Duration
30h Th
Number of credits
Lecturer
Language(s) of instruction
French language
Organisation and examination
Teaching in the first semester, review in January
Schedule
Units courses prerequisite and corequisite
Prerequisite or corequisite units are presented within each program
Learning unit contents
This year, the theme of the seminar is the anthropology of animals, understood as the anthropology of human-non human relationships. The course is divided in three parts :
1- An introductory course where the nature/cutlure debate is presented.
2- A theoretical part devoted to the examination of specific questions concerning anthropozoology and the relationship with the natural world
3- Practical exercices aiming at experiencing what it is to be affected by animal bodies and/or other natural beings. These exercices will be later the target of an autoethnographic reflexive work.
Learning outcomes of the learning unit
At the end of this teaching unit, students will be able to:
- understand the socio-anthropological roots of the animal issue, and more broadly the "non human" issue
- take seriously non western ontologies and tackle questions about relativism in ontologies
- question their own relation with other living beings
Prerequisite knowledge and skills
None
Planned learning activities and teaching methods
The course is built on academic and experiential work, the latter being the object of an analytic autoethnographic report. Is is organised as follows:
1- the presentation and reading of academic works
2 - a feedback on one's own experience of nature in order to integrate, in the first person, the emotional dimension of the relationship with nature and animals.
3 - (auto) -ethnographic exercise at home and during classes
The course aims to examine the cultural frameworks that organize the relationship to non-human beings in various societies, including our own. How do modern and nonmodern cosmologies or ontologies differ? What becomes of the concept of "nature" or "animal" in the light of a nonmodern ontology? Is the definition of nature the same everywhere? Is the opposition between nature and culture, which has been at the root of anthropology, really outdated? The anthropology of nature and animals addresses these questions. It does so through ethnographic works that document precisely how humans and non-humans coexist, but also through more philosophical works that seek to renew ways of thinking for humans and non-humans. By helping to rethink the relationship with life, the anthropology of nature and animals has an undeniable political significance.
Mode of delivery (face to face, distance learning, hybrid learning)
Face-to-face course
Additional information:
The course is organized as a 2h per week seminar. It will take place at the first term. Students' active participation is expected. Relevant scientific papers will be introduced as they are needed. Each group is expected to expose its advances in research every two to three weeks.
The practical part includes auto-ethnographic exercices at home and during classes. The students will have to examine his or herx own relationship with a chosen natural being. He or she will have to record his or her observations and thoughts in a personnal diary.
Recommended or required readings
Texts (papers and books) are provided at the beginning of the course, according to the specific subjects chosen by the students. These are later enriched by other sources, books and/or papers.
Marks are given according to the daily work in the classroom, the quality of the academic report (according to the instructions that are given to the students) and a reflexive work on the student's own experience of nature and/or animals.
Work placement(s)
There is no work placement for this teaching unit.
Organisational remarks and main changes to the course
Contacts
Teacher
Véronique SERVAIS, Professeur
Faculty of Social Sciences
Place des orateurs, 3, Bât B31
Sart Tilman
4000 Liège
+ 32 4 366 32 08
E-mail v.servais@ulg.ac.be
Secrétariat
Alexia Mainjot
Tél. 04 3662756