Veidlapa Nr. M-3 (8)

Course Description Status: Approved

Course Description Version: 25/26.R.1.00

Description Period: 2025./26 academic year rudens semestris

Study Course Accepted: -

Study Course Description

Regional Studies (Ethnography): the Caribbean Sea Region

Main Study Course Information

Course Code
KSK_038
Branch of Science
Social Anthropology; Sociology and social work
ECTS
6.00
Target Audience
Sociology
LQF
Level 7
Study Type And Form
Full-Time

Study Course Implementer

Course Supervisor
Dita Auziņa
Structure Unit Manager
Ieva Puzo
Structural Unit
Faculty of Social Sciences
Contacts

Dzirciema street 16, Rīga, szf@rsu.lv

About Study Course

Objective

The objectives of the course are: 1. The course will allow the student to become more familiar with the geography of the region, the main currents of Caribbean studies, and some of the analytical frameworks that have been used to understand its social and cultural life. 2. To critically assess different media and disciplinary approaches (ie, film, fiction literature, music, life-history, ethnography, geography, etc.) dedicated to the study of Caribbean societies, from an anthropological perspective. 3. To explore, in a preliminary way, the role the Caribbean played in the processes of Western modernity. The course seeks to provide a framework within which to better understand the Caribbean's diversity and the cultural and social distinctiveness of this region of transplanted peoples on its own terms

Preliminary Knowledge

Previous basic knowledge in anthropology.

Learning Outcomes

Knowledge

1.After completing the course, the student will gain autonomous knowledge about an unknown or little-known subject (= social anthropology in the Caribbean, Caribbean culture and society). Knows their ethnography.

Skills

1.After completing the course, you will be able to independently navigate and understand the academic literature on the specific region, will be able to analyze it; will be able to understand and reason about theoretical concepts and empirical research; will be able to conceptualize and develop academic presentations on the given topic, draw (own) conclusions.

Competences

1.Will acquire competences in independent acquisition of knowledge about the specific region, will be able to apply critical thinking, will understand and be able to apply scientific activities (text reading, analysis, comparison and discussion).

Assessment

Individual work

Title
% from total grade
Grade
1.

Individual work
-
-
Preparing the literature for each class/topic, preparing one presentation about a topic (given by the lecturer). In order to evaluate the quality of the study course as a whole, the student must fill out the study course evaluation questionnaire on the Student Portal.

Examination

Title
% from total grade
Grade
1.

Examination
-
-
Will be discussed with the students at the first meeting. Independent works; exam.

Study Course Theme Plan

FULL-TIME
Part 1

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Delimiting the Caribbean & Theories of Pre-European Life & European Contact

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Delimiting the Caribbean & Theories of Pre-European Life & European Contact

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Delimiting the Caribbean & Theories of Pre-European Life & European Contact

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Nation Building and popular culture

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Nation Building and popular culture

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Nation Building and popular culture

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Nation Building and popular culture

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Nation Building and popular culture

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Nation Building and popular culture

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Lecture

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Religion & society

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Migration, transnationalism and Diaspora

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Migration, transnationalism and Diaspora

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Migration, transnationalism and Diaspora

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Migration, transnationalism and Diaspora

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Migration, transnationalism and Diaspora

  1. Class/Seminar

Modality
Location
Contact hours
On site
Auditorium
2

Topics

Migration, transnationalism and Diaspora
Total ECTS (Creditpoints):
6.00
Contact hours:
48 Academic Hours
Final Examination:
Exam (Written)

Bibliography

Required Reading

1.

Perry Henzell. (1972). “The Harder they Come”.

2.

Benítez-Rojo, Antonio. (1996). Fernando Ortiz: the Caribbean and postmodernity. The Repeating Island: The Caribbean and the Postmodern Perspective. Durham: Duke University Press.

3.

Besson, Jean & Chevannes, Barry. (1996). The continuity-creativity debate: The case of Revival. The New West Indian Guide. 70.3 & 4: 209-228

4.

Fog Olwig, Karen. (2001). Researching Global Socio-Cultural Fields. Paper presented at Workshop on "Transnational Migration: Comparative Perspectives". Princeton University.

5.

Glissant, Édouard. (1997). Paths. Poetics of Relation. Michigan: University of Michigan Press.

6.

Hall, Stuart. (1995). Negotiating Caribbean identities. New Left Review: 3-14

7.

