Sumários
Belief and Knowledge
24 Fevereiro 2026, 16:00 • Manuel João Ramos
A short story of anthropologists' belief in "belief". "Folk psychology", conceptualisation and knowledge. R. Needham's Belief, Knowledge and Experience: issues on religion and cognition, and his influence on Dan Sperber's Le savoir des anthropologues. (see B. Saler's review in LAmerican anthropologist). Symbolism, belief and rationalism in D. Sperber's text in La fonction symbolique. To know and to believe, in Jean Pouillon's "Remarques le verbe croire". Reading for next class - preparation of class seminar: D. Sperber, Le savoir des anthropologues.
Language and mind - meaning and paradox
12 Fevereiro 2026, 16:00 • Manuel João Ramos
Dualism and concepts of ontological reality in Greek thought. A compared view with hindu thought (W. Doniger O'Flaherty) The dichotomous principles of Plato's philosophy: A. Lovejoy's criticism of the thisworldliness/thatworldliness divide in Plato and his heirs. The Greek way of thinking and making war: John Keegan's analysis of Greek dualism and their concepts of war. Judeo-Christian dualism and platonic thought. The way to the Calcedon. An explanation of the creed, and its ontological deirivatives. Bibliography: W. Doniger O'Flaherty, Dreams, illusion and other realities Reading for next class: E. Benveniste, Categories de la langue, categories de la pensée
The conundrums, continued
10 Fevereiro 2026, 16:00 • Manuel João Ramos
The notion of "category" in Anthropology and its logico-philosophical foundations. Boole, Cantor, Gödel - numbers, groups and paradoxes. Bertrand Russel's critical review of Aristotelian logics and metaphysics, and why it's important for a new grounding of anthropological thought. The language-mind debate: universality and substance. Categories of thought or categories of language. Bibliography: J. Barrow, The Book of Nothing. W. Folley, Anthropological Linguistics B. Russel, History of Western Philosophy E. Benveniste, Catégories de langue, catégories de pensée Reading for next class: W. Doniger O'Flaherty, Dreams, illusion and other realities
The conundrums of cognition
5 Fevereiro 2026, 16:00 • Manuel João Ramos
Problematisation of accepted anthropological concepts. From Plato to the doctrine of Chalcedon: the archaeology of the n otions of dualism in Western thought. Counter-examples from non-Chalcedonic Churches. Mind - Language - Culture The notion of "category" in Anthropology and its logico-philosophical foundations. A criticism of the Aristotelian groundings of anthropological categorisations. The language-mind debate. Where do symbols stand? A lost possibility: non-rousseauian anthropology in the 18th century: de Sade, Lametrie, Montesquieu, Kant. Bibliography: Reading for next class: - B. Russel, History of Western Philosophy - E. Benveniste, Catégories de langue, catégories de pensée
Presentation
3 Fevereiro 2026, 16:00 • Manuel João Ramos
Presentation of the course's programme, bibliography and system of evaluation. Introductory discussion of contemporary issues on symbolism and cognition. The need for an interdisciplinary approach (anthropology vis a vis the neurosciences) and the relevance of a revisited ethnography (Tim Ingold in the Debated Mind, and Maurice Bloch's connectivist views on cultural cognition). The problems of the Western-centric semantic (and rhetoric) conditioning of anthropological discourses. The limitations of a materialist approach to cognition. Example: António Damásio's Self comes to Mind: Constructing the conscious brain John Searle's critical review of Damasio's Self comes to mind Reading for next class: