"War and It's Worlds" needs little introduction as to why war is significant in characterizing the twentieth and twenty-first century and how our societies are created around profound militarization and violence. This class takes a book length ethnographic take on classic debates within the anthropology of violence and war. Each week we will read a different ethnography which tackles fundamental questions, for example: How does war create new forms of work? How do we understand differentiated forms of victimhood and suffering in war? What is experience in war? How is war experienced and how do wars shape experiences, sensorially, epistemologically, and structurally? These are just some of the many questions that different ethnographies tackle. We will read broadly across region and emphasize historically situated works that endeavor to understand war and their worlds not through episodic but chronic forms.
5 units · Letter (ABCD/NP)
"War and It's Worlds" needs little introduction as to why war is significant in characterizing the twentieth and twenty-first century and how our societies are created around profound militarization and violence. This class takes a book length ethnographic take on classic debates within the anthropology of violence and war. Each week we will read a different ethnography which tackles fundamental questions, for example: How does war create new forms of work? How do we understand differentiated forms of victimhood and suffering in war? What is experience in war? How is war experienced and how do wars shape experiences, sensorially, epistemologically, and structurally? These are just some of the many questions that different ethnographies tackle. We will read broadly across region and emphasize historically situated works that endeavor to understand war and their worlds not through episodic but chronic forms.