Heuman, Gad. (1997).The Social Structure of the Slave Societies in the Caribbean, in Knight, 8. Franklin W. (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume III: The Slave Societies of the Caribbean. Oxford: Palgrave MacMillan Press.

8.

Hulme, Peter and Whitehead, Neil L. (eds.) (1992). Wild majesty : encounters with Caribs from Columbus to the present day : an anthology. Oxford : Clarendon Press.

9.

Irving Rouse. (1953). The Circum-Caribbean Theory, an Archeological Test. American Anthropologist. 55. 2: 188-200

10.

Jean Bernabé, Patrick Chamoiseau, Raphaël Confiant and Mohamed B. Taleb Khyar. (1990). In Praise of Creoleness. Callaloo. 13. 4: 886-909.

11.

Knight, Franklin W. (1997). The disintegration of the Caribbean slave systems, 1772-1886, in Knight, Franklin W. (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume III: The Slave Societies of the Caribbean. Oxford: Palgrave MacMillan Press.

12.

Lefever, Harry G. (1996). When the Saints go Riding in: Santería in Cuba and the United States. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 35.3: 318 – 330.

13.

Maingot, Anthony P. (1987). Haiti: Problems of a Transition to Democracy in an Authoritarian Soft State. Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs. 28.4: 75-102

14.

Manning, Frank E. (1981). Celebrating Cricket: The Symbolic Construction of Caribbean Politics. American Ethnologist. 8. 3: 616-632

15.

Manuel, Peter. (1994). Puerto Rican Music and Cultural Identity: Creative Appropriation of Cuban Sources from Danza to Salsa. Ethnomusicology, 38.2: 249-280

16.

Millette, James. (2004). Decolonization, populist movements and the formation of new nations, 1945-70, in Brereton, Bridget (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume V: The Caribbean in the Twentieth Century

17.

Pérez-Stable, Marifeli. (2004). The Cuban Revolution and its impact on the Caribbean, in Brereton, Bridget (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume V: The Caribbean in the Twentieth Century

18.

Moscoso, Francisco. (2003). Chiefdoms in the islands and mainland: a comparison. in Jalil Sued-Badillo (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume I: Autochthonous Societies. Oxford: Palgrave MacMillan Press.

19.

Price, Richard and Price, Sally. (1997). Shadowboxing in the Mangrove. Cultural Anthropology.

20.

Rivera-Pagán, Luis. (2003). Freedom and servitude: indigenous slavery and the Spanish Conquest of the Caribbean, in Jalil Sued-Badillo (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume I: Autochthonous Societies. Oxford: Palgrave MacMillan Press.

21.

Sanabria, Harry. (2007). The Anthropology of Latin America and the Caribbean. Boston: Pearson Allyn and Bacon.

22.

Sarah Gammage. (2004). Exercising Exit, Voice and Loyalty: A Gender Perspective on Transnationalism in Haiti. Development and Change 35(4): 743–771

23.

Sidney W. Mintz, Sidney W. (1996) .Enduring Substances, Trying Theories: The Caribbean Region as Oikoumene. The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute. 2.2: 289-311.

24.

Silvia W. de Groot, Silvia W. et al. (1997). Maroon communities in the Circum-Caribbean, in Knight, Franklin W. (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume III: The Slave Societies of the Caribbean. Oxford: Palgrave MacMillan Press.

25.

Simpson, George Eaton. (1985). Religion and Justice: Some Reflections on the Rastafarian Movement. Phylon. 46.4: 286 – 291.

26.

Sued-Badillo, Jalil. (2003). The indigenous societies at the time of Conquest in Jalil Sued-Badillo (editor) General History of the Caribbean Volume I: Autochthonous Societies. Oxford: Palgrave MacMillan Press.

27.

Trouillot, Michel-Rolph. (1992). The Caribbean Region: An Open Frontier in Anthropological Theory. Annual Review of Anthropology. 21: 19-42.

28.

Trouillot, Michel-Rolph. (2002). Culture on the Edges: Creolization in the Plantation Context, in Keith Axel, Brian (editor). From the Margins: Historical Anthropology and Its Futures. Duke University Press.

29.

Various Editors. (1999 – 2007). General History of the Caribbean Volume 1-6. Oxford: Palgrave MacMillan Press.