Human Nature Exploration

Cultural Anthropology 2021

For Cultural Anthropology 2021, we read the second edition of Introducing Anthropology by Laura Pountney and Tomislav Marić. The subtitle of their text is “What makes us human?” The theme of the course was how we can work toward realizing our own humanity, by recognizing the humanity of others and attempting to radically listen to other perspectives. This human nature exploration formed the core of our anthropological inquiry. Here is the YouTube Playlist of lectures:

For an update, here is a YouTube Lecture Playlist from Cultural Anthropology 2024:

Part 1: What makes us human?

Human Biology & Culture

• Chapter 1, “What makes us human?”

Rethink Evolution

• Agustin Fuentes, “‘The Descent of Man,’ 150 years on”
• Elizabeth Preston, “Did Dads Evolve?”

Researching Culture

• Chapter 2, “Research Methods”

Body

• Chapter 3, “The Body”

Thinking

• Chapter 4, “Ways of Thinking & Communicating”

Part 2: Society, Nature, Identity

Social Relations

• Chapter 5, “Social Relations”

Science & Sustainability

• Chapter 6, “Engaging with Nature”

Persons

• Chapter 7, “Personhood”

Identity

• Chapter 8, “Identity”

Ritual

• Chapter 9, “Ritual”

Part 3: Boundaries & Beyond

Gender

• Chapter 10 (part 1 of 2), “Gender” (280-296)

Gender Alternatives

• Chapter 10 (part 2 of 2), “Alternative Gender Identities” (296-307)

Phases of Globalization and Globalization Trends

• Chapter 12, “Globalization”

Boundaries

• Chapter 11, “Boundaries”

Material Culture

• Chapter 13, “The Role of Material Culture”

Applying Anthro

• Chapter 14, “Applied Anthropology”

Human Nature Exploration: Conclusions

This was one of those courses that I finally learned what the course might be about at the very end. I hope we all learned a lot as we went along, but things really took shape during the conclusion. This was when the authors wrote: “Anthropology is the only contemporary discipline that approaches human questions from historical, biological, linguistic and cultural perspectives” (421). As is so often the case, that should have been at the beginning! Our human nature exploration through anthropology provided a unique lens to understand ourselves and others. See here for the YouTube lecture from the final class:

Related: Human Nature Exploration

This course is part of a series of Cultural Anthropology courses that have evolved over time. Other versions of Cultural Anthropology include:

• The 2024 course as a Cultural Anthropology Toolkit
• Cultural Anthropology 2023: A Global Toolkit
• Cultural Anthro 2022
• Cultural Anthropology 2021 using Introducing Anthropology
• Cultural Anthro 2020 with Ken Guest’s Essentials of Cultural Anthropology