1
课程详述
COURSE SPECIFICATION
以下课程信息可能根据实际授课需要或在课程检讨之后产生变动。如对课程有任何疑问，请联
系授课教师。
The course information as follows may be subject to change, either during the session because of unforeseen
circumstances, or following review of the course at the end of the session. Queries about the course should be
directed to the course instructor.
1.
课程名称 Course Title
生命历程的人类学
Birth, Death, and Life in-between: Anthropology of the Life Course
2.
授课院系
Originating Department
社会科学中心 Center for Social Sciences
3.
课程编号
Course Code
SS070
4.
课程学分 Credit Value
2
5.
课程类别
Course Type
通识选修课程 General Education (GE) Elective Courses
6.
授课学期
Semester
春季 Spring
7.
授课语言
Teaching Language
英文 English
8.
授课教师、所属学系、联系方
式（如属团队授课，请列明其
他授课教师）
Instructor(s), Affiliation&
Contact
（For team teaching, please list
all instructors）
Erin Thomason,
南方科技大学人文社会科学荣誉学会 PhD, Junior Fellow, Society of Fellows, SUSTech
Thomasonee@mail.sustech.edu.cn
9.
实验员/助教、所属学系、联系
方式
Tutor/TA(s), Contact
无 NA
10.
选课人数限额(可不填)
Maximum Enrolment
（Optional）
2
授课方式
Delivery Method
讲授
Lectures
习题/辅导/讨论
Tutorials
其它(请具体注明)
Other（Please specify）
总学时
Total
11.
学时数
Credit Hours
32
32
12.
先修课程、其它学习要求
Pre-requisites or Other
Academic Requirements
无 NA
13.
后续课程、其它学习规划
Courses for which this course
is a pre-requisite
无 NA
14.
其它要求修读本课程的学系
Cross-listing Dept.
无 NA
教学大纲及教学日历 SYLLABUS
15.
教学目标 Course Objectives
While each one of us grows from baby to adult, and confronts the reality of death, how we go about moving from one life
stage to another is very much shaped by the times and places in which we live. This semester-long undergraduate
seminar addresses major themes of the anthropology of life course. How do other societies understand birth, death, and
life in-between? The first part of the course covers major theoretical and methodological approaches in life course
research. Focusing on Anthropology, we also cover interdisciplinary topics drawn from Sociology, Demography, Human
Geography to consider the significance of age, culture, and generation in human experience. The second half of the
course is divided into major life stages from birth to death. Students will complete three short essays, a group
presentation, and an end of semester open-note exam.Upon the completion of this course,
Students will become familiar with basic theories in the life course.
Students will compare and contrast life ways in different societies.
Students will demonstrate learning of a different social system through essay and presentation.
Students will illustrate knowledge of international academic conventions.
16.
预达学习成果 Learning Outcomes
Students will become familiar with life courses in different societies.
Students will access, analyse and evaluate academic writing in English.
Students will advance communication skills in speech and writing.
Students will relate their learning of social patterns to their own realms of experience and compare and contrast cultural
life ways.
17.
课程内容及教学日历 （如授课语言以英文为主，则课程内容介绍可以用英文；如团队教学或模块教学，教学日历须注明
主讲人）
Course Contents (in Parts/Chapters/Sections/Weeks. Please notify name of instructor for course section(s), if
this is a team teaching or module course.)
3
2 hours per week, 32 hours in total.
Week 1: Constructions of age, what is “the life course?”
Basic introduction to themes of the life course, including theoretical perspectives and methodological debates.
Introduction to the course.
Week 2: The Life Course Perspective: Methods and approaches to studies of life course
Instructor will discuss the life course perspective further and discuss specific types of studies, benefits and drawbacks of
life course and life course methods
Week 3: Principal 1: Time and place
Students will read short stories which give a different perspective to ideas of time and place. Students will discuss issues
of generation. Assignment 1: Diagram the period of “generations” as far back as you can. What characterizes a
generation? What events have changed this generation? In class, compare to generational splits in other societies.
