So You Want to Change the World
Spring 2009 ANTH 0066J S01
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Instructor: Daniel J. Smith
Please check the Detailed Class Information for up to date information about this course.
Information on meeting times for this course can be found on Course Schedule at http://selfservice.brown.edu
Course Description
Examines from an anthropological perspective efforts to address global poverty that are typically labeled as "development." The enterprise of development is considered critically, both with regard to the intentions and purposes that underlie the actions of wealthy countries, donor organizations, and expatriate development workers and with regard to the outcomes for the people who are the intended beneficiaries. Privileging the prespectives of ordinary people in developing countries, but also looking carefully at the institutions involved in development, the course relies heavily on ethnographic case studies that will draw students into the complexity of one of the greatest contemporary global problems: social inequality. In a highly participatory seminar, students will read, discuss, and write about ethnographies that combine theoretically sharp and experience-near accounts of poverty and development in a range of world areas and across numerous specific development problems such as the environment, public health, gender inequality, agriculture, population and economic transformation. Reserved for First Year students. Enrollment limited to 20. FYS DVPS LILE