TITLE OF THE PROGRAM: Masters of Social Science – MSS Program
DURATION OF THE PROGRAM: 1 (One) Academic Year. A student shall be allowed a maximum of two years to complete the degree starting from the year of admission into the University.
VISION OF THE PROGRAM: Department of Anthropology of the University of Dhaka is appealing for an all-encompassing and modern curriculum of anthropology especially that follows relevant theoretical, methodological, and epistemological trends.
MISSION OF THE PROGRAM: To develop a holistic understanding of cultural diversity in past and present human groups, this program is designed to offer the highest quality instruction in the discipline of Anthropology. The mission of the program is to provide students an integrated foundation ensuring a comprehensive understanding of Anthropology at the Master's level which is both theoretically vibrant and methodologically significant and to prepare them for an enlightened career through specific concentrations in applied fields of Anthropology.
ELIGIBILITY FOR ADMISSION: Students completing (passing) their BSS (Honors) program are eligible for promotion to the Master's program. Following the rules and regulations of the University, he/ she will collect admission forms for enrollment in the Master's program.
DEGREE REQUIREMENTS:
ACADEMIC YEAR, SEMESTER, CREDIT HOUR, AND CREDIT PER-SEMESTER:
20 courses · 80 credit hours across 2 terms
| Code | Course title | Credits | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ANTH 501 | CONTEMPORARY ANTHROPOLOGICAL THEORIES | 4 | The course is designed to make students familiar with some of the theories formulated in the field of anthropology over the last few decades. Emphasis has been given to understand the contributions from post-modern, feminist, neo-liberal, and post-colonial thinkers in anthropology. |
| ANTH 502 | ADVANCED RESEARCH METHODS IN ANTHROPOLOGY | 4 | The course is designed to make students familiar with the advanced research methods in anthropology. Emphasis has been given to highlight the epistemological issues, critical thinking, and scientific and post-scientific analysis in anthropology. |
| ANTH 503 | ANTHROPOLOGY OF DEVELOPMENT | 4 | The course is designed to expose the students to the ethnographic knowledge of how anthropology analyzes issues such as rural poverty, environmental degradation, and the globalization of trade. Emphasis has been given to the critiques of development theory, projects, and methods used by anthropologists to study development projects. The course also intends to orient students to the knowledge related to environment and development. |
| ANTH 504 | INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE | 4 | The course is designed to expose the students to an understanding of indigenous knowledge. Emphasis has been given to analyze the impact of rapid modernization on indigenous knowledge. The course also intends to orient students about the importance of studying the practical applications of the hidden transcript of knowledge. |
| ANTH 505 | VISUAL ANTHROPOLOGY | 4 | The course is designed to explore the theories and paradigms in visual anthropology by highlighting the artistic/ aesthetic, social scientific, commercial, and political agendas that influence the production of various forms of visual document. Starting from the colonial exhibition of ‘exotic natives’, the course further intends to proceed through photography to classic and contemporary ethnographic film, art, and documentaries with a special focus on Flaherty, Mead, Gardner, Rouch, and MacDougall. The course also offers students practical training in photography and videography. |
| ANTH 506 | HISTORY, MEMORY AND AMNESIA | 4 | The course is based on the perspectives of history from below, subaltern and feminist. It tries to add these perspectives to the changing landscape, objectives, and canvas of history. However, starting from a new inquiry, the discipline of history itself could be useful for social science. It will open the window for history and anthropology to exchange their experiences and applications. |
| ANTH 507 | GLOBAL ETHNOSCAPES: MIGRATION AND DISAPORA | 4 | The main purpose of the course is to equip students with thorough knowledge of the major theoretical and empirical issues in migration and diaspora studies. The course will provide a thorough grounding in critical theoretical approaches to migration, space, and identity, race and hybridity, the gendered construction of nationhood, and cultural identity concerning globalization and transnationalism. Theoretically, the course will focus on various perspectives of transnationalism and transnational activism and how these are related to processes of migration, diaspora politics, and forced migration and displacement. The course will analyze how these interact and affect collective and individual action at a global, national, and local level and what impacts these have on multicultural societies. |
| ANTH 508 | POPULATION ANTHROPOLOGY | 4 | The purpose of this course is to orient students to the uses of anthropological theories and methods in understanding population dynamics. Conventionally, demography, or population studies include fertility, mortality, and migration through the application of statistical tools. Currently, cultural anthropologists have come forward to examine the relationships between population dynamics and culture using qualitative approaches which will be covered in this course. |
| ANTH 509 | ANTHROPOLOGY AND PUBLIC HEALTH | 4 | This course focuses on many issues related to public health. It discusses the key debates concerning emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, Malaria, etc. It also highlights non-communicable diseases and discusses how anthropologists are engaged themselves to deal with such issues in policy-making as well as in interventional level. Alongside this, it provides a detail of the political, economic, and cultural complexity of most health problems of the “Third World Countries”. Finally, it points out the success and limitation of various health programs implemented in Bangladesh and other societies. |
| Code | Course title | Credits | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ANTH 551 | POSTCOLONIAL STUDIES: HIBRIDITY AND OTHERNESS | 4 | The course aims at exploring, otherness, and hybridity, both concerned with identity, the two theoretical concepts that have been central to postcolonial theory in anthropology. ‘Otherness’ is a western philosophical concept that postcolonial theory has primarily sought to critique and repudiate, while hybridity is generally considered an ‘invention’ of postcolonial thought, a radical substitute for hegemonic ideas of cultural identity like racial purity and nationality. |
| ANTH 552 | ANTHROPOLOGY OF MIND AND EMOTION | 4 | The course aims at unfolding some theoretical and methodological assumptions to examine the implicit ideology of the emotions which have conventionally been associated with femininity and in opposition to the reason (or rationality), while reason accorded the higher value. This course draws on the assumption that studying the theorization and expression of the emotions is itself a study in the politics and values of a culture. Emotions vary from culture to culture and at the same time also have histories within cultures. Therefore, the course intends to explore emotions as a source of knowledge. |
| ANTH 553 | ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE BODY | 4 | The purpose of this course is to introduce the major debates and theoretical approaches to the study of the body from an anthropological perspective. This course considers the body as a site of diversified meanings and looks at how socio-cultural, historical, and political processes shape the idea of the body in different cultural settings. It examines the mechanisms that regulate and control the body and the processes by which bodies resist. |
| ANTH 554 | DISASTER ANTHROPOLOGY | 4 | The main purpose of the course is to offer students an overview of a variety of natural and man-made disasters. It will also examine how society is prepared for, response to, and recovers from specific events of the disaster from an anthropological perspective. The course will allow students access to scientific storytelling, social research, and theories on disasters. Students will gather an increased appreciation of the complexities associated with planning for and responding to natural and man-made disasters. Students will also learn how disasters emerge from the confluence of hazard, risk, and the social construction of vulnerability. |
| ANTH 555 | COSMIC ANTHROPOLOGY | 4 | The purpose of this course is to give theoretical understanding to the student to explore the numerous dimensions of the fundamental concepts in cosmic anthropology such as living universe, nature, sound, space, time, mind, etc. Taking this course in the postgraduate anthropology program students will be able to help facilitate the birthing and renewal of life-giving socio-economic and political structures so that everyone may have access to live and live it to their fullest potential and help to understand the dynamics of the earth changes from flat at a shallow perspective to spherical at a larger perspective. It will help students to view the present epoch in the history of our planet and permanent deleterious changes in the entire earth from a cosmic perspective. In the modern age, the importance of the study of cosmic anthropology has arisen in connection with issues such as global warming and species extinction for sustainable development of human culture, society, and the entire universe. |
| ANTH 556 | SYMBOLIC ANTHROPOLOGY | 4 | The major objective of this course is to provide students with an introduction to the theoretical trends in symbolic anthropology; to the purposes and limitations involved in studying the cultural contexts of symbols. Lectures and readings will be oriented at introducing students to the available theories and methods. The students will learn to critically discuss, defend, and write about ideas presented in class. On completion of this course, the students are expected to be able to get adequate knowledge about the sign, semiotics, and symbolism; understand various symbolic methods and theories properly; evaluate the diverse social structure and cultural contexts from a symbolic perspective; and apply symbolic anthropological theories to explain and analyze social and cultural dynamism. |
| ANTH 557 | BUSINESS, SOCIETY AND CULTURE | 4 | The purpose of this course is to apply the theories and methods of cultural anthropology in studying business in the local and global contexts. The objective is to give students a clear understanding of how businesses operate in different societies and cultures. Case studies of how businesses interact with the local societies, cultures, and environments will be taken from Bangladesh, India, China, Japan, the USA, and the UK. |
| ANTH 558 | ANTHROPOLOGY OF PUBLIC POLICY | 4 | This course attempts to broaden the scope of anthropological inquiry by shifting emphasis from the daily practices of local actors “on the ground” to the daily practices of policymakers, government bureaucrats, and the staff of international financial agencies such as the IMF and the World Bank who are explicitly and implicitly engaged in the negotiation and mediation of policy at the national and international levels. At a time when anthropologists are increasingly turning their attention to social and cultural phenomena of global reach and magnitude, the policy offers a lens through which to view the articulation of knowledge and power, upon which contemporary regimes of governance are based. This course will pursue questions including: What is the state, anthropologically speaking? How do specific policies come into being, and what makes them effective (or ineffective) instruments of governance? What is the relationship between policy forms and contemporary discourses of neoliberalism and globalization? How can ethnographic projects capture the critical dimensions of policymaking? What types of methodological challenges does the anthropology of policy pose? |
| ANTH 559 | CULTURAL HERITAGE STUDIES | 4 | The objective of this course is to introduce students to a range of theoretical and practical issues of cultural heritage and the major challenges of the management of cultural properties/ heritage resources. The course discusses the relations of heritage studies with anthropology, archaeology, history, natural and cultural resource management, tourism, and other allied disciplines. The course provides an opportunity to explore, analyze, and evaluate the state of the art and emerging trends in the description and digital collection of heritage in libraries, archives, and museums. It examines the principles and practices to enhance people’s access to cultural heritage materials, make easy digital content and articulation of digital technologies. Case studies of heritage from both developed and developing world will be selected for special focus. |
| ANTH 560 | MASTER'S THESIS | 4 | The course is designed to engage students in the field taking experiences gathered from the first, second third, and the fourth year of fieldwork. This course will provide an approach to common concepts and methodologies in anthropology relating to ethnographic fieldwork. At the end of the fieldwork, students will have to write a Master's thesis. This is a 4 credit course equivalent to 100 marks. and the examination of the Master's thesis has two parts: an examination of the written thesis (80 marks) and viva-voce (20 marks). |
| ANTH 561 | COMPREHENSIVE AND VIVA-VOCE | 4 | The course Comprehensive and Viva-Voce has two parts: written comprehensive (50 marks) and oral defense (50 marks). Students will sit for this Comprehensive and Viva-Voce examination during 2nd semester of the MSS (Masters) program. It will test their learning from the MSS program. |