Cultural Anthropology: Focus on U.S. Cultures

What is Cultural Anthropology?

Cultural Anthropology is a branch of anthropology that specializes in the comparative study of culture and peoples' beliefs, practices, and the cognitive and social organization of human groups. Cultural anthropologists study how people who share a common cultural system organize and shape the physical and social world around them, and are, in turn, shaped by those ideas, behaviors, and physical environments.

See CCSF Fall Schedule for available Sections.

Required Textbooks

Edited by Virginia R. Dominguez & Jasmin Habib (2017)

Paperback

ISBN-13: 978-1785334351

Ebook

ISBN-13: 978-1785333613

Syllabus

In-Person Section

n/a

Cultural Anthropology: Focus on U.S. Cultures introduces basic concepts of cultural anthropology through the focus on cultures in the United States. The course also investigates aspects of the sociocultural structures of the United States such as inequality, power, race/ethnicity, kinship, gender, and globalization.

Ethnographic studies, history, literature, film, and music are used to illustrate the ways that people living in the United States negotiate cultural values and confront social conflict. We will be discussing topics such as: colonialism; culture, race, & biology; immigration, assimilation, and contested norms; North American pop culture, as well as North American globalization and empire abroad.

Course Topics:

Part 1: Course Introduction and Orientation

Introduction to ANTH 3C & Cultural Anthropology
U.S. Culture and Anthropological Theories

Part II: Culture, Double-Consciousness, and 'Otherness'

Indigenous North Americans and the American Imaginary
The Political Economy of Slavery and Its Traumatic Legacies
Conceptualizing Race in the U.S.
The Melting Pot? - Ethnicity, Race, and Multiculturalism

Part 3: U.S. Identity, Culture, and Society

U.S. Identity and Culture
Family, Enculturation, and Education
Sex, Gender, and Sexuality in the U.S.
Language, Culture, and Thought
Religion, Myth, and Ritual
U.S. Art and Expressive Culture

Part 4: Power, Memory, and Politics in the U.S. (and Beyond)

Geography, Space, and Place
U.S. Economics and Class
Power, Politics, and Empire
Globalization and Cultural Change
Course Wrap-Up / Final Exam