DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY
4229 Social Science
Plaza B; (949) 824-7602
Bill Maurer, Department Chair
Anthropology is the comparative study of past and present human societies and cultures. The Department of Anthropology at UCI is at the forefront of addressing issues in contemporary theory and ethnographic methods within the discipline. The Department has a strong interdisciplinary bent, with research and teaching interests in economic anthropology, political and legal anthropology, the anthropology of finance, social history and social change, the anthropology of science, technology and medicine, identity and ethnicity, gender and feminist studies, urban anthropology, modernity and development, religion, visual anthropology, and the arts and expressive culture. The Department also has a strong emphasis on the study of contemporary issues, especially those concerned with emergent, fluid, and complex global phenomena such as international flows of goods, peoples, images, and ideas; the relationship between global processes and local practices; immigration, citizenship, and refugees; population politics; violence and political conflict; ethnicity and nationalism; gender and family; food, health, and technological innovation; law; development and economic transformation; urban studies; and environmental issues. Geographic regions of expertise include China, Southeast Asia, South Asia, Oceania, Europe, Latin America, the Caribbean, East Africa, Latino communities of the United States, and diasporic and transnational communities in the United States and abroad.
REQUIREMENTS FOR THE BACHELOR'S DEGREE
University Requirements: See pages 57-62.
School Requirements: See page 452.
Departmental Requirements for the Major
School requirements must be met and must include 12 courses (48 units) as specified below:
A. Anthropology 2A.
B. Anthropology 2B, 2C, or 2D.
C. Anthropology 30A or 30B.
D. Three topical courses (12 units) from Anthropology 120-159, 170-179).
E. Two courses (eight units) on a geographical area, from Anthropology 160-169.
F. Four additional elective courses (16 units) from Anthropology 30A, 30B, 40-179, 180A.
Students are strongly encouraged to take Anthropology 180A after they have had at least three courses beyond Anthropology 2A and 2B, 2C, or 2D. Students are also strongly encouraged to take both Anthropology 30A and 30B.
The faculty encourages Anthropology majors or minors to study abroad and experience a different culture while making progress toward degree objectives. The Center for International Education, which includes the Education Abroad Program (EAP) and the International Opportunities Program (IOP), assists students in taking advantage of many worldwide opportunities. For example, EAP offers excellent opportunities to study anthropology at many universities abroad; courses taken abroad can be used to fulfill departmental requirement C, D, and E. Study abroad also can provide opportunities for cross-cultural experience, field research, and foreign language training. The Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP) provides funding for independent field research. See the Center for International Education and the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program sections of the Catalogue for additional information.
Honors Program in Anthropology
The Honors Program in Anthropology is designed to allow undergraduates to pursue field research and write an honors thesis on topics of their choice under the guidance of Department of Anthropology faculty members. Research projects typically involve a combination of library research, exploratory ethnographic interviews, participant observation, and systematic data collection and analysis. The program is open to all senior Anthropology majors with a grade point average of 3.3 or better overall, with 3.5 in Anthropology courses (at least five courses). Successful completion of the Honors Program and the honors thesis satisfies the upper-division writing requirement. Students must apply to be admitted into the Honors Program. The application form is available on the Departmental Web site (http://www.anthro.uci.edu); in the Department office (SSPB 4229); and in the School of Social Sciences Counseling Office (SST 370D).
Although course work for the Honors Program does not start until the senior year, it is highly recommended that during the spring quarter of the junior year, students find a professor willing to serve as their research project advisor on the basis of a mutually acceptable abstract that indicates the goal and significance of their project. If extensive research is to be undertaken at this time, students enroll in Anthropology 199.
During the fall quarter of the senior year, students enroll in Anthropology H190A and write a proposal describing their research question, the relevant background literature, and the method of data collection and analysis. Field work for the project may begin during this quarter.
In the winter quarter of the senior year, students begin or continue ethnographic field research by enrolling in Anthropology H190B. Field research typically combines exploratory field research with fixed format data collection methods.
In the spring of the senior year, students enroll in Anthropology H191 and complete a senior honor thesis that is typically 40 to 80 pages long. Honor theses are read and evaluated by the advisor and the Undergraduate Program Director.
