This class offers intensive study of the archaeology and culture history of the Andean region prior to the Spanish conquest. The complexity and distinctiveness of Andean social organization, political institutions, religious ideologies, and economic practices have long fascinated anthropologists. Ultimately, the course will explore Andean cultures over a 10,000 year period, highlighting key debates, current research projects, and innovative theoretical approaches shaping contemporary archeological scholarship in South America and beyond.

The course uses tourism as a lens to examine global connections. Particular focus will be on the politics of cultural encounters. Drawing examples from diverse ethnographic materials, the course explores how different visions of the world come into contact, negotiated and transformed, and how tourist encounters shape peoples everyday lives.

This course introduces students to the field of Indigenous archaeology. Indigenous archaeology is a form of critical praxis that encompasses archaeological research conducted for, with, and by Indigenous peoples. Throughout the class we explore the colonial origins of archaeology, Indigenous activism and its impacts on the discipline of anthropology, ongoing efforts to decolonize and indigenize cultural heritage, and community-based research methods. Students will all also be introduced to new theoretical perspectives emerging out of the intersection of Anthropology and Indigenous Studies including survivance, refusal, futurity, and resurgence.

The role of language and symbolism in the representation and manipulation of ideology and power structure. Case materials drawn from the study of verbal arts, gender, law, advertising, and politics with a focus on North America.

This course provides background in the practical and theoretical aspects of fieldwork in Paleoanthropology. Students are trained in the treatment and analysis of fossil vertebrates, plant macro- and micro-fossils and sediments. Excursions to paleoanthropological localities of Homo erectus and Homo sapiens, and excavation at a hominoid site. (Joint undergraduate-graduate) Not eligible for CR/NCR option. Additional fees of up to $2500 for field trip costs will apply. The details and the application form are posted on the following website: https://www.anthropology.utoronto.ca/undergraduate/curriculum-course-information/field-schools-and-research-opportunities. The application form should be submitted by the deadlines indicated on the website.

A survey of living primates, this lab-oriented course describes and compares the diverse behavioural and anatomical adaptations that are characteristic to this order of mammals. The understanding of the biological diversity and evolutionary history of primates is important for further understanding of human adaptation and evolution.

Exploration of the development and maintenance of the human skeleton and dentition, with emphasis on application to archaeological, forensic and biomedical sciences.

This course takes the student on a survey of human evolution from our ape ancestors to modern humans. Students will learn to identify skulls, teeth and limb bones, explore hundreds of casts, and learn how researchers understand human origins and trends in the development of human anatomy and behavior.

This course will explore the foundational and leading concepts in evolutionary anthropology. Historically important readings and current concepts will be presented and discussed in the context of research, especially in areas of human population biology, ecology and the evolution of Homo sapiens. Topics will include behavioral ecology and life history theory, as well as a critique of the adaptationist program.

This course will investigate human movement and physical activity patterns through the lens of evolutionary anthropology. The evolution of hominin physical behaviours, such as bipedalism and tool use, will be explored alongside the morphological traits associated with these behaviours. We will also examine social and cultural factors that may moderate physical activities among diverse human groups, including subsistence strategy variation and contemporary views on activity and exercise.

Molecular anthropology is an interdisciplinary field combining biology, genetics, evolution and anthropology. In this class, we will explore the use of DNA for the study of past migrations and admixture patterns, the evolution of pathogens, plant and animal domestication and especially the relationships between recent and archaic humans.

This course offers a general introduction to transformations in modern and contemporary China from an anthropological perspective. This course covers major aspects of Chinese culture, history, and society in a global context.

This course will examine the role of anthropology in the development, maintenance, as well as critique, of race as a concept and racism as a social, cultural, and structural reality. Topics include: the relationships among anthropology, race, and colonialism; the constructions of race as a social, cultural, and biological concept; ethnographic engagements with whiteness and white supremacy; and the future of anthropology as an anti-racist and anti-colonialist enterprise.

Gender concerns the ways that groups define and experience what it is to be male, female, or a gender identity in-between or outside of that binary, and in all societies the boundaries of gender categories are both policed and resisted. In this course we examine how gender is made materially, discursively, and through intersections with other structures of inequality (e.g. race, sexuality, class, etc.).

