Inhalt |
How are categories like ‘money,’ ‘marriage,’ or ‘gender’
created and sustained, and what makes them real to those who rely on them? How
do we, as individuals, participate in shaping the social realities around us?
This course explores these questions through three prominent frameworks for
understanding social construction: social norms, performativity, and collective
intentionality. By analyzing and applying these theories to anthropological
contexts, we will examine contrasting accounts of how social expectations form
and guide behavior, how individuals’ repeated (re)enactments bring social
properties and entities into being, and how shared goals and intentions lay the
groundwork for social reality itself. The course will critically assess the
strengths and limitations of each approach, highlighting both the stability and
transformative potential of social constructs. By the end, students will be
equipped with analytical tools to explore the intersections of conventions,
performative acts, and collective agency, fostering a nuanced understanding of
how these frameworks can help anthropologists understand the creation of the
social world. |
Literatur |
A complete reading list will be provided one week before the
semester begins. However, familiarity with the class themes will greatly
enhance students’ ability to critically analyze the ideas we will engage with
throughout the course.
For an accessible overview that summarizes and attempts to
integrate two of the frameworks we will focus on, consider reading:
Guala, Francesco. 2016. Understanding Institutions: The
Science and Philosophy of Living Together. New Jersey: Princeton University
Press. |