General information

Course type AMUPIE
Module title Anthropology of Culture
Language English
Module lecturer prof. Sławomir Sztajer
Lecturer's email sztajers@amu.edu.pl
Lecturer position Professor
Faculty Faculty of Anthropology and Cultural Studies
Semester 2025/2026 (summer)
Duration 30
ECTS 4
USOS code 20-S2KLka04-P04444

Timetable

Tuesday, 11:30 - 13:00, Room 013, Builing D, (Szamarzewskiego 89) 

Module aim (aims)

The goal of the lecture is to familiarize students with the most fundamental anthropological concepts of culture, introduce the key theoretical approaches within the anthropology of culture, demonstrate how the discipline has changed over time, and provide knowledge on the methods and practical skills required in the anthropological study of culture.

 

Pre-requisites in terms of knowledge, skills and social competences (where relevant)

Syllabus

 

  1. Early definitions of culture
  2. The emergence of cultural anthropology
  3. The evolution of the anthropological thought
  4. Studying culture: research methods in cultural anthropology
  5. The invention of culture. 
  6. Cultural researcher as a participant in culture. Practical problems of ethnography
  7. Postmodern turn in anthropology of culture
  8. Anthropology of culture in the contemporary, globalized world

 

Reading list

 

Obligatory

  1. Frazer J. The Golden Bough. Chancellor Press. London 2000. [Chapters: 3 and 4]
  2. Malinowski B. A Diary in the Strict Sense of the Term. Stanford University Press 1983. [chosen parts – student’s choice]
  3. Malinowski B. The Argonauts of the Western Pacific. Fundacja Nowoczesna Polska (wolnelektury.pl project). [Chapter III]
  4. Mead M. Coming of age in Samoa: a study of adolescence and sex in primitive societies. Penguin Books. Harmondsworth 1961. [chapters: II, VI, VII]
  5. Wagner R. „The Invention of Culture”. in: The Invention of Culture, R. Wagner, University of Chicago Press. 2016.
  6. Clifford J. “On Ethnographic Authority” in: Representations No. 2 (Spring, 1983). University of California Press. pp. 118-146
  7. Darnton R. The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History. Basic Books. New York 1984. [chosen chapter – student’s choice]

Optional

  1. J. D. Eller, Anthropology. Global Forces, Local Lives, 3rd edition, Routledge, New York, 2016.
  2. T. H. Eriksen, Small Places, Large Issues. An Introduction to Social and Cultural Anthropology, 2nd edition, Pluto Press, London-Sterling, VA, 2001.