ANTHROPOLOGY AT BOSTON UNIVERSITYOur program offers rigorous training in social and cultural theory and commitment to an anthropology capable of engaging the modern world. We focus on four interrelated topics: the culture, politics and economics of development; the anthropological study of history; the psychocultural relationship between individual and society; and the comparative anthropology of the world religions, with special attention to Islam. Our area strengths include the Middle East, Africa, and East Asia. The majority of our staff are directly involved in research at the boundaries of economic change, culture, and history. The department has a long tradition of expertise in development theory and practice as well as more general anthropological issues. Two of us (Hefner and Weller) are associated with the Institute for the Study of Economic Culture, which sponsors cross-cultural research precisely on the link between cultural values and political-economic change. We also believe that an adequate study of development and change requires achieving an historical perspective. All of our faculty, in one way or another, undertake historical research, including work on topics such as the evolution of civil society, the rise and fall of social movements, and the development of modern "identities" - personal, ethnic, and national. Some of us also study the relationship between cultural context, biological disposition and individual motivation, while others investigate the way gender and culture intersect. Finally, religion, as the ultimate source of value systems, is of central importance in our agenda. To undertake comparative research on values, our Department has developed the largest center in the United States for the anthropological study of the Islamic world in all its geographic and political diversity: Indonesia (Hefner), Afghanistan and Central Asia (Barfield), Iran and Pakistan (Haeri), Pakistan (Lindholm), the Arab countries (Norton), and Turkey (J. White). We have access as well to a large and active group of scholars in the rest of the University community and the Boston area who study Muslim literature, politics and history. The Anthropology Department also has an extremely strong African studies component, which is enhanced by the close ties of two of our faculty (Shipton and Pritchett) with Boston University's world renowned African Studies Center. The Center provides students with scholarly resources, financial aid, language training, and a wide variety of specialist courses. Another areal strength is in East and Southeast Asia. Our staff study topics as varied as the ecological movement in East Asia (Weller), educational methods in Japan (M. White), and religious conversion in Indonesia (Hefner). In sum, our program is devoted to gaining an understanding the complex interplay of culture, history, political economy, and psychology. We favor cross-disciplinary study, and encourage innovative approaches to ethnography. Our pedagogical aim is to unite analytical insight with a sensitivity to the constraints and possibilities of the human condition For further information about the graduate degree programs in the Department of Anthropology, contact: Boston University March 2001 |
August 15, 2001