ANTH 1550 - ETHNOGRAPHY OF SPORT

Minimum Credits: 3
Maximum Credits: 3
This course will equip students with the fundamentals of qualitative research practices applied in the social spaces associated with Sport. Students will learn and appreciate the social complexity of sporting worlds as sites for ethnographic research but also anthropological theorizing on the human experience. Sport offers a lot to anthropological discourse because it is both part of the mundane but also highly ritualized. In this course students will have an opportunity to research the global and cross-cultural impact of sport and its impact on local social life, institutions and processes. Following the work of activist anthropology this course will teach students that "critical engagement brought about by activist research is both necessary and productive. [An activist research practice] allows us to merge cultural critique with political action to produce knowledge that is empirically grounded, theoretically valuable, and ethically viable." (Speed 2006). Students will explore sporting worlds in terms of relationships of power, political and social inequity and social action. This course will explore major conceptual work on the role and ethical responsibility of anthropological research and social justice issues. Students will be required to participate in methodological exercises that will require engagement on site during the program. This course will be taught as part of the Pitt at the Women's World Cup Summer Study Abroad Program in Australia.
Academic Career: Undergraduate
Course Component: Lecture
Grade Component: LG/SNC Elective Basis

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