Master in Social & Historical Anthropology Master in Women & Gender Candidate doctors Thesis
The program
Academic staff
Offered Courses



Master in Social and Historical Anthropology
Offered Courses
 

A΄Semester
1. The Anthropology of Religion, Rituals and Symbolic Systems (Compulsory)
2. Theory and History of Social Anthropology (Compulsory)
3. Family in European Historiography (Compulsory)


B΄Semester
4. Issues in Economic and Political Anthropology (Compulsory)
5. Historical Approaches of the National Phenomenon (Compulsory)
6. Social and Political History of the Ancient World (Compulsory)

C΄Semester
7. Ethnography of Greece and Southern Europe (Compulsory for majors)
8. Issues in Historical Anthropology (Compulsory for majors)
9. Anthropology of Kinship and Social Gender (Elective)
10. Political and Social History of Modern Greece
11. Introduction to Medical Anthropology
12. Special Issues in Historiography (Elective)
 


Description of Courses


 

1. The Anthropology of Religion, Rituals and Symbolic Systems

The course refers to the ways in which religious beliefs, religious and lay rituals and symbolic systems are approached, analyzed, and interpreted. Anthropological theories and approaches of religion are discussed in depth. Moreover, we also analyze systems of classification and structure of human experience, the logic of magical thought and practice, ritual practice and anthropological approaches to symbolism. Issues such as cognitive anthropology as well as the anthropology of face, emotions, and the body are also examined.




 

2. Theory and History of Social Anthropology

The aim of this course is to present momentous trends in contemporary post-Malinowskian anthropology through both a historical perspective�namely in relation to the intellectual framework of the era and the theoretical practices in relative fields�as well as from the perspective of their implementation in processing and presenting ethnographic data. Classical ethnographic monographs are analyzed as examples of anthropological attestations, like evolutionism, structural-functionalism, structuralism, exchange theory, and cultural ecology. The contemporary trends of interpretive anthropology, anthropological constructivism, and the recent post-structural reforms and exchanges with history and literary criticism are scrutinized in the light of competing points of view.




 

3. Issues in the History of Family in European Historiography

This course aims at introducing historical research relevant to the history of the family and the debate with the corresponding surveys in the area of social anthropology. During the course, the various historiographic trends in the field of history of family in the European world are presented. The focus is on studies around the forms of settlement and domestic organization and the European model of marriage (15th-10th century), the practices of transfer and family strategies, intra-family relations, the emergence of the new conjugal culture. Additionally, we also present the debate in the domain of historical research with regard to the shift of attitudes and practices towards children and the elderly.





 

4. Issues in Economic and Political Anthropology

The course includes three units. The first unit introduces the basic approaches of the concept of �economy�, examines commercial exchange, gift, and bartering, while it comments on examples of anthropological attestations concerning material objects. The latter are analyzed as commercial goods from a political-economical point of view or as vehicles of symbolic meaning. It also examines various views on the ethics and symbolism of money as well as analytical approaches of consumption. The second unit covers fundamental issues in the anthropology of tourism and introduces, from a critical point of view, older and contemporary speculations regarding issues relevant to the socio-economic transformation�as, for example, the source of social change and the relationship between structure and action. The third unit analyzes the relation between political anthropology and political science and introduces examples of non-western societies which established the battery of issues dealt with in political anthropology. Finally, it examines the prime approaches to the national and ethnic phenomenon and comments upon the relation between the relevant terms and analytical categories. Special attention is given to nationalism as a cultural process towards the composition of identity.




 

5. Historical Approaches of the National Phenomenon

The course deals with the national phenomenon as a contemporary issue, product and factor of modernity at the same time. The aim of the course is to foreground the historicity and the complexity of the national phenomenon on the grounds of the presentation and debate of the relevant theoretical bibliography and the approach of particular examples that are manifested in these levels. The course presents three units grounded on comparative discussion of examples from Europe, the Balkans and the Middle East, and India: a) Language, History and Community; b) Social Gender, Class and National Identity; c) Nation and Religion; d) Modernism and Tradition; e) Nationalism, Revolution, and Reform in 19th century Europe; f) Nation and Political Power.





6. Social and Political History of the Ancient World


Course outline:
A) The historiography of the economy of ancient Greece since the 19th century. The conflict between liberal and Marxist researchers of ancient economy. Home economics and relevant models of analysis. Monetarism as the starting point of an early capitalistic system. Theoretical approaches into the foundation of the institution of slavery within the framework of home economics.
B) The stratification of ancient Greek society. Conceptual models for the analysis of social grouping. The Marxist and Weberian proposal. The neo-Weberian proposals. The reconstruction of Marxist analysis by G.E.M. de Ste Croix and its acceptance by the academic community; Sociological schools and the conflict on the analysis of pre-industrial societies.
C) The presence of social discrimination in existing sources. Superior and inferior strata during the Homeric, archaic, classical and Hellenistic era. The distinctions founded on criteria of blood, wealth, status, and moral supremacy. The specification and self-conscience of social identity: the particularity of ancient societies (clash between poor vs. rich and free citizens vs. slaves). Comparison of the ancient Greek paradigm to the equivalent Roman one.
D) Slavery from its birth to its culmination in Roman times. Forms of slavery and its correlation to other manifestations of dependent workmanship. The view of political philosophers against slavery and the moral dimension of the issue. The collapse of the institution of slavery.




7. Ethnography of Greece and Southern Europe


The course introduces ethnographic studies that concern contemporary Greek society as well as societies of Southern Europe pivoting on inter-cultural comparisons within this ethnographic area. The introductory unit refers to the history of ethnographic research in this particular geographical and cultural part of the world with regard to the methodological trends and specializations in subject matters and areas. It touches upon issues related to the Greek mountainous community as a privileged subject of research, the �Mediterranean� as a cultural fabrication and it develops the speculation of contemporary anthropology around �indigenous� or local anthropology. It proceeds to present the subject matters focused upon in anthropological research in Greece and the wider area of Southern Europe: the forms and cultural content of kinship and the domestic group with local societies as a point of reference; gender ideologies in Greek society; symbols and cultural versions of femininity and masculinity; forms of practice of men and women; the cultural dimensions of political life and the set-up of modern Greek cultural and national identity.




8.
Historical Anthropology


The program of the course is announced at the beginning of each academic year.



9.
Anthropology of Kinship and Social Gender


In spite of the fact that the study of kinship has constituted a privileged field of ethnographic research and theoretical analysis, the study of social gender began to preoccupy anthropologists relatively recently, in particular from the 1970s on. The distinction between social and biological gender and the investigation of the social and cultural framework within which the roles of kinship networks and social gender arise has led to the analysis of social gender as a product of these networks and simultaneously as their contributor. The course aims at examining the fundamental anthropological attestations of kinship from the 19th century on, the relationship by kinship, social gender and sexuality, and it will critically explore the �naturalness� with which kinship and gender are usually dealt with.




10.
Introduction to Medical Anthropology


The course constitutes an introduction to medical anthropology on a postgraduate level and focuses on cultural manifestations of physical and mental pain, therapy, chronic diseases, and malaise.





11.
Political and Social History of Modern Greece


The aim of the course is the presentation and analytical discussion of contemporary historiography on Modern Greek history and the emergence of new topics and approaches with regard to the subject matter in hand. The discussion on the social structure of Modern Greek society, the issue of patronage and class conflicts, the problem of the state and state initiative in the constitution of modern Greed society, the function of politics and the Greed nationalism, etc. are indicatively mentioned.



12.
Special Issues in Historiography


The subject matter of the course changes every academic year and it is announced at the beginning of every academic year.