Week 4: Principal 2: Transitions—(groups assigned for projects)
Review Rites of Passage, Liminality and concepts of transitions in different societies.
Week 5: Principal 3: Agency
What is agency and control? Is it important to everyday life? Why or why not? Assignment 2: Venn diagram: what you
can control and what you can’t. do you feel control or agency is important, why or why not?
Week 6: Birth
Students will learn how birth is undertaken in several different societies. Group Presentation 1: Choose birth in culture
not covered in the class reading and make a presentation about it. Include your comparison for giving birth in China or
your home country. What options are available for giving birth? Watch, The Business of Being Born (2008) Abby Epstien,
Dir, 1 hr. 27 mins
Week 7: Infancy
Instructor will discuss how infancy, ways of understanding infancy differs in other societies. Film: Bathing Babies in
Three Cultures, Gregory Baetson 1954, 12:34 mins Group Presentation 2: Small (1999) Chapter 5, infant crying, include
a discussion about how crying babies are soothed in China or your home country.
Week 8: Childhood
How does childhood differ in different contexts? Instructor will guide students into a comparative discussion of different
kinds of childhood. Short Essay 1: Write 1-2 pages about a memory from childhood. It could be an ordinary memory,
something poignant or emotional, or simply a favorite event. Write a paragraph about why you selected the memory that
you did and what you think it might say about childhood in your cultural context. Integrate the themes from Lancy’s
discussion of different childhoods.
Week 9: Adolescence
Is adolescence always difficult in every society? When does childhood end and adulthood begin? Students will begin to
think through how rites of passage (discussed in week 4) apply to human life course. Group Presentation 3: Read
Mead’s Coming of Age in Samoa (Chapters 1-2) and talk about cultural variability in adolescence. What is the biggest
“problem” of adolescence in China or your home country? Why is it a “problem”? How does life course impact this
problem?
4
Week 10: Adulthood
What are markers of adulthood? At what point are we independent from our families? Students will discuss and learn
how competence and independence construct our ideas of being an adult in different societies. Assignment 3: bring in 3
memes or other #adulting examples to share.
Week 11: Parenting
How does parenting expectations differ in different societies? How does this shape childhood experience and the rest of
the family? Group Presentation 4: Read T. Kuan’s article “The heart does one thing, the hand does another” and discuss
the issues of parenting in China or your home country. What do you think it takes to be a “good” mother or father?
Week 12: Aging
Is aging something positive or negative? Students will look at aging in a variety of societies to understand how aging
might be different or similar across the globe. Short Essay 2: Call or visit an elderly person in your family, neighborhood,
or social group. Have a conversation about what you’ve learned in this class and talk to them about what they think
about getting “older”. Write a 1-2 page reflection on this conversation integrating the themes from the reading.
Week 13: Death
Students will study funeral rituals around the world. Film: The Undertaking, Thomas Lynch, 2007, 55:34 minutes,
available on PBS.org Short Essay 3: Reflect on the theme of death, dying, and funeral passages. What is your personal
experience with these themes? Why do you think it’s important to have rituals mark this transition (hint, revisit the life
transitions reading from week 4)?
Week 14: Connecting the life course
Tying together themes in the course, we will discuss how different parts of life might impact other phases.
Week 15: Final Day Ⅰ. Wrap up review
Week 16: Final Day Ⅱ. Open note exam
18.
教材及其它参考资料 Textbook and Supplementary Readings
Van Gennep, A. 1960. The Rites of Passage University of Chicago Press
Davis-Floyd, Robbie and Melissa Cheyney. 2019. Birth in Eight Cultures. 1 edition. Waveland Press, Inc.
Lynch, Caitrin, and Jason Danely, eds. 2013. Transitions and Transformations: Cultural Perspectives on Aging and the
Life Course. Berghahn Books.
Riley, Matilda W. 1987. “On the Significance of Age in Sociology.” American Sociological Review 52:1-14.
Furstenberg, Frank, Jr. “Growing Up Is Harder to Do.” Contexts 3(3):33-41.