Anthropology Minor Requirements
Requirements for the minor in Anthropology are met by taking seven Anthropology courses (28 units) as specified below:
A. Anthropology 2A.
B. Anthropology 2B, 2C, or 2D.
C. Anthropology 30A or 30B.
D. Two topical courses (eight units) from Anthropology 120-159, 170-179).
E. Two courses (eight units) on a geographical area, from Anthropology 160-169.
Medical Anthropology Minor Requirements
Requirements for the minor in Medical Anthropology are met by taking seven Anthropology courses (28 units) as specified below:
A. Anthropology 2A.
B. Anthropology 2B, 2C, or 2D.
C. Anthropology 30A or 30B.
D. Anthropology 134A.
E. Three topical courses (12 units) from among the following: Anthropology 121D, 128B, 133A, 134D, 134E, 134G, 136K; Anthropology 129, 139 (special topics, by petition to the Undergraduate Director); Sociology 154.
Residence Requirement for the Minor: The four required upper-division courses must be completed successfully at UCI. Two of the four may be taken through the UC Education Abroad Program provided course content is approved in advance by the Undergraduate Director of the Department of Anthropology.
NOTE: Students may complete only one of the following programs: the major in Anthropology, the minor in Anthropology, or the minor in Medical Anthropology.
Interdisciplinary Minor in Archaeology
An interdisciplinary minor in Archaeology is offered by the Department of Art History. See the School of Humanities section of the Catalogue for information.
Participating Faculty
Victoria Bernal: Feminist theory, capitalism and social transformation, the Islamic revival, civil society, globalization, and cyberspace
Tom Boellstorff: Sexuality, postcoloniality, HIV/AIDS, mass media and popular culture, language and culture, Indonesia, Southeast Asia
Michael Burton: Economic anthropology, ecological anthropology, psychological anthropology, gender; Africa, Micronesia
Teresa Caldeira: Urban violence; spatial segregation and urban changes in multicultural societies; citizenship, individual rights, and conceptions of the body; racism; gender, critical urban studies, and contemporary developments in social theory; Brazil
Frank Cancian: Economic anthropology, inequality, peasants; Mexico
Leo R. Chávez: International migration, Latin American immigrants, medical anthropology, transnational communities, cultural analysis of popular images
Benjamin Colby: Culture theory and cultural pathology, content analysis, psychological anthropology, cognition, narrative structures, psychoneuroimmunology; Japan, Mesoamerica, women's health and well-being in Orange County
Robert Garfias: Ethnomusicology, ethnicity
Susan Greenhalgh: Social studies of science, technology, and medicine; politics of population reproduction, modernity/globalization, feminism/gender, China, Taiwan, Pacific Rim
Karen Leonard: Social history of India, caste, ethnicity and gender, Asian-Americans and Muslim Americans, religion, ethnicity, class, and gender
George E. Marcus: Distributed knowledge systems, aesthetic influences on diverse practices of rationality; the changing metaculture of the anthropological research process, challenges to secularism, the study of intellectuals and power, the decline of elites, transcultural networks; Europe and Oceania
Bill Maurer: Anthropology of law, globalization, transnationalism, citizenship and nationalism, finance capital, identity, Caribbean
Michael J. Montoya: Social inequality and health; race and ethnicity; social and cultural studies of science, technology, and medicine; the participation of ethnic populations in biomedical research; the U.S./Mexican border, critical bioethics
A. Kimball Romney: Experimental and psychological anthropology, quantitative and cognitive anthropology
Kaushik Sunder Rajan: Biotechnology, capitalism, comparative ethnography, genomics, globalization, nation-state, political economy, post-colonialism, science and technology studies, subjectivity; India
Roxanne Varzi: Media, youth culture, religion and public space; Iran
Douglas White: Cross-cultural research, mathematical anthropology, social networks, longitudinal analysis, development and social change
Mei Zhan: Medical anthropology, cultural and social studies of science, globalization, transnationalism, gender, China, the United States
Affiliated Faculty
Etienne Balibar: French and comparative literature, literary and social theory, Marxism and postmodernism
Duran Bell: Economics, economic anthropology
Susan Bibler Coutin: Law, culture, immigration, human rights, citizenship, political activism, Central America
John P. Boyd: Kinship, social networks, mathematical anthropology
Carol Burke: Folklore, cultural studies
Lara Deeb: Islam, gender, modernity, religious movements, transnational feminism, public sphere, Middle East and North Africa, Lebanon
J. Paul Dourish: Human-computer interaction, computer-supported cooperative work
Paula Garb: Anthropology of conflict and conflict resolution, ethnic and environmental conflict in the former U.S.S.R.
