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Greetings Dear Students,
This is to welcome you to the fifth year and the module ARC 5164-Urban Anthropology. The module examines urban life at different times and places. It is a cross-cultural study of urbanization and human problems associated with it, especially in urban environments. As more of the world’s population settles in cities, the sites of anthropologists have increasingly shifted from rural to urban settings. The goal of the course in this class year is to investigate cities and their socio-cultural experiences and practices of urban dwellers in relation to the larger socio-economic and cultural contexts and questioning how thesis students can better represent the life worlds of urban dwellers and what anthropological insights and methods could contribute to a deeper understanding of the urban phenomena linked to their research projects. Major emphasis is given to the ethnography of city life and its relationship to the practical applications of urban research that the thesis students will be undertaking this year. Using literary works, ethnographies and case studies of African cities, the course hopes to present coherent and readable syntheses of theory, methods, and analysis of various urban issues and experiences of urban life.
Learning Objectives:
1. To learn basic anthropological approaches, concepts, issues, and perspectives of urban anthropology and the role of cities as social, economic and cultural nodes
2. To learn how to use anthropological research methods to describe, explain, and propose recommendations for solving urban problems.
3. To unpack outstanding examples of recent ethnographies of urban life and culture, for analyzing sociological conditions in relation to life in cities- examples from African cities.
4. To learn how to communicate ideas clearly through short written responses, write well-organized, well-developed essays and oral presentations that reflect appropriate use of language and technology.
5. To demonstrate how knowledge gained from 1,2,3,4 can be applied to generate architectural design interventions for students’ ongoing thesis projects
Course Instructor:
Dr. Josephine Malonza