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Regular version of the site
2022/2023

Anthropology of Belief and Knowledge

Category 'Best Course for Broadening Horizons and Diversity of Knowledge and Skills'
Category 'Best Course for New Knowledge and Skills'
Type: Minor
Delivered by: Department of History
When: 3, 4 module
Open to: students of all HSE University campuses
Instructors: Aleksandra Kasatkina, Nikolai Ssorin-Chaikov, Тамбовцева Светлана Георгиевна
Language: English
ECTS credits: 5
Contact hours: 60

Course Syllabus

Abstract

Anthropology of belief and knowledge seek an understanding of an understanding: it aims at grasping what people across cultures admit to be true. How various systems of knowledge and belief distinguish the rational and the irrational? What is sense and senselessness? How are knowledge, belief, intuition and revelation distinguished in different social and cultural contexts? How are epistemologies related to aesthetics, ethics, moral order and everyday knowledge practices, and how are they embedded in forms of society that that articulate and constitute? We consider these questions by drawing on detailed ethnographies of science and religion. Cases that we explore range from studies of witchcraft and shamanism to laboratory and computer science, from conspiracy theories to knowledge about climate change and different religions.
Learning Objectives

Learning Objectives

  • be able not only read key ethnographies, but also make an individual research, based on the unique ethnographic experience, applying the skills learnt through the course.
Expected Learning Outcomes

Expected Learning Outcomes

  • A student knows the history of the discipline and subfields
  • Able to solve professional problems based on synthesis and analysis
  • A student can critically evaluate and rethink the accumulated experience (one's own and another's), think about professional and social activities.
Course Contents

Course Contents

  • ethnographies of magic
  • ethnographies of science
Assessment Elements

Assessment Elements

  • non-blocking project essay
  • non-blocking final essay exam
Interim Assessment

Interim Assessment

  • 2022/2023 4th module
    0.5 * final essay exam + 0.5 * project essay
Bibliography

Bibliography

Recommended Core Bibliography

  • E. E. Evans-Pritchard. (1960). The Organization of a Zande Kingdom. Cahiers d’études Africaines, (4), 5. https://doi.org/10.3406/cea.1960.3678

Recommended Additional Bibliography

  • Bielo, J. S. (2016). A companion to the anthropology of religion. Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale, 24(1), 103–106. https://doi.org/10.1111/1469-8676.12247

Authors

  • LYUBAVINA SVETLANA VYACHESLAVOVNA
  • KASATKINA ALEKSANDRA KONSTANTINOVNA
  • TAMBOVTSEVA SVETLANA GEORGIEVNA
  • SSORINCHAYKOV NIKOLAY VLADIMIROVICH
  • NEVSKIY ANDREY VLADIMIROVICH