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Semester 1

Waste: Anthropologies of Pollution and Repair (SCAN10090)

Subject

Social Anthropology

College

CAHSS

Credits

20

Normal Year Taken

3

Delivery Session Year

2023/2024

Pre-requisites

Visiting students must have completed at least 3 Social Anthropology courses at grade B or above, including a suitable background in Sustainable Development or a related subject area. We will only consider University/College level courses.

Course Summary

From contemporary economic and ecological wastelands of the anthropocene to cultural theories of waste and pollution, this course surveys anthropological approaches waste. Reading ethnographic case studies and social theory, It critically examines the production and designation of people, things, and places as waste, the concomitant diversity of social and institutional practices of waste management, and how these are entangled with the construction of social differences of race, class, and gender.

Course Description

Waste is all around us. A product of everyday life, of economic activity, of regimes of bodily care and hygiene, waste is an inescapable aspect of contemporary culture and a central element in the constitution of cultural difference. This course examines what the world looks like from the vantage point of its waste streams and the diverse efforts to repair a polluted world. Taking up classic and contemporary anthropological approaches to waste and pollution, the course asks: Where is "away" when we throw things away? How do people, things and places become disposable? And what socio-technical imaginaries shape contemporary waste management initiatives? Under what conditions might alternatives to disposability and possibilities for socio-ecological remediation flourish? Indicative themes include: Cultural theories of waste and pollution; Comparative studies of waste regimes; Coloniality of waste and pollution; Toxicity and embodiment; 'Throw-Away culture'; Disposability as an economic system; Circular economies; Sanitary urbanism; Waste work & informal infrastructures. Student Learning experience. The course is taught through weekly 2-hour sessions that combine lectures and seminars. Some weeks' lecture content may be pre-recorded to make extra time in-seminar for hands-on activities & flipped classroom engagement. In this case students will be expected to view lectures before course meetings. Assessments are a Short Essay (40%) and a Long Essay (60%).

Assessment Information

Written Exam 0%, Coursework 100%, Practical Exam 0%

view the timetable and further details for this course