John Comaroff
40400. Colonialism, Postcoloniality and the Dialectics of Modernity. PQ: Graduate Students Only. Limit 30. This course – part lecture and part seminar, part conceptual and part ethnographic – will explore the nature of colonialism and modernity, and the dialectical relationship between them. It will also interrogate recent writings on postcoloniality and postmodernity – and their impact on historical anthropology, sui generis. (with Jean Comaroff)
420. Anthropological Methods. PQ: Second-year anthropology graduate students only. A critical introduction to the methods of anthropology, paying special attention to the ethics of fieldwork; the politics of knowledge involved in ethnography; the problems of "writing" culture; the (so-called) crisis of representation in the social sciences; and the varieties of techniques and methods conventionally used by anthropologists.
523. Seminar: The Craft of Anthropology: Methods and Ethics. PQ: Consent of instructor. A critical introduction to the methods of anthropology, paying special attention to the ethics of fieldwork; the politics of knowledge involved in ethnography; the problems of "writing" culture; the (so-called) crisis of representation in the social sciences; and the varieties of techniques and methods conventionally used by anthropologists.
52600. AdvRdgs: Africanist Anthropology. (with Jean Comaroff )
53700. The 21st Century. A course sponsored by the Chicago Center for Contemporary Theory. (Limit: 25 graduate students, no auditors. Preference for students from doctoral departments) This seminar is concerned with current theoretical reflections on the nature of the state, social order, violence and citizenship. (with Jean Comaroff)
53701. The 21st Century: Law and Disorder in the Postcolony. A course sponsored by the Chicago Center for Contemporary Theory. (Limit: 25 graduate students, no auditors. Preference for students from doctoral departments) Postcolonial and post-totalitarian polities across the world appear to be caught in a pervasive paradox. On one hand, they manifest a pronounced faith in the law, in the capacity of the constitution and litigation, to produce social order amidst radical economic, political, and ideological change. Indeed, it might be argued that political processes are increasingly being displaced into the legal arena. On the other hand, postocolonial polities are haunted by a metaphysics of disorder: by the collapse of the Weberian ideal of the state in the face of apparently uncontrollable violence and unpoliceable crime and by the sheer difficulty of imagining a politics adequate to the present global moment. How might we understand the co-presence of these two things, the fetishism of the law and the metaphysics of disorder? And why has the growth of democratic institutions across the world been accompanied by a dramatic expansion of more-or-less organized, increasingly violent crime? What general theoretical issues do these questions raise for an understanding of the Twenty-first Century? (with Jean Comaroff)
541. Seminar: Post Field/Professionalization. Discussion of a broad range of topics related to academic professionalization: creating a CV, job letters, job interviewing at the national meetings and on campuses, projection of a professional persona, publication (before and after receipt of the PhD, journal articles, dissertation into book, etc). professional service, entering a new department/first job, creating oneself as a teacher/colleague, second major research project, preparation for tenure, etc.
54500. Political Anthropology. This course is an exploration of major theoretical approaches to the study of political institutions, structures, and processes in different societies, with special reference to the nature of power, the role of symbolism and ideology in politics, and images of the state. We will explore the constitution of political authority in reference to both ethnographic and archaeological investigations that will take us from the problems of early state origins to the transformations of the post-colonial. Throughout, our discussions will attempt to bring forward problems of structure and process, history and practice, that animate anthropological approaches to political life. (with A.T. Smith.)
55505. Advanced Seminar: Legal Anthropology.
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