through different cultural processes. However, anthropology has also been part of a long history of seeking biological bases for racial difference, and of using these supposed biological bases to justify different hierarchies and forms of exploitation. This course surveys some of the key moments of this history, focusing on how different “scientific” theories of race have impacted the lives of marginalized groups. Special emphasis is placed on how traces of these older, debunked theories of race continue to emerge in ways that impact public discourse. {H}{S}
This course looks at the cultural construction of illness by examining systems of diagnosis, classification, and therapy in both non-Western and Western societies. Special attention is given to the role of the traditional healer, the anthropological contribution to international health care, and the training of physicians in the United States. Restrictions: Not open to first-years. Enrollment limited to 30. {N}{S}
This course considers the city as both a setting for anthropological research and as an ethnographic object of study in itself. The class aims to think critically about the theoretical and methodological possibilities, challenges and limitations that are posed by urban anthropology. Students consider concepts and themes such as urbanization and migration; urban space and mobility; gender, race and ethnicity; technology and virtual space; markets and economies; citizenship and belonging; and production and consumption. Enrollment limited to 40. {S}
ANT 269Indigenous Cultures and the State in Mesoamerica4
This course is a general introduction to the relationship between indigenous societies and the state in Mesoamerica. Taking a broad historical perspective, the course explores the rise of native state-level societies, the transformations that marked the process of European colonization, and the relationship of local indigenous communities to post-colonial states and transnational social movements. Texts used in the course place special emphasis on continuities and changes in language, social organization, cosmology, and identity that have marked the historical experience of native groups in the region. {S}
What can anthropologists teach us about religion as a social phenomenon? This course traces significant anthropological approaches to the study of religion, asking what these approaches contribute to our understanding of religion in the contemporary world. Topics include religious experience and rationality; myth, ritual and magic; rites of passage; function and meaning; power and alienation; religion and politics. Readings are drawn from important texts in the history of anthropology and from contemporary ethnographies of religion. {S}
ANT 282Living with AI: An Anthropology of Intelligent Machines4
What does it mean to be human in an age of intelligent machines? This course explores the social, cultural, and political life of AI through an anthropological lens, examining how these systems shape everyday experience across work, science, culture, and politics. The course also asks who builds them, who profits, and who bears their costs. Through speculative experiments, students examine weekly sites where AI reflects the political moment, engaging key concepts and treating AI tools as objects of study. Together, students ask how AI is reshaping the way humans think, feel, create, and relate, and how anthropology helps to make sense of it. Enrollment limited to 30. (E) {S}
This course harnesses students’ current and previous coursework to address a real life ethnographic design problem. Working in conjunction with students enrolled in ANT 200, students help to design and carry out a qualitative research project led by an anthropology faculty member and gain insight into anthropology’s practical applications. Students are expected to take leadership roles, think creatively and concretely, work well collaboratively and see projects through to completion. Enrollment limited to 10. Instructor permission required.
ANT 317Seminar: The Air We Breathe--An Anthropology of Atmosphere4
From air pollution to atmospheric carbon, from extreme weather events to respiratory viruses, the earth's atmosphere is currently intensely palpable. While these topics are typically the purview of natural scientists, they are also cultural phenomena worthy of anthropological exploration. This seminar explores this contemporary atmospheric moment while situating it in a historical context with readings that provide a multidisciplinary perspective traversing the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Readings draw from anthropology, the history of science, literary studies, climate science, botany, and more. Discussions include wind, breathing, evapotranspiration, climate change, and utopia. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {N}{S}
ANT 333Calderwood Seminar: Topics in Public Writing4
Cannot be taken S/U. Prerequisites: One ANT course. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only; Anthropology majors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required.