Kinsella, Kevin. 2002. “Demographic Dimensions of Global Aging.” Journal of Family Issues 21:541-558.
Glen H. Elder, Jr. 1994. “Time, Human Agency, and Social Change: Perspectives on the Life Course.” Social
Psychology Quarterly 57:4-15.
Short Fiction:
“Civil Peace” by Chinua Achebe (1971)
5
“Six Feet of the Country” by Nadine Gordimer (1953)
“We Didn’t Like Him” by Akhil Sharma (2013)
Van Gennep, A. 1960. The Rites of Passage University of Chicago Press (selections)
Linda K. George. 1993. “Sociological Perspectives on Life Transitions.” Annual Review of Sociology 19:353-373.
Hitlin, Steven, and Glen H. Elder, Jr. 2007. “Time, Self, and the Curiously Abstract Concept of Agency.” Sociological
Theory 25:170-191.
Ahearn, Laura M. 1999. “Agency.” Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 9 (1/2): 12–15.
Watch, The Business of Being Born (2008) Abby Epstien, Dir, 1 hr. 27 mins
Small, Meredith F. 1999. Our Babies, Ourselves: How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Parent. New York:
Random House. (chapters 2-3)
Film: Bathing Babies in Three Cultures, Gregory Baetson 1954, 12:34 mins
Arnett, Jeffrey J. 2000. “Emerging Adulthood: A Theory of Development from the Late Teens Through the Twenties.”
American Psychologist 55(5):469-480.
Schlegel, Alice, and Bonnie L. Hewlett. 2011. “Contributions of Anthropology to the Study of Adolescence.” Journal of
Research on Adolescence 21 (1): 281–89. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1532-7795.2010.00729.x.
http://linguisticanthropology.org/blog/2018/04/02/adulting-disordered-state-american-adulthood/ Blog post,
Settersten, Richard A., Timothy M. Ottusch, and Barbara Schneider. 2015. “Becoming Adult: Meanings of Markers to
Adulthood.” In Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences, edited by Robert Scott and Stephend Kosslyn,
1–16. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118900772.etrds0021.
Cabrera, Natasha, Catherine S. Tamis‐LeMonda, Robert H. Bradley, Sandra Hofferth, and Michael E. Lamb. 2000.
“Fatherhood in the Twenty-First Century.” Child Development 71 (1): 127–36. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-
8624.00126.
Miller, Daniel. 1997. “How Infants Grow Mothers in North London.” Theory, Culture & Society 14 (4): 67–88.
https://doi.org/10.1177/026327697014004003.
Palgi, Phyllis and Henry Abramovitch. (1984) “Death: A Cross-Cultural Perspective.” Annual Review of Anthropology.
13: 385-414.
Jane D. McLeod and Elbert P. Almazan. “Connections between Childhood and Adulthood.” Chapter 18 in Mortimer and
Shanahan, eds., Handbook of the Life Course. Springer.
Ferraro, Ken F. and T.P. Shippee. 2009. “Aging and Cumulative Inequality: How Does Inequality Get Under the Skin?”
Gerontologist 49(3):333-343.
课程评估 ASSESSMENT
19.
评估形式
评估时间
占考试总成绩百分比
违纪处罚
备注
6
Type of
Assessment
Time
% of final
score
Penalty
Notes
出勤 Attendance
15
More than 4 absences, fail course
课堂表现
Class
Performance
15
Short assignments
小测验
Quiz
课程项目 Projects
平时作业
Assignments
15
3 short essays
期中考试
Mid-Term Test
15
Group Presentation
期末考试
Final Exam
40
Open note exam
期末报告
Final
Presentation
其它（可根据需要
改写以上评估方
式）
Others (The
above may be
modified as
necessary)
20.
记分方式 GRADING SYSTEM
A. 十三级等级制 Letter Grading
B. 二级记分制（通过/不通过） Pass/Fail Grading
课程审批 REVIEW AND APPROVAL
21.
本课程设置已经过以下责任人/委员会审议通过
This Course has been approved by the following person or committee of authority