Postgraduate Course: The Anthropology of Monsters: Demons, witches, cyborgs and other fabulous creatures (PGSP11460)
Course Outline
| School | School of Social and Political Science |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course is about monsters. It is about the way in which monstrous bodies mix and match realms that should be kept separate - nature/culture, human/animal, male/female, familiar/unfamiliar, material/immaterial and, above all, self/other. From African witches and the ghost of Burnt
Woman in Australia to Freddy Krueger or 'pharma' animals and cyborgs, it brings together Western and non-Western monsters in order to explore some of the ways in which they have been portrayed and experienced in different ethnographic contexts as well as through time. |
| Course description |
Do monsters exist and how can we define them? What role do monsters and monster narratives play in culture? Does the logic of monstrosity remain constant across time or does each era embrace the monsters it needs? Do African witches or the ghost of Burnt Woman in Eastern Australia
share anything with Freddy Krueger, cyborgs or the chimeric 'pharm' animals of the new biotechnologies? How useful is it to bring together cinematic monsters like Freddy Krueger with African witches or, indeed, African witches with cyborgs? Focusing on a number of monstrous beings
(demons, witches, vampires, spirits, cyborgs, chimeras, tc.), this course attempts to answer these questions by exploring some of the ways in which monsters have been portrayed and experienced in different ethnographic contexts as well as different times.
This exploration is organized around two main themes. We will start with the idea that monsters are arbiters of order and disorder - they allow us, that is, to express ideas about what is normal and channel fears about what is not. As 'the abnormal' that monsters represent appears to be conditioned by the mixture of different realms that need to be kept separate, the first part of the course will concentrate on different kinds of Monstrous Bodies in relation to particular examples of such a mixture (e.g., human/animal, self/other, male/female, familiar/unfamiliar, material/immaterial).
In the second part of the course, Monstrous Technologies, we shall concentrate on the idea that monstrosity does not simply represent fear of abnormal selves or abnormal bodies but also challenges, permeates and constructs normal selves and normal bodies. In this
sense, rather than a simple representational category, it may be seen as a way of being or becoming.
Indicative topics:
Monstrous Bodies:
From the uncanny to the abject: un/familiar monsters
From Gods to heroes and angels: im/mortal monsters
From the impossible to the forbidden: im/moral monsters
Monstrous Technologies:
Excess and lack
Defilement and disgust
Ruination and transgression
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
|
Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
|
| Academic year 2017/18, Available to all students (SV1)
|
Quota: 20 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 20,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
176 )
|
| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
|
| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Short essay (1,500 words): 20%
Long essay (4,000 words): 80% |
| Feedback |
The overall aim of the assessment and feedback is to allow students to develop their own ideas, demonstrate their ability to focus on pertinent issues and analyse relevant evidence in a critical and well-informed manner.
As the short essay carries only a weighting of 20% and it is submitted early in the semester, it will be used to provide formative assessment and feedback that can help students identify their strengths and weaknesses - beyond providing individual written feedback, as well as general verbal feedback in class, students will be encouraged to seek further individual feedback during one-to-one meetings with the lecturer. In the form of long essay plans and student presentations that focus on issues closely related to the long essay topics, there will be more opportunities for feedback throughout the course.
The long essays will be returned with written comments providing individual summative feedback for each student at the end of the course. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate critical knowledge and advanced understanding of the key theories, concepts and issues central to the anthropological study of monsters and the monstrous.
- Critically analyze, synthesize, and evaluate research and contemporary debates about alterity as well as navigate complex issues to form informed opinions and analyses.
- Exhibit a critical awareness of the articulation and significance of cultural and political forces that contribute to the 'monsterization' of the Other.
- Demonstrate the ability to question, examine, and understand key anthropological issues through independent research.
- Communicate through empirically grounded and theoretically informed written work and oral presentations, their knowledge of issues relevant to the study of monsters and their comparative significance.
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Reading List
Forth, G. 2008. Images of the Wildman in Southeast Asia: An Anthropological Perspective. Milton Park: Routlledge.
Foucault, M. 2003. Abnormal: Lectures at the College de France, 1974-1975, eds V. Marchetti, A. Salomoni, and A. Davidson. New York: Picador.
Kearney, R. 2003. Strangers, Gods and Monsters. London & New York: Routledge.
Levina, M. and Diem-My T. Bui, eds. 2013. Monster Culture in the 21st Century: A Reader. London & New York: Bloomsbury.
Musharbash, Y and G. H. Presterudstuen, eds. 2014. Monster Anthropology in Australasia |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Be able to use collaboration and debate effectively in order to test, modify and strengthen their own views.
Make effective use of oral, written and visual means to negotiate, create and communicate critical understanding.
Seek and value open feedback to inform genuine self-awareness.
Transfer their knowledge, learning, skills and abilities from one context to another.
Use an anthropological approach to understand and act on social, cultural, and political issues surrounding questions of alterity and the significance of 'othering'. |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Dimitri Tsintjilonis
Tel: (0131 6)50 3934
Email: |
Course secretary | Miss Morag Wilson
Tel: (0131 6)51 5122
Email: |
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