ANT 333MDCalderwood Seminar: Topics in Public Writing-When Life Becomes a Diagnosis: Medicalization and Its Discontents4
Medicalization refers to the process through which behaviors, emotions, and social problems come to be framed and treated as medical conditions. From ADHD and depression to menopause, addiction, obesity, and risk factors such as high cholesterol, medicine increasingly shapes how everyday life is understood. This Calderwood Seminar explores how anthropologists analyze these processes and trains students to translate anthropological insights about medicine and society for public audiences. Cannot be taken S/U. Prerequisites: One ANT course. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only; Anthropology majors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {N}{S}
ANT 340AFSeminar: Topics in Anthropology- Anthropology of the Future4
In a landscape transformed by the pandemic, climate change, tightening borders, surveillance, and artificial intelligence technologies, what form will anthropology assume and what role will it play in the near future? This course focuses on three major forces – health, climate change, and technology – to show how the discipline is being transformed by them. The course also examines how anthropology is responding by treading a delicate balance between domestic and international issues and specialist knowledge and non-specialist audiences in these domains to rearticulate its relevance for future societies. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {S}
ANT 340ETSeminar: Topics in Anthropology-Ethnographic Writing4
Anthropological writing must convey the life-worlds of people and the textures of ethnographic encounters and fieldwork, and refine anthropological theories. How can writing do all of this at once? And as this course crafts a narrative, what does it leave out? Is ethnographic “reality” really described or are anthropological fictions created? Why then does this class look to ethnographic accounts to understand societies and cultures? Anthropological writing has dealt with these questions and more since its inception, but most profoundly since the 1980s. Students read pieces that reflect on and innovate with writing as anthropological praxis, and related issues of fact versus fiction, the politics of representation, narrative style, writing as a form of political action and the role of theory in the creation of knowledge. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {S}
ANT 347PPSeminar: Topics in Anthropology-Pondering Pottery4
Pottery, both fragments and whole vessels, is ubiquitous in the archaeological record and provides insights into technological choices, shifting styles, food-related practices, economic relationships and many other aspects of past lifeways. This course focuses on how archaeologists collect, analyze, interpret and present information about pottery from diverse contexts across the globe. Students have the opportunity to conduct independent research on fragmentary and complete pottery vessels, and they also utilize ethnographic and historical studies of potters to expand the understanding of these practices today. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {S}
ANT 352EUSeminar: Topics in Anthropology-Eugenics at Smith College4
This course is a research seminar based on the history of the eugenics movement and other forms of racial pseudo-science in the United States. After completing some general readings on the history of American eugenics, students develop individual research projects based on the rise, decline and lingering impacts of the movement. The focus in developing these projects is on materials stored in the Smith College Archives, which range from the papers of Harris Hawthorne Wilder, Morris Steggerda and other faculty who were involved in eugenics research to ephemeral materials that document the participation of Smith students in this research from the 1910s to the late 1930s. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only; ANT 352 may be repeated once with a different topic. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {S}
ANT 352MPSeminar: Topics in Anthropology-Moral Panics4
Broadly defined, the term “moral panic” refers to a state of collective dread regarding forces that threaten to undermine collective values and well-being. Fears of witchcraft in the 17th and 18th centuries, beliefs in widespread Masonic conspiracies in the 19th century, and general paranoia about Communist subversion in the post-World War II era all had significant impacts on the course of modern history. Taking a comparative anthropological perspective, this seminar explores the cultural dynamics of moral panic, from its roots in shared beliefs and values, to the “moral entrepreneurs” who promote a particular subversion narratives, to the impacts that the ensuing panic has on different sectors within society. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only; ANT 352 may be repeated once with a different topic. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {S}
ANT 353CCSeminar: Topics in Anthropology-Cannabis as Catalyst4
Once maligned as a dangerous "gateway drug" and as a troubling sign of social decay, cannabis is increasingly regarded as a potent and future-focused remedy for a range of medical and social ills. This course considers this rapid and dramatic cultural, legal and political transformation and what it has to teach us about much broader social shifts and tensions. The study of cannabis is a starting point for thinking about a variety of crucial anthropological topics, including human-plant relations, legality and illegality, race and (in)justice, pharmaceuticals and botanical treatments, kinship and care, science and expertise, and disability activism. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {S}
ANT 353DDSeminar: Topics in Anthropology-Disability and Difference4
Disability is both a universal human reality and a profoundly embodied, contested and situated experience. This course explores this tension from a range of methodological and theoretical perspectives, with an emphasis on innovative ethnographic work. The approach is insistently transnational and intersectional, taking into account how disabled selves and communities are shaped by geographical and historical context, racial and ethnic identity, class background, gender and sexuality. The course considers concepts and themes such as embodiment, citizenship and belonging, access and visibility, creativity, medicalization and diagnosis, politics and advocacy, and virtuality and technology. Restrictions: Juniors and seniors only. Enrollment limited to 12. Instructor permission required. {S}
