ANTHROPOLOGY OF DEVELOPMENT AND ENVIRONMENTAL CONFLICTS

The course is aimed at students pursuing a Master's degree in Cultural Anthropology, Ethnology and Ethnolinguistics or students from other disciplines, interested in the critical tools offered by the discipline and its application in relation to the study of the relationship between civil society, development projects and the state and between humans and nature. The general aim of the course is to provide students with the analytical tools necessary to approach the ethnographic analysis of contexts marked by environmental frictions and conflicts.

1. Knowledge and understanding
Through the analysis of specific case studies, students will acquire the ability to analyse cases of environmental conflict from an ethnographic perspective.
2. Ability to apply knowledge and understanding
Acquisition of the basic tools for applying the ethnographic method to the observation of environmental development processes.
3. Ability to apply judgement
Critical analysis of various texts will sharpen the capacity for judgement in applied and environmental anthropology texts.
4. Communication skills
Through the seminar exercises carried out during the course, the student will deepen his or her expository skills.
5. Learning skills
Through the individual and group exposition exercises carried out during the course, the student will deepen his or her critical and research skills.

It is suggested that students attend the course after having passed and attended at least two of the core examinations of the ACEL degree course.

During the course, various case studies will be considered that will enable students to acquire the theoretical and methodological tools to analyse situations marked by environmental conflicts. After an introductory part, the course will focus on the alteration of the balance and of the coexistence between local communities and nature. The second monographic part will focus on the changing ecologies of the landscape of Venice and of the lagoon.

Testi obbligatori
Parte generale
-Bruce Albert, Davi Kopenawa, Lo spirito della foresta, Nottetempo, Milano, 2023. Cap. 1, 2, 3, 11, 16.
-Tim Ingold, Ecologia della cultura, Milano, Meltemi, 2016, Capitolo 2, pp.49-79; Capitolo 4 pp.111-139; cap. 6 pp.189-218.
- Valentina Bonifacio, "Of Feral and Obedient Cows: Colonization as Domestication in the Paraguayan Chaco." in Cultural Anthropology, 2023.
-Donna Haraway, Chthulucene, sopravvivere su un pianeta infetto, Roma, Nero, 2023. Capitolo 2 Il pensiero tentacolare; Capitolo 3 Simpoiesi.

Parte monografica
-Cristina Baldacci, Shaul Bassi, Lucio de Capitani, Pietro Omodeo, Venezia e l’antropocene, Wetlands, 2022.
-Serenella Iovino, Leggere i corpi di Venezia. Viaggi attraverso le narrative materiali della laguna in Vesper, n. 1, 2019, pp. 138-159.
-Rita Vianello, La macchina-MOSE. Un approccio antropologico allo studio del progetto per la salvaguardia dalle inondazioni nella laguna di Venezia , Arcipelago delle maree. Esplorare gli incerti confini della Venezia anfibia, Venezia, Editrice Cafoscarina, 2023, vol. 1, pp. 132-165 .
-Gilda Zazzara, Il «secondo tempo» di Porto Marghera: deindustrializzazione e memoria operaia, in Luca Zan, Franco Mancuso, Luca Menichelli (a cura di), Venezia tra storia, sviluppo e sostenibilità, il Mulino, Bologna 2024, pp. 251-260.


Letture di approfondimento facoltative
-Miguel Barnet, Cimarrón. Biografia di uno schiavo fuggiasco,A cura di Elena Zapponi. Presentazione di Italo Calvino, Quodlibet Storie, 2024.
-Emanuela Borgnino, Ecologie Native, Elèuthera, Milano, 2022.
-Nadia Breda, I respiri della palude, Roma: CISU, 2020.
-Cavallo, Vallerani, Visentin, Heart of Wetness. Living, narrating, and representing ancient memories and new water rhythms in the Venetian Lagoon in Shima, 2021, V.15 (1).
-Valentina Bonifacio, Rita Vianello, Il ritmo dell'esperienza. Dieci casi etnografici per pensare i conflitti ambientali, Cluep, 2020.
-Lorenzo D'Angelo, Diamanti. Pratiche e stereotipi dell'estrazione mineraria in Sierra Leone, Milano, Meltemi, 2019.
- Eduard Glissant, Poetica della Relazione, Poetica III Macerata, Quodlibet, 2007. Capitolo 1 Avvicinamenti, pp. 19-55; Capitolo 3, Strade pp.105-137
-Tim Ingold, The Perception of the Environment. Essays in livelihood, dwelling and skill, London New York, Routledge, 2000.
-Rossi A., D’Angelo L., Antropologia, risorse naturali e conflitti ambientali, Mimesis, 2012.
- Chiara Spadaro, L’arcipelago delle api. Microcosmi lagunari nell’era della crisi climatica, Wetlands, Venezia, 2022.
-Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, Il fungo alla fine del mondo. La possibilità di vivere nelle rovine del capitalismo, Keller, 2021.

The final examination consists of an oral test, during which the exercises carried out in class will be taken into account for the students* attending the course. For non-attending students, the programme is the same.

The course will consist of lectures, vision and commentary of audio-visual materials and group exercises on selected articles and topics. If possible, educational trips to museum spaces and field research workshops in the Lagoon will be organised. During the course in-depth texts will be uploaded in MOODLE

Italian