introduction what is social anthropology? - University of St Andrews

SECTION 2
WORLDS IN MOTION: MOVEMENT, MIGRATION, DIASPORA
WEEKS 4 & 5
Dr Stavroula Pipyrou sp78@st‐andrews.ac.uk 1st Floor, 71 North Street
This section of the course examines constructions of ‘home’ and ‘movement’ in transitional and
transnational contexts. Until recently, home was associated in anthropology with ideas of fixed
space, time and culture. We will address the notion of movement in direct relation to identity,
space and cultural environment. Various forms of movement will be critically assessed through
ethnographic examples of Gypsies, labour migrants, refugees and exiles. Considering the
construction of Sameness and Difference through dance performances that bring together
people from diverse cultural environments, analytical dichotomies such as rural/urban and
insider/outsider will be critiqued as inadequate tools to capture the dynamic complexity of
global movements. We will also explore the role of the anthropologist as a ‘global mover’ in
terms of research and employment, considering such concepts as ‘Anthropology at Home’.
LECTURE 1: INTERNAL MOVEMENTS: URBAN‐RURAL/ RURAL‐URBAN, OR ‘URBAN VILLAGERS’
The flows of migrants within a state and the new social dynamism introduced by these
movements suggest that analytical categories such as ‘rural’ and ‘urban’ are not adequate to
explain the complexities of moving across diverse environments. This lecture introduces some
of these complexities with reference to urban‐rural and rural‐urban movements and the
different ‘ways of life’ created.
• Forsythe, D. (1980) 'Urban Incomers and Rural Change. The impact of migrants from the
city on life in an Orkney community', Sociologia Ruralis, Vol. 20.
• Goddard, V. (1996) Gender, Family and Work in Naples. Oxford: Berg.
• Irving, A. (2010) ‘Everyday Adventures in London’, in Reveries of Home, Williksen, S. and
Rapport, N.J. (eds.) Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars.
• Kenny, M. and D. Kertzer (1983) Urban Life in Mediterranean Europe: Anthropological
Perspectives. London: University of Illinois Press.
• Pahl, R. (1968) 'The Rural‐Urban Continuum', in Readings in Urban Sociology, Oxford:
Pergamon Books.
• Pipyrou, S. (2010) ‘Urbanities: Grecanici Migration to the City of Reggio Calabria, South
Italy’, History and Anthropology, Vol. 21, No. 1, pp: 19‐36.
• Rapport, N.J. (1986) 'Cedar High Farm: Ambiguous Symbolic Boundary. An essay in
anthropological intuition', in Cohen, A.P (ed.) Symbolising Boundaries: Identity and
Diversity in British Cultures, Manchester: Manchester University Press.
• Sutton, S. (1986) ‘Family and Work: New Patterns for Village Women in Athens’, Journal of
Modern Greek Studies, Vol. 4, No. 1, pp: 33‐49.
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