Anthropology of Art and Material Culture (2025/2026: Semester 2 – Spring)

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Cursusdoel

After completing this course students are able to
  1. demonstrate historically informed knowledge of anthropological approaches to art and material culture;
  2. demonstrate anthropologically- informed knowledge of concepts, approaches and debates concerning art, photography, material culture, the ‘material turn’, and materiality;
  3. describe specific colonial and postcolonial forms of art and material culture, their connection to governing, independence/ emancipation movements, and unfolding histories of modernity;
  4. understand the historical distinctions made between art and material culture, as pan-human phenomena, and specific ways of understanding and interpreting their production, use, exchange, circulation and transformation;
  5. apply scholarly skills of critical reading and preparation of texts combined with rhetorical skills of communication and argumentation, in leading a group discussion;
  6. engage relevant concepts and methods – such as photo elicitation and collaborative image-making – to design and conduct a small ethnographically-informed study of the making/ acquisition/ use/ or disposal of a work of art or material culture.
Assessment connected to learning goals:
First essay 20% (photography, visual methods) : Learning goals 1, 2, 3
Term essay proposal (10%) :Learning goals 1, 6
Term essay 30% (research an art or craft) : Learning goals 1, 2, 5, 6
Final test 20% (concepts, theories, approaches) :Learning goals 1, 2, 3, 4
Weekly blog + 2 x presentations 20% :Learning goals 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Vakinhoudelijk

How is art different from everyday things? And what does this distinction tell us about society and culture? This course examines the relevance of material culture, its making, use and exchange, for understanding cultures and societies. The sliding scale between what is seen as material culture and what is admitted to the category of art has exercised the minds of both anthropologists and art historians throughout the twentieth century, and is still relevant today. Ideas about creating, using, and displaying material culture and art have inspired theory ranging from nineteenth-century social evolutionism all the way to late twentieth-century actor-network theory.

The course addresses the methodological question of what a fine-grained ethnographic approach adds to the understanding of material culture and art. Reading two full-length ethnographies offers an in-depth understanding of such questions as “local” theories of practice, uses of life stories, and multi-sited ethnographies. Students are challenged to research a material culture or art practice of their own choice, drawing and expanding on the course literature, and using it to prepare an interview with a practitioner.

The course cultivates a critical approach to understanding how different forms of material culture and art shape social action and discourses about authenticity, aesthetics, distinction, identity, tradition, modernity, heritage, and citizenship.

Format
Each week there will be one lecture and one class devoted to student-led presentation presentation and discussion, followed up by a blog entry on Blackboard/ Discussion Board:
I. focusing on the week’s readings, and
II. focusing on different aspects of the term essay: concepts, methods, and specific art and material culture practices.
You visit the Afrika Museum, Berg en Dal (Nijmegen), in your own time.

Werkvormen

UCU SSC 2 course

Toetsing

Weekly blog, attendance, participation

Verplicht | Weging 20% | ECTS 1,5

Includes presenting a one paper on methodology and one paper on concepts – connected to course work, to be used in the term essay

Term essay

Verplicht | Weging 30% | ECTS 2,25

3000 - 3500 words - small-scale study of a form of art or material culture (own choice) using relevant approaches and concepts

Term essay proposal

Verplicht | Weging 10% | ECTS 0,75

First essay

Verplicht | Weging 20% | ECTS 1,5

1500 - 2000 words - topic linked to the Strassler book

*midterm FEEDBACK*

Niet verplicht

Take home final test

Verplicht | Weging 20% | ECTS 1,5

Covers the approaches, concepts and cases covered in the course. Three short essays, with choice.

Ingangseisen en voorkennis

Ingangseisen

Er moet voldaan zijn aan de cursus:

Voorkennis

Er is geen informatie over benodigde voorkennis bekend.

Voertalen

  • Engels

Competenties

  • Academisch schrijven
  • Debatteren / discoursanalyse
  • Internationale en interculturele oriëntatie
  • Interdisciplinariteit
  • Kritisch lezen
  • Onderzoeksvaardigheden
  • Presenteren
  • Samenwerken

Cursusmomenten

Gerelateerde studies

Tentamens

Er is geen tentamenrooster beschikbaar voor deze cursus

Verplicht materiaal

  • BOEK
    Probst, P. (2011), Osogbo and the Art of Heritage: Monuments, Deities, and Money. Bloomington: Indiana University Press ISBN: 0253222958 *UU library provides unlimited access to an e-book.
  • BOEK
    Svasek, M. (2007), Anthropology, Art, and Cultural Production. London: Pluto Press. ISBN: 9781783714759 * UU library provides unlimited access to an e-book.
  • DIVERSE
    Visit to the Afrika Museum of the National Museum of World Cultures, Berg en Dal (Nijmegen), in your own time (week 9)

Aanbevolen materiaal

Er is geen informatie over de aanbevolen literatuur bekend

Opmerkingen

Cross-Listed with HUM (Art History/Museum Studies). Counts towards SSC or HUM major.

Coördinator

dr. R. Woets r.woets@uu.nl

Docenten

dr. R. Woets r.woets@uu.nl

Inschrijving

Let op: deze cursus is niet toegankelijk voor studenten van andere faculteiten, bijvakkers mogen zich dus niet inschrijven.

Naar OSIRIS-inschrijvingen
Permanente link naar de cursuspagina
Laat in de Cursus-Catalogus zien