Kinship, Family, and Power (ANTH*3770)

Code and section: ANTH*3770*01

Term: Winter 2025

Instructor: Deidre Rose

Details

Course Description:

The study of kinship and family has long held an important place in anthropology. This course will explore changing ideas about relatedness and belonging from anthropological and cross-cultural perspectives. Topics and themes will include descent systems, marriage practices, connections among households, markets, and states, gender relations, sexuality, reproduction, parenting, personhood, and agency. The primary objectives of this course are 1. to critically examine our assumptions about what is ‘natural’ in discussions and debates about families and 2. To understand the role of class, status, and geographical location in relation to who can raise their own children, and, as Ann Laura Stoler put it, “Who gets to bed and who gets to wed”. We will also interrogate heteronormative biases in kinship studies and examine the systems of intersectional inequalities and webs of power in which these social institutions are embedded.

Some questions will guide us: How do we rethink fundamental questions and assumptions about familial connection? What new possibilities and critical insights are offered by new reproductive technologies? How are transnational familial relations mediated and maintained across time and space?

Learning Outcomes:

1. Demonstrate knowledge of the history and importance of kinship studies, systems, and notation in anthropology.

2. Acquire an understanding of the significance of kinship for social organization in differing societies.

3. Explore contemporary changes in focus and the application of kinship studies.

4. Explore a variety of non-traditional families and consider the social implications of various new reproductive technologies.

5. Use an intersectional lens to understand the importance of gender, power, and geographical location in kinship and marriage systems.

6. Demonstrate professional and ethical communication in both written and spoken forms.

Readings: TBA

Evaluation: TBA

A detailed syllabus will be available on Courselink by the first day of classes.

Syllabus