This course explores the conceptual and methodological tools anthropologists employ to study the ways social groups enact, resist, and transform social relations that involve the production and distribution of power. It studies how anthropologists theorize politics in relation to power, authority, coercion, and consent. Topics explored in this class include political cultures in state and statelessness societies, political affect and the politics of everyday life, hegemony and resistance, governmentality and bio-politics, violence and militarization, social movements and citizenship, and the difficulties of anthropological research in conflict zones.

This course examines medical anthropology's contributions to, and critiques of, global health policies and programs. Topics covered include: colonialism and health, the political ecology of disease, indigenous constructions of illness and healing, medical pluralism, the politics of primary health care, population policies, reproductive health, and AIDS.

Social anthropological perspective on the nature and meaning of food production, culinary cultures, industrial food, food as metaphor, and famine and hunger.

The role of culture, cultural diversity, space and performance in urban institutions and settings. The cultural context and consequence of urbanization.

This course deepens students’ understandings of health and illness as social, cultural, political and historical phenomena. Drawing on theories and approaches from social-cultural anthropology, students will develop skills in critical analysis of experiences and meanings of healing and illness in particular contexts, with a focus on anthropological critique of dominant health policies, discourses, technologies and practices.

What might it mean to think of death as inside of life, as opposed to at the end of it? This class examines Anthropological approaches to understanding life and death in our contemporary moment, one marked by widespread illness, war, policing, suicide, accident, and further loss. How do we go on living surrounded by death every day? Why are certain deaths valued above others? We will examine a range of related themes including funerary rituals, grief and mourning, violence and killing, illness and ageing, and ghosts and the afterlife.

Anthropological and other approaches to right-wing nationalism, populism, illiberalism, and “democratic backsliding,” in specific parts of the world and across continents. Economic and geopolitical sources of right-wing nationalist ideas and their patterns of transmission. International cooperation among right-wing nationalists. White supremacism. Conspiracy theories. Connections between extreme and mainstream forms of illiberal nationalism.

This course introduces selective anthropological and ethnographic rendering of religion and theology; matter, magic and the miraculous; religion and media. It also engages with some political understandings of religious affects; the religious in movement; mystics and relics; religious practices and their entanglements in colonial histories.

Presents anthropological perspectives on provision of healthcare as a complex social and cultural phenomenon. Examines hierarchies and division of labour among health care providers, and how social groups come to occupy particular positions. Considers how knowledge and skills are gained through formal training and/or lived experience, how they are recognized and valued, and may become sources of identity. Examines local variations within biomedicine as practiced in different settings around the world.

It is widely acknowledged that sharp disparities in disease burden and access to medical care characterize global patterns in health. These disparities affect the life chances of much of the worlds population, based on class position, gender, and geographical region.

We tend to think of sports as unserious. This course shows that much serious cultural work is conducted through sports, but also that sports are indeed not always serious. This anthropology of sports engages with sports as both work and play, considering issues like gender, bodies, competition, and pleasure.

This course is designed for students eager to participate in, and reflect on, on-going advocacy on climate and environmental justice. Students will be placed, either as individuals, in partners, or in teams, with a government, non-profit or community advocacy group to collaboratively address a specific problem or need of the organization. In classroom discussions, and in assignments students will have an opportunity to reflect critically on their experiences, explore social and ethical issues, and integrate placements with course readings in ways that mobilize or perhaps challenge academic knowledge. Assignments will integrate practice in a range of forms of expression (for instance personal story, policy brief, podcast, interview, news release, or blog) to support the development of the range of expressive skills needed to support working for change. The application form is posted on the following website: https://www.anthropology.utoronto.ca/undergraduate The application form should be submitted by the deadline indicated on the website.

Explores how anthropologists have traditionally studied social movements and how new social movements have challenged anthropologists to rethink some of their ethnographic methods and approaches. Some specific movements covered include those related to indigenous rights, environmentalism, refugees, gay and lesbian issues, biotechnology, new religions, and globalization.

An in-depth critical review of foundational ideas in the development of the practice of Anthropology. Topics may include questioning fieldwork, origins and legacies of functionalism, cultural materialism, politics of culture, power and political economy, globalization and post modernism, gender and post-structuralism.

Development, or deliberate intervention to improve the lives of people deemed to be lacking, or left behind, has shaped the modern world for at least a century. Drawing on historical and ethnographic studies, this course examines the trajectory of development as a concept and practice, and traces its effects.

The relationship between humans and other animals is one of the most hotly debated topics of our times. Through key classic and contemporary writings, this course introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of animal studies, and explores how anthropologists and other theorists have critically engaged in debates about animal and human distinctions.