Preliminary reading list
Below is a preliminary reading list which you might like to explore in the coming months - through borrowing some of the titles from your local library rather than buying them. Please note, however, that you are not obliged to do any reading before the course begins.
For students who have a limited background in social anthropology, it may be useful to read one of the following textbooks.
R.M. Keesing & Andrew Strathern Cultural anthropology: a contemporary perspective
T.H. Eriksen Small places, large issues: an introduction to social and cultural anthropology
M. Carrithers Why humans have cultures: explaining anthropology and social diversity
There is no single textbook for any of the Development Studies Institute MSc programmes but the following are generally useful:
E. A. Brett, Reconstructing Development Theory: International Inequality, Institutional Reform and Social Emancipation (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).
H-J Chang, (ed.) Rethinking Development Economics (London: Anthem, 2003)
J. Ferguson, The Anti-Politics Machine: ‘Development’, Depoliticisation and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994 [1990])
D. Mosse, Cultivating Development: An Ethnography of Aid Policy and Practice (Pluto Press, 2004)
D. North, J.J. Wallis, B.R.Weingast, Violence and Social Orders: A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting Recorded Human History (Cambridge, 2009)
D. Rodrik, One Economics, Many Recipes: Globalization, Institutions, and Economic Growth (Princeton University Press, 2008)
A.K. Sen, Development As Freedom (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1999)
A.K. Sen, The Idea of Justice (Allen Lane, 2009)
S. Chari and S. Corbridge (eds.) The Development Reader (London: Routledge, 2008)
M. Todaro and S. Smith, Economic Development (New York: Addison-Wesley, 2008) – remains one of the key textbooks in development studies
To familiarise yourself with the work of the LSE Department of Anthropology, you might also like to read some of the books written by members of staff. You can see recent publications on the Anthropology Department's Recent Books page. We would also recommend the following (depending on your area of interest):
Catherine Allerton, Potent Landscapes: Place and Mobility in Eastern Indonesia
Rita Astuti, People of the sea
Mukulika Banerjee, The Pathan unarmed
Laura Bear, Lines of the Nation: Indian Railway Workers, Bureaucracy, and the Intimate Historical Self
Maurice Bloch, In and Out of Each Other's Bodies
Maurice Bloch, How we think they think
Maurice Bloch, Essays on cultural transmission
Fenella Cannell, Power and intimacy in the Christian Philippines
Fenella Cannell (ed.), The anthropology of Christianity
Matthew Engelke (co-ed.), The limits of meaning
Stephan Feuchtwang, After the Event: The Transmission of Grievous Loss in Germany, China and Taiwan
Stephan Feuchtwang, Popular religion in China: the imperial metaphor
Deborah James, Gaining Ground? Rights and Property in South African Land Reform
Deborah James, Culture Wars: Context, Models and Anthropologists' Accounts
Nicholas Long (Ed), Sociality: New Directions
Mathijs Pelkmans, Ethnographies of Doubt: Faith and Uncertainty in Contemporary Societies
Mathijs Pelkmans, Defending the Border: Identity, religion and modernity in the Republic of Georgia
Mathijs Pelkmans, Conversion after Socialism: Disruptions, Modernisms and Technologies of Faith in the Former Soviet Union
Michael W. Scott, The severed snake: Matrilineages, Making Place, and a Melanesian Christianity in Southeast Solomon Islands
Charles Stafford, Ordinary Ethics in China
Charles Stafford, The roads of Chinese childhood
Charles Stafford, Separation and reunion in modern China
Hans Steinmuller, Communities of Complicity: Everyday Ethics in Rural China
Harry Walker, Under a Watchful Eye: Self, Power and Intimacy in Amazonia
Course availability
The table below contains a listing of our intended Anthropology courses for 2016/17, but please note that these may be subject to change due to circumstances beyond our control. We have also included a listing of courses which have been run recently, but which are not available this year, for your information.
Courses marked with an (H) are half units.
The online registration facility for choosing courses is usually released onto LSE for You in September, and you will have until midday on 10 October to make your selections.
Some courses are capped to a certain maximum size. Caps are set, or not, by the Department owning each course. Details of which courses are to be capped are not yet available. Please be aware that Departments may give preference to students registered on their own programmes when offering places on capped courses.
Paper
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Course number and title (H = half unit)
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1
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AN436 The Anthropology of Development (H) and either
AN456 Anthropology of Economy (1): Production and Exchange (H) or
AN457 Anthropology of Economy (2): Transformation and Globalisation (H)
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2
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DV400 Development: History, Theory and Policy or
DV442 Key Issues in Development Studies (H) and
One half unit in Development (DV4**) from paper 3.
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3
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One full unit, or two half units, from the following:
AN402 The Anthropology of Religion
AN404 Anthropology: Theory and Ethnography
AN405 The Anthropology of Kinship, Sex and Gender
AN444 Investigating the Philippines- New Approaches and Ethnographic Contexts (H)
AN447 China in Comparative Perspective
AN451 Anthropology of Politics (H)
AN461The Anthropology of Ontology (H)
AN467 The Anthropology of South Asia (H)
AN473 Anthropological Approaches to Value (H)
DV407 Poverty (H)
DV413 Environmental Problems and Development Interventions (H)
DV415 Global Environmental Governance (H)
DV418 African Development (H)
DV428 Managing Humanitarianism (H)
DV490 Economic Development Policy I: Applied Policy Analysis for Macroeconomic Development (H)
DV492 Economic Development Policy III: Government Policy Analysis (H)
GY467 Global Migration and Development (H)
Any other courses offered by Anthropology or Development Studies, as approved.
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4
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AN499 Dissertation
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Notes
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The following courses will not be available in 2016/17:
AN419 The Anthropology of Christianity (H)
AN420 The Anthropology of Southeast Asia (H)
AN424 The Anthropology of Melanesia (H)
AN437 Anthropology of Learning and Cognition
AN439 Anthropology and Human Rights (H)
AN458 Children and Youth in Contemporary Ethnography (H)
AN459 Anthropology and Media (H)
AN469 The Anthropology of Amazonia (H)
AN474 Subjectivity and Anthropology (H)
AN475 The Anthropology of Revolution (H)
DV420 Complex Emergencies (H)
DV429 Global Civil Society I (H)
DV491 Economic Development Policy II: Microeconomic Analysis (H)
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Provisional Timetable
The provisional timetable for 2016/17 is not yet available. Larger Anthropology courses, such as AN404 will have multiple seminars each week. You will be put into a group at the beginning of term and will only need to attend one seminar per week in addition to the weekly lecture.
Welcome week
In the week before the start of teaching in the Michaelmas term we and the Department of International Development will be having departmental orientation sessions for all new students. These are in addition to the LSE's Welcome Week events, and they will provide you with important information about the department and your programme of study, as well as giving you the opportunity to meet your new peers and getting to know the academic and administrative staff, who will be able to answer your questions.