Ethnography seminar I/II: Violence, Conflict and Protest in Latin America (758301/758302, 7 op, 10 op)

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Prerequisites

Course participants should have completed their basic studies (perusopinnot) in anthropology.

Compensations

Ethnography seminar I/II (758301/758302, 7/10 op)

Target group/Course level

This course is meant only for students for whom anthropology is either their major or minor field of study. If the number of students registered for the course exceeds 20, priority is given to the former.

Content

This course focuses on violence, conflict and protest in Latin America. We will discuss different forms of violence in Latin American societies, and seek to understand their social, cultural and political causes and implications. We will also scrutinize how violence and conflict can and have been studied by anthropologists. Each class will focus on a different ethnographic case/context (9 cases altogether). These cases have been chosen so as to enable us to cover a wide range of interrelated theoretical issues. We will discuss the relationships between violence and culture (in the example of the Yanomamös of Venezuela), violence by the state (the Mayas of Guatemala) and violence against the state (the Shining Path in Peru), violence due to and protests against globalization and the world economy (coca growers of Bolivia, the EZLN in Chiapas, the Kayapos of Brazil). We also look at links between poverty and everyday violence at the grassroots level (street-children in Brazil, “maras”/gangs of El Salvador), as well as the relationships between violence, trauma and memory (the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo in Argentina).

Completion

Each class consists of a short lecture, video, and student discussions. All course participants are expected to read the required readings for each class, participate actively in seminar discussions, submit a number of “reflection papers” based on weekly readings, and write a final research paper. The number of “reflection papers” to be submitted and the length of the final research paper are different for Ethnography Seminar I and II.