Inderpal Grewal: Feminist theories of internationalism and transnationalism, cultural studies, South Asia and its diasporas
Bonnie Nardi: Human-computer interaction, activity theory, cultural responses to technology development
Kavita Philip: Transnational studies of science and technology; feminist technocultures; gender, race, globalization, and postcolonialism; environmental history; and new media theory
Justin B. Richland: Anthropology of law, legal discourse analysis and semiotics, indigenous law and politics, North American postcolonialism
Gabriele Schwab: Nineteenth-century English and comparative literature; modernish; American literature; contemporary theory; literature and psychoanalysis; feminist and gender studies; cultural studies and criticism; Native American literatures
Jennifer Terry: Cultural studies, science and technology studies, formations of sexuality, American studies in transnational perspective
Alladi Venkatesh: New media, information technologies, marketing, postmodern theory and marketing, cross-cultural consumer behavior
James Diego Vigil: Urban, psychology, socialization and educational anthropology, sociocultural change, urban poverty, Mexico and U.S. Southwest ethnohistory, comparative ethnicity
The Department of Anthropology offers a Ph.D. degree program in Anthropology. The program focuses on social and cultural anthropology, with a strong focus on understanding emergent processes and systems at a number of scales, including the national and transnational level. Areas of teaching emphasis include: the anthropology of modernity and development; political, legal, and economic anthropology; ethnographic method; and the anthropology of science, technology, and medicine. In addition, Ph.D. students have the option of enrolling in a Feminist Studies or a Critical Theory emphasis, both of which involve interdisciplinary work with departments and centers in the School of Humanities. The Department's faculty members have interests in ethnicity, gender, international migration, science, technology and medicine, law and finance, urban anthropology, youth culture, and social networks. The program also provides rigorous training in ethnographic method. The Department is committed to fostering new and innovative approaches to anthropological inquiry in a pluralistic and intellectually open academic environment. Program faculty take diverse theoretical and methodological approaches to a variety of substantive issues. They are united, however, in a willingness to question taken-for-granted theoretical premises and analytic frames, and to engage in good-faith intellectual dialogue about alternative models and approaches.
ADMISSION
Students are admitted to the program based on their application materials and evidence of scholarly potential, including grade point average, GRE scores, and letters of recommendation.
REQUIREMENTS
Students must complete a one-year Proseminar in Anthropology during their first year and one course in Anthropological Fieldwork during their second year. In addition, students are required to complete two quarters of Statistics, one course in Research Design, and six elective courses in Anthropology, which are selected in consultation with their advisor and which normally cover a coherent area of specialization within the field. All course work must be completed before a student is advanced to candidacy. Students must demonstrate competence to read one foreign language, in accordance with the requirements of the Ph.D. degree in Anthropology.
At the end of the first year, students must pass a formal evaluation which is made by the Department of the basis of (1) the first-year course work and (2) examinations to be taken as part of the Proseminar. Students should advance to candidacy by the end of the third year; the advancement to candidacy examination is based on a research proposal, a review of relevant literature, and an annotated bibliography. The fourth (and, in many cases, some or all of the fifth) year is normally devoted to extended anthropological fieldwork. The sixth year (in some cases, also part of the fifth) is devoted to writing the dissertation, in close consultation with the advisor. The normative time for completion of the Ph.D. is seven years, and the maximum time permitted is eight years.
Feminist Studies Emphasis
A graduate emphasis in Feminist Studies is available. Refer to Women's Studies in the School of Humanties section of the Catalogue for information.
Critical Theory Emphasis
A graduate emphasis in Critical Theory is available. Refer to the Critical Theory Emphasis in the School of Humanities section of the Catalogue for information.