Course Details

This two credit course prepares students for the 2010 Honors/African Studies program to Sierra Leone. In the context of alterity (radical difference) we aim to prepare students for best-cultural practices that maximize their time, value, and experience. The course includes work in the lingua franca Krio, basic words and phrases in Landogo, as well as a primer on daily life, rules, etiquette, and protocol. In this context we will also discuss how ethnography actually works, issues of health, as well as rules and guidelines for food and water. Following our best practices model, we establish absolute responsibility, liability, and consequences for individuals, the UW group, and its relations with the Kagbere community. Texts include: Donald Carter’s Under The Tree Called Gbendeh (2005), Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw’s Writing Ethnographic Field Notes (1995), and Krio and Landogo language primer by Kelly and Speed (2007). Evaluation is via concept notebooks, library research, and a 5 page research proposal with word work.