| Class Id | 7884 |
| Days | W |
| Start time | 01:30 PM |
| End time | 04:20 PM |
| Building | BURRH |
| Room | 216 |
| Course Id | 3484 |
| Dept and Number | ANT 360 |
| Area | EM |
| Title | The Uses of Deception: Perspectives on Magic and Science |
| Description | "Deception" usually has negative connotations, but scientists and magicians use it in service of truth, justice, and entertainment. For a magician's trick to induce doubt and delight, an audience's attention must be misdirected. Likewise, biomedicine and many other fields use deception (e.g., the placebo) as a research tool. Topics include: the 'real' as objective truth or cultural construct; social fictions in daily life; the tangled histories and present day alliance of science and magic; fraudulent vs. legitimate deception; popular access to science. Guest magicians may visit; research projects may involve fieldwork and multimedia. |
| Prerequisites | This seminar approaches the uses of deception anthropologically, as culturally meaningful practices. Participants must have at least one prior course in anthropology and/or history of science and/or a field that customarily employs misdirection as a research technique, or instructor's permission. Students with prior training in ethnographic methods (or other relevant experience) are welcome to design field research projects. |
| Professor | Rena S. Lederman |