ANT 3212 Exam 2

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Florida Atlantic University *

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Anthropology

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Apr 3, 2024

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PEOPLES AROUND THE WORLD (ANT 3212) SPRING 2022 EXAM 2: ATROCITY/DEATH/AFTERMATH DEADLINE: April 22, 2022, BY 5:00 PM U.S. EASTERN TIME 85 POINTS GENERAL DESCRIPTION: This exam is a culmination to Part II of this course (Atrocity/Death/Aftermath). Part II built on key themes from earlier in the semester: the centrality of the body in anthropological inquiry; ethnography as a tool, practice, and method; concepts of violence and power, etc. Additionally, while Part I stressed the lived body, Part II stressed another aspect of the life course: Death and its aftermath. In this regard, we began exploring ethnography not only as something that amplifies silenced and marginalized stories, but also something that bears witness to overt atrocities against humanity. Here, you must demonstrate substantive knowledge and a grasp of these issues. INSTRUCTIONS: Complete the following take-home and writing-based exam. It is open-note/open- book. You can consult all course materials made available to you — lecture recordings (in the course Canvas site, go to “modules,” then “lecture recordings”), readings, videos, assignments, and your notes from our discussions. Submit your exam via the exam’s Turnitin portal, in the course’s Canvas site by the above deadline—April 22, 2022, 5:00 PM, U.S. Eastern Time. CHEATING, PLAGIARISM, AND OTHER MATTERS: You must complete your exam without consulting your peers . Peer consultation is considered cheating. Additionally, adhere to the following to avoid plagiarism and/or cheating:  As noted above, you may consult all course materials made available to you. However, you must ensure that you provide proper in-text citations. You may use your desired citation style-guide (e.g., MLA, Chicago, APA, etc.) but be consistent. A “References Cited” page is not required.  Outside research is unnecessary and forbidden for completing this exam.  Do not use words verbatim from lectures—this is considered plagiarism. If you are using words verbatim, then you need to provide quotation marks and properly cite from where you acquired the quotation. o At the same time, ensure that your exam responses do not over rely on direct quotes, as that would signal a lack of synthesis and a lack of understanding the material. Over relying on quotes in your responses will thus result in points deducted.  Even if you paraphrase or summarize an idea that is not your own, you need to properly cite it.  You will receive a ‘zero’ on this exam if you are found to have cheated or plagiarized. You may also fail the course and face additional academic sanctions. If you have not already, familiarize yourself with what plagiarism is, how to avoid it, and the academic sanctions associated with it.  Visit this link for resources that further explain what plagiarism is and how to avoid it: https://libguides.fau.edu/plagiarism  Visit this link to view FAU’s academic integrity policy (also in the syllabus), as well as to see how plagiarism issues are handled and to see associated serious sanctions: https://www.fau.edu/studentsindistress/academicintegrity.php 1

This exam has four parts—extra credit, concept identification, specific-questions, and short essay. Ensure that your responses provide substantive information while being very direct, concise, and precise. Vagueness will result in points deducted. Avoid fluff at all costs. You may ‘re-use’ examples where appropriate. PART I: EXTRA CREDIT [4 points] 1. As presented in lecture, explain how multiple subfields of anthropology come together during work on mass graves and political violence. [2 points] 2. In this course, we talked about how mass graves are tools of violence. But, we also indicated that exhumation and identification can produce their own violence. How is this the case? [2 points] PART II: CONCEPT IDENTIFICATIONS [20 points] Instructions: Select five and only five concepts/terms from the 11 provided below. For each selected concept/term, do the following: (a) Define —indicate the concept’s/term’s meaning and discuss its significance in the context of this course; also (b) explain (not just name) an example or evidence from any course materials, such as readings, lectures, films. If you attempt to provide more than 5 responses, anything beyond your first five responses will not be graded. Each response is worth 4 points (20 points total). 1. Political Violence 2. Ethnoreligious sectarianism 3. Hierarchy of Suffering 4. Primary Mass Grave vs. Secondary Mass Grave 5. “Innovation of Violence” 6. The Social Paradox of Mass Graves 7. “Power over the Dead is Power over the Living” 8. Biological Profile 9. DNA (as relates to its cultural anthropological significance in identification and knowledge production) 10. Improvisational Practices (as relates to exhumation and identification of partial remains) 11. Memorials a. Hint: You can discuss some of the following as being significant in the context of this course. What meanings are usually associated with memorials? What are some associated (and improvised) practices? What identities, relations, and reactions are associated with memorials? How does power over the dead become shared with families? Regarding memorials, how do community, national, and international politics play out? How are social cohesion and narratives produced regarding memorials? How can memorials be divisive? PART III: SPECIFIC QUESTIONS [47 points] 1. Explain (not just name) one shift in the anthropological study of violence that is directly related to the topic of political violence. [2 points] 2

2. Explain (not just name) one important thing about human rights investigations as relates to anthropology’s history and/or debates in anthropology. [2 points] 3. In lecture and our discussions, we talked about challenges to ethnographic practice in contexts of political violence. (a) Name one such challenge. (b) Additionally, illustrate that challenge by identifying and explaining a quote/scene/example from Sarah Wagner’s To Know Where He Lies . [3 points] a. Challenge [1 point] : b. Example and explanation [2 points] : 4. As discussed in this course, name—and only name —the four main phases/components of the social process of mass death. [2 points; ½ point each] a. b. c. d. 5. In lecture, we argued that mass graves communicate meanings related to violence and power. We also argued that exhumation can, to an extent, counteract those meanings. As presented in lecture, explain (not just name) one such meaning of mass graves, as well as the corresponding counter-meaning that is produced by exhumation. [4 points] a. Mass grave meaning [2 points] : b. Exhumation counter-meaning [2 points] : 6. (a) How is identification (and recognition) dependent upon both scientific knowledge and more “humanistic” knowledge, as well as various parties? (b) Additionally, illustrate your points by identifying and explaining a quote/scene/example from Sarah Wagner’s To Know Where He Lies . [4 points] a. b. 7. How do identification and care function as forms of power? How do identification and care involve politics, despite people saying that identification and care are apolitical? [4 points]  Hint: See Wagner chapter 8, especially pages 253-265. Chapters 3, 5, and 7 are also relevant. 8. In the context of this course, explain (not just name) two differences between mass graves and mass burials (burials for a mass number of people in a cemetery). [4 points]  Hint: You may wish to explain matters regarding social order/disorder; matters regarding individual & collective identities; power dynamics, etc. See lectures. See also Wagner’s introudction chapter, chapter 7, and/or portions of Wagner chapter 5. a. Difference 1 : b. Difference 2: 3

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9. Explain one “co-existing contradiction” of the Srebrenica-Potočari memorial cemetery. [2 points] 10. Compare Srebrenica’s cemetery-memorial and the Rwandan museum display-memorial discussed in lecture. [4 points] 11. Compare Wagner’s To Know Where He Lies with the documentary Finding Oscar. To do so, address two of the following interrelated questions of your choosing: How do the ethnography and the documentary address memory, genocide, and accountability even in the distant future? How are histories of violence not confined to the past, but active in the present? Why do people and organizations in Bosnia (like the Women of Srebrenica) and Guatemala (like FAMDEGUA) strive for the identification and re-exhumation of their loved ones? What does it mean to them? Why do people in Bosnia and Guatemala think it is important to continue talking about it? What roles do memory and imagination play in identification and also in potential re-traumatization? [4 points] 12. Seth Holmes’ Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies explains that ethnographic writing does not use standardized sections (e.g., “background,” “methods,” etc.) but interweaves vignettes, methods, theory, and so on, to present an argument and narrative (see Holmes 2013, Appendix). Additionally, current ethnographic writing discusses the ethnographer and their positionality, for, as Holmes (2013:36) highlights, the ethnographer’s body provides key, if partial, “field notes on social suffering,” hierarchies, inequalities, violence, and varied reactions to different kinds of bodies. Moreover, the ethnographer is part of and transformed by the research process, as well as cultivates long-term relationships. The ethnographer, that is, is part of the story. At the same time, during the beginning of the semester, we had interesting debates about whether standardized sections would actually be desirable and whether ethnographers should be visible or invisible in a text. Now that you’ve read multiple ethnographies, revisit the above ideas and your initial thoughts. Have you changed your mind since the beginning of the semester? Do you find ethnography to be a convincing style of argumentation? Irrespective of whether you’ve changed your mind, what do you think ethnography can uniquely help us see about human experiences, meanings, and conditions? [4 points] 13. Apart from anything you might have discussed in question 12, how did this course help you question any previously held assumptions about the body and anthropology? That is, as opposed to the first day of classes, what did this course help you see in a different—perhaps more complicated—way regarding the body and anthropology? [4 points] 14. Apart from anything you might have discussed in questions 12 and 13, what was the most interesting or surprising thing you learned in this course and why? In your response, name a text or video that stuck out to you. [2 points] 15. Now that you have completed this course, what will you do with what you learned? [2 points] 4

PART IV: SHORT ESSAY QUESTIONS [18 points] Instructions: • Below are two prompt options. Respond to one and only one prompt of your choice. If you respond to more than one prompt, I will only mark the first response I encounter. • Use full sentences and provide substantive information. I estimate that you will need four carefully and thoughtfully crafted paragraphs that very directly address your chosen prompt. • Avoid fluff at all costs. Just go right to the heart of the matter. • When you use key concepts/terms , define them. I will not assume that you know what they mean. Thus, not defining such terms would constitute not demonstrating your knowledge and your grasp of the material. In turn, not defining major concepts/terms will result in points deducted. Essay Prompt Option 1: Death and its Aftermath [18 points] Especially in times of violence, death and its aftermath are complicated phenomena. They involve many social meanings, practices, and “politics” (anthropologically defined). Indeed, in To Know Where He Lies , Sarah Wagner discusses how these meanings, practices and politics are tied to memory and imagination (Chapter 5), as well as memorializing, commemoration events, and funeral ceremonies (Chapter 7). They also play out at different “levels”—the individual, the family, the community, the nation, and the international. Thus, even after physical life, dead bodies are significant in many ways. At two different levels, what are meanings, practices, and politics that Wagner’s ethnography helps us see? How are these dynamics tied to memory and imagination—or alternatively, to memorializing and funeral ceremonies? To address this prompt, do the following:  Select two “levels” of your choice—individual, family, community, nation, or international.  For each of your selected levels, describe at least one set of meanings and practices, as well as one set of “politics” (anthropologically defined) for which the dead are central.  Present the above phenomena, as detailed in Wagner’s analysis of memory and imagination (Ch. 5), or alternatively memorializing, commemoration, and funerary ceremonies (Ch. 7).  In your discussion, weave-in how, even after physical death, relations between dead bodies and living bodies are significant—either socially, spiritually, or politically. Be explicit with your points—don’t leave them implied. Essay Prompt Option 2: Ethnography and Bearing Witnessing [18 points] One of the basic goals of anthropology, and ethnography in particular, is to understand human diversity. Beyond this basic goal, a main premise of this course is that ethnography challenges what we take for granted, highlights silenced stories, and “bears witness” to violence and inequality. We’ve also seen that such work is filtered through an embodied anthropologist who must deal with a host of politics and ethics. Compare Sarah Wagner’s To Know Where He Lies and Seth Holmes’ Fresh Fruit Broken Bodies , the two major ethnographies we read. Address the following questions in your comparison:  What does it mean to bear witness, anthropologically?  How are Wagner’s and Holmes’ ethnographies similar and different in how they “bear witness” to violence, lives, and deaths?  What is each one’s positionality?  What are some of the political and ethical circumstances with which Wagner and Holmes must contend, during their fieldwork and during the writing process?  Finally, how are the two ethnographies different from anthropology’s earlier “salvage ethnography,” a topic mentioned in Part 1 of this course? 5

ANT 3212 Exam 2

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