Module Content

The aim of the first term is to provide students with an overview of some of the current approaches to environmental issues, particularly perspectives from societies in less developed countries; and the implications that contrasting understandings have for management and development intervention outcomes. The aim of the second term is to provide students with specialist methods training and guidance on research design. The course focuses on empirical case studies of actual developing country situations and patterns of change, and keeps the emphasis deliberately on the practical rather than theoretical dimensions of the subject. By investigating the way impacts of resource use are measured and interventions planned, and by critically assessing research design and method, this course will equip students with some of the theoretical ideas and practical skills required for their own original research project in the third term.

Topics covered could include: political ecology; local ecological knowledge and practice vs. Western science and management models (e.g. in dryland [grazing, fire ecology] and forest ecosystems); natural resource use and management; climate change; conservation and sustainability (e.g. REDD+, PES, ecotourism); poverty; livelihoods (e.g. farming, hunting); historical ecology; current debates and implications for management and development; conceptualising, measuring, and analysing resource use behaviour; environmental impacts and implications for human welfare; research design; writing grant proposals; research methods (e.g. sampling strategies, mixed methods research, participatory rural appraisal, interpreting statistics etc).



Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course students should be able to:

1. Demonstrate understanding of political and social ecology approaches in analysing resource use and impact issues, and more generally people/environment relations

2. Demonstrate awareness of both Western/global and non-Western/local perspectives on environment (including other species), development and sustainability.

3. Be aware of the contribution of anthropology to environment and development issues and the ways in which it can challenge classic paradigms and ongoing interventions

4. Demonstrate understanding and critical awareness of both natural and social sciences approaches to studying resource use and impact issues

5. Develop an understanding of the diverse qualitative and quantitative methods used by anthropologists when researching human-environmental interactions and systems of resource use.



Additional Information

Formative assessments

Student presentations on course topics are discussed in detail and informal formative feedback given.



Indicative readings

Paul Robbins: Political Ecology: a critical introduction: especially chs 1-3

Brightman M and Lewis J (eds) 2017 The Anthropology of Sustainability