This course is taught in English.
In this semester-long course, we will be reading a selection of texts that have informed the anthropological study of visual and material objects of art in the second half of the twentieth century. We will be focusing less on the ethnographic content of these essays and more on the concepts and methodologies they are explicitly or implicitly committed to. The topics that will be discussed include: What constitutes the anthropological approach to art and aesthetic phenomena? How do anthropologists define art?; What differentiates the social sciences from the humanities in their treatment of art?; What is the function of art within a society according to anthropologies of art?
- Teacher: Jakub Stejskal