So You Want to Change the World?

Catalog description

Examines from an anthropological perspective efforts to address global poverty that are typically labeled as "development." The enterprise of development is considered critically, both with regard to the intentions and purposes that underlie the actions of wealthy countries, donor organizations, and expatriate development workers and with regard to the outcomes for the people who are the intended beneficiaries. Privileging the prespectives of ordinary people in developing countries, but also looking carefully at the institutions involved in development, the course relies heavily on ethnographic case studies that will draw students into the complexity of one of the greatest contemporary global problems: social inequality. Enrollment limited to 19 first year students.