Anthro 289C: Marilyn Strathern: Thinking Through Relations

Spring Quarter 2014

Meeting time: Thursdays, 9:30-11:50am
Meeting place: SBSG 3200
Co-instructors: Mei Zhan and Taylor Nelms
Website: https://eee.uci.edu/14s/60775

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Marilyn Strathern’s formative influence as a scholar can be seen throughout the recent history of
anthropology, as well as in associated intellectual domains, from feminist theory to science
studies. In this course, we will explore a theme to which Strathern has returned again and again
throughout her career: “relation” as constitutive simultaneously of the social and of social
thought. The class is structured around readings of Gender of the Gift (1988) and the book
Strathern has called Gender of the Gift’s “remainder,” Partial Connections (2004 [1991]). These
readings will be supplemented by articles and chapters that elucidate Strathern’s mode of
analysis, her attention to form, and her contributions to debates on exchange, nature/culture, and
political and social theory. In addition, Morten Pedersen and Bill Maurer will visit class as guests
to share their own engagements with Strathern’s thought and method. Throughout, we will pay
close attention to the ways Strathern theorizes anthropological methods and the parallels she
consistently draws between the subject of matter of analysis and the ways anthropologists make
sense of it.

In addition to completing the readings and coming to class prepared to discuss them, students
will be responsible for presenting to the rest of the class, alone or with another student, on one of
the following week’s assigned readings.

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§ Books
Strathern, Marilyn. 1988. The Gender of the Gift. Berkeley: University of California
Press.
Strathern, Marilyn. 2004 (1991). Partial Connections. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.

§ Academic honesty

If you have any questions about what constitutes academic dishonesty, please do not hesitate to
contact us. You can also familiarize yourself with the UCI Policy on Academic Honesty here:
http://www.senate.uci.edu/senateweb/default2.asp?active_page_id=754.

§ Disability information

Students with disabilities who believe they may need accommodations in this class are
encouraged to contact the Disability Services Center at 949-824-7494 or visit the UCI Disability
Services Center’s website (http://disability.uci.edu/).

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§ Weekly Readings

Week 1: April 3
Reading:
1995. The Relation: Issues in Complexity and Scale. Prickly Pear Pamphlet No. 6.
2005. Kinship, Law and the Unexpected: Relatives Are Always a Surprise. Cambridge
University Press, Preface, Introduction, and Chapter 2 (Embedded Science), vii-x, 3-
14, 33-49.
2014. Reading Relations Backwards. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
20(1): 3-19. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-9655.12076/abstract

Week 2: April 10
Visit by Morten Pedersen
Reading:
Pedersen, Morten Axel 2011. Layered Lands, Layered Minds. In Not Quite Shamans:
Spirit Worlds and Political Lines in Northern Mongolia. Cornell University Press,
115-147.
2011. Binary License. Common Knowledge 17(1): 87-103.
http://commonknowledge.dukejournals.org/content/17/1/87.abstract
Pedersen, Morten Axel 2011. Non-identity Politics. Common Knowledge 17(1): 117-122.
http://commonknowledge.dukejournals.org/content/17/1/117.abstract
2011. What Politics? Common Knowledge 17(1): 123-127.
http://commonknowledge.dukejournals.org/content/17/1/123.abstract

Week 3: April 17
Reading:
1980. No Nature, No Culture: The Hagen Case. In Nature, Culture, Gender.
MacCormack and Strathern, eds. Cambridge University Press, 174-222.
1981. Culture in a Netbag: The Manufacture of a Subdiscipline in Anthropology. Man
16: 665-688. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1409963
1985. Discovering ‘Social Control.’ Journal of Law and Society 12(2): 111-134.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1409963
1992. Qualified Value: The Perspective of Gift Exchange. In Barter, Exchange and
Value. Humphrey & Hugh-Jones, eds. Cambridge University Press, 169–191.

Week 4: April 24
Reading:
Gender of the Gift: Preface, Acknowledgement, and Chapters 1-4, ix-xv, 3-97

Week 5: May 1
Reading:
Gender of the Gift: Chapters 5-8, 98-224

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Week 6: May 8
Reading:
Gender of the Gift: Chapters 9-12, 225-345

Week 7: May 15
Reading:
Partial Connections: introductory material and Part 1, xiii-xxxiv, 1-55

Week 8: May 22
Reading:
Partial Connections: Part 2, 57-119

Week 9: May 29
Visit by Bill Maurer
Reading: TBA

Week 10: June 5

Reading:
1996. Cutting the Network. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 2(3): 517-535.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3034901
1999. Property, Substance and Effect: Anthropological Essays on Persons and Things.
London: Athlone Press, Chapter 1 and Chapter 1 Concluded, 1-26, 227-261
2005. Kinship, Law and the Unexpected. Cambridge University Press, Part 2 Introduction
and Chapter 4, 81-110.