>DIL (Distance Learning) courses are one type of OPC courses (OPen Campus) offered at ACC. For this course you must have access to the Internet, and 1) access materials posted on ACC’s Blackboard site (acconline.austincc.edu), 2) read the required text, 3) view the programs of the series: “Our Diverse World”, and 4) take the 4 exams either online or at any of 10 campus testing centers.  There are no regularly scheduled meeting times, so keep in touch with me by email or phone listed above, or meet with me during office hours or by appointment.  Many students that are taking a DIL course for the first time assume that it will take less time than an in-class course.  That is usually not the case.  It takes self-discipline and very efficient use of time, but works well if you have an unpredictable schedule.

The course has four Units with four Unit Tests, with one optional Essay Final taken at the end of the semester. The score on the optional Essay Final will replace the lowest of your 4 Unit Test scores.  Each Unit Test is 50 multiple choice questions.  They can be taken online through Blackboard or can be taken at any of the 10 ACC Testing Centers.  Go to www.austincc.edu/testctrfor their hours and locations.  Note that only Northridge and Riverside currently have Testing Center hours on both Saturday and Sunday. There is also an optional Extra Credit Video Summary.

>The required text: You may use either the 1^st or 2^nd editions of  Cultural Anthropology by Nancy Bonvillain, (1^st edition: ISBN 0-13-045545-8,  2^nd edition: ISBN 0-20-568509-9).  The ACC Rio Grande Bookstore is the bookstore that typically stocks texts for all DIL courses, and is currently selling the 2^nd edtion. If the ACC bookstore at the campus nearest you does not carry this text, you can request that it be sent to any ACC bookstore from the Rio Grande ACC bookstore. The Rio Grande ACC Bookstore is located at 817 W. 12th Street, on the west side of the Rio Grande Campus. Its telephone number is (512) 474-2704. You can order the text online through the ACC Bookstore by visiting http://austincc.bkstore.com.  If you wish to try to find a used copy online, there is a long list of websites that sell used college texts posted in Blackboard.   Select “Fast Shipping” if possible. There is also a copy of the 1^st edition text for 2 hour room use on Reserve at the Rio Grande library.

> The required video series– “Our Diverse World” can be viewed in 2 ways:

1) View anytime, streamed online at: http://dl.austincc.edu/videos/dw.php

2) On campus, look on the shelves under Anthropology in the Media Areas of the 8 main ACC Libraries for the “Our Diverse World” DVD series.  You may watch them on the TVs in the Media Areas, but cannot check them out.  ACC Library Media Centers are at: Cypress Creek, Fredericksburg, Eastview, Northridge, Rio Grande, Riverside, Pinnacle, South Austin. (Make sure you are watching the DVD series: “Our Diverse World”, not the video tape series: “Faces of Culture”.)

Course Subjects:This course will introduce the basic concepts of cultural anthropology, trace the discipline’s development historically, and discuss anthropology’s basic theoretical perspectives.  Supported by a variety of ethnographic videos and Internet resources, we will compare the ways different cultures solve the problems of survival and organize themselves to thrive socially, economically, and spiritually.

Since this course does not meet for lecture, please look at the following schedules for an overview of assignments and test dates.

Below are two schedules. Please be careful in reading these schedules.  Deadlines are firm.

The first schedule lists the Text Chapters in each Unit with Test Deadlines. 

The second schedule matches the “Our Diverse World” program with the Text Chapters.

First Schedule:Text Chapters in each Unit with Test Deadlines

Units and Assigned Chapters

Unit                 Text Chapters Chapter Titles                                               

Unit I               Chap 1             What is Anthropology?                                   

                        Chap 2             The Nature of Culture

                        Chap 3             Studying Culture

                        Chap 4             Language and Culture

                        Chap 5             Learning One’s Culture           

________________________________

Unit II            Chap 6             Making a Living

                        Chap 7             Economic Systems                                                                  

                        Chap 8             Kinship and Descent                                                               

                        Chap 9             Marriage and Family

                        Chap 10           Gender

_________________________________

Unit III            Chap 11           Equality and Inequality

                        Chap 12           Political Systems                                                                     

                        Chap 13           Conflict and Conflict Resolution

___________________________­______

Unit IV            Chap 14           Religion

                        Chap 15           The Arts                                                          

                        Chap 16           Colonialism & Cultural Transformations                                  

                        Chap 17           Living in a Global World

________________________________

The deadlines for the  Extra Credit Video Review and Optional Essay Final are at the end of the semester

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2^nd Schedule:

“Our Diverse World” program titles matched with Text Chapters

                  Goes with

                  Text Chapter          Program Titles

                        1                      1.  Essence of Anthropology AND

                                                17 Applied Anthropology

                        2                      2.  Characteristics of Culture

                        3 & 5                3.  Becoming Human

                        4                      4.  Communication & Culture

                        5                      5.  Social Identity, Personality & Gender

                                                     (Chapter 10 will cover aspects of Gender

                                                       presented in this program) 

                        6                      6.  Subsistence Systems

                        7                      7.  Economics Systems

                        8                    10. Kinship & Descent

                        9                      9.  Marriage & Family AND

                                                8.  Sex & Marriage

                        10                    5.  Social Identity, Personality & Gender 

                        11                    11.Grouping by Gender, etc.

                        12 & 13                        12. Politics, Power & Violence              

                        14                    13. Religion and Spirituality

                        15                    14. The Arts

                        16                    15. Process of Change

                        17                    16. Global Challenges                        

Students who complete this course will 1) have gained a broad cross-cultural background against which to view our culture as well as contemporary social problems, 2) be able to recognize similarities and differences in human cultures, 3) have discovered there are various valid cultural solutions to the problems of life, 4) be able to understand the factors involved in culture change, and 5) be able to understand some of the procedures used by anthropologists in studying cultures.

Mastery of these concepts will be reflected in your grade, which is achieved by the following scoring system. Your grade for the course depends on the total points you accumulate on 4 Unit Tests (4 x 100 points/test = 400 points) plus an optional Extra Credit Review (20 possible points). If you fail to take a test for a unit, it will result in a 0 for that unit, which can be replaced by the optional Essay Final at the end of the semester. The optional Essay Final can also be done to replace a low grade on a Unit Test.  You must have a score for all 4 Unit Tests.  There is no averaging of test scores, it is a simply point system with these cut-offs:

            >90% of 400 total points or >360 pts = A

            >80% of 400 total points or >320 pts = B

            >70% of 400 total points or >280 pts = C

            >60% of 400 total points or >240 pts = D

Points:

Test 1 - 100pts

Test 2 - 100pts

Test 3 - 100pts

Test 4 – 100pts

Optional Essay Final – 100pts

Optional Extra Credit Video Summary   __________/20