Examination arrangement

Course content

Globalisation is the buzzword of the 21st century. Yet the global is not a given and must be reproduced through intense and highly unequal exchanges. Today the Internet, mobile phones, and cheaper airplane tickets are accelerating and complicating these exchanges. Multinational corporations, financial markets and free-trade agreements are producing global flows of merchandise, capital, movies and advertisements on a scale and speed as never before. The global movement of images and ideas is no longer impeded by the maintenance of a costly infrastructure that once separated the "developed" from the "underdeveloped" worlds. Thus, the world is undergoing a transition in which communities are becoming interconnected through myriad economic, political, and technological changes. Many of these changes are induced from several centers, especially "the West," and this process affects people’s lives and cultures in new and often unpredictable ways.

This course examines how local cultures, ecologies, and people’s lives are being affected by "globalisation" in multiple and not necessarily positive ways. For analytical purposes, we reflect on globalisation through three distinct processes:

1. The emergent Anthropocene reflects a historical break from a world composed of a natural order to a highly-managed human-centric world characterized by imposing unsustainable risks to the global environment.
2. Statecraft and the post-national order examines the rise of our current geopolitical formation by examining the transformations in the global order that bind people, states, and territories as well as the challenges of transnational processes and institutions.
3. Digital worlds and flows draws attention to the rising amounts and faster deliveries of information that accompany the movements of people and things, suggesting a new knowledge-driven economy, one that is fragmented by its reliance on end users as much as on its producers.

Learning outcome

Learning Outcome: The students shall gain knowledge of recent anthropological approaches to globalization with an emphasis on the twin role of Culture and Power in these analyses. The specific objective is to gain insights into how globalization is conceptualized through different and diverse combinations of practices which produce meaning and how anthropological theory contributes to established concepts of globalization.

Skills: The course provides insights into different ethnographic, historical, and analytical approaches for understanding theories of power in the historical and contemporary development of globalization.

Learning methods and activities

Lectures and seminars.

Please note that mandatory activities and lectures may start prior to the registration deadline.

Mandatory activity The mandatory activity in this course is a oral presentation of a group assignment. The mandatory activity will be assessed as approved or not approved. The mandatory activity has to be approved in order to qualify for the exam.

SANT2020, SANT2021, SANT2024 and SANT3508 Minimum 15 credits will be offered in the spring semester. Which courses that are offered will be announced in the course description.

Compulsory assignments

• Plenary presentation of group assignment

Further on evaluation

The examination is a group exam.

Retake exam Is is possible to retake the exam, but the examination is only offered in the spring semester.

Specific conditions

Required previous knowledge

Either 60 ECTS in Social Anthropology or a bachelor's degree or equivalent.

Course materials

See reading list available at the beginning of the semester.

Credit reductions