Anthro 179A: Networks and Complexity

Anthropology 179A (60250)

Networks and Complexity

mirror site
Fall 2002 TuTh 12:30-1:50
in SST 155 (Computer Lab)
last year's special topic:

Social Dynamics

Announcements / Assignments	List of Links	Discussion Board... Topics
Syllabus Initial Projects	Data	UCI electronic education environment

for off-campus access to readings please click here to configure your proxy server Special Announcements for Talks-click here (Extra credit for reportage):

"Stability, instability, and everything between" Don Saari will be held in SSPB 1208 Tuesday, October 15, from 1:30 to 3:00 Everyone is invited -- UCI CENTER FOR DECISION ANALYSIS Donald G. Saari, Director

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 24th, 2002. TIME: 9:00am to 5:15pm Computational Colloquium, UCLA Faculty Center, California Room: Location of the faculty center is at coordinates G4 on the campus map: http://www.ucla.edu/map/sectors/northeast.html

Text: illustrated tour through the book: Linked: The New Science of Networks Albert-László Barabási Amazon Price: $18.20

Text: Signs of Life: How Complexity Pervades Biology by Ricard V. Sole and Brian Goodwin Amazon Price: $12.25

advanced copy of Exploratory Social Network Analysis with Pajek - 2003 - Wouter de Nooy, Andrej Mrvar, Vladimir Batagelj $18, available at cost from instructor. Datasets included - provides a workbook with examples, explanation of the network program Pajek. The software, exercises and research module provided by this module provide one excellent track towards a final grade with a high learning curve.
Recommended: Re: Long-Term Field Anthropology
Chronicling Cultures: Long-term Field Research in Anthropology, eds., Robert V. Kemper, Anya Royce. AltaMira Press. $29.95 Ch. 4 and "The Navigability of Strong Ties" (on the same case, the two articles provide an introduction to long-term anthropological studies through issues of networks and complexity -- for an anthro major this might provide an alternate route to a final grade through a term project involving analysis of anthropological network data
On-line Resources:
Networks and Complexity: Special Issue (see Intro, Social Insects, Brain, Small Worlds, History, Civilizations, Markets)
Fractal Properties of Growing Networks source: Networked Nation by Sid Karen
Graph Theory: Wolfram
Jean-Pierre Eckmann and Elisha Moses slides: Curvature and Thematics in the WWW, the Brain, Gene Regulation, Protein Interaction
Community structure in social and biological networks Authors: Michelle Girvan, M. E. J. Newman
Barabási Article: All the World's a Net
Supplementary:
Theme 1 - Social Network Analysis: A Handbook by John Scott
Theme 1 - Nexus: The Groundbreaking Science of Networks Mark BuchananAmazon Price: $18.17
Theme 2 - Self-Organized Systems (SOC) How Nature Works: The Science of Self-Organized Criticality - Per Bak. ISBN: 038798738X Amazon: $18.00
Theme 2 - The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. 2000. Malcolm Gladwell. Amazon Price: $22.46 Free shipping within 24 hours. Hardback: ISBN:0316316962 Paper: ISBN: 0316346624
Theme 3 - Simulations of Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) Silicon Second Nature: Culturing Artificial Life in a Digital World by Stefan Helmreich For hands-on simulation experience, Download Starlogo from the MIT media lab (PC and Mac)
Readings by the author of Starlogo: first chapter, pp. 3-19 (on decentralization): Turtles, Termites, and Traffic Jams: Explorations in Massively Parallel Microworlds (Complex Adaptive Systems) - Mitchel Resnick; 1997. Paperback MIT PRESS. ISBN: 0262680939 Usually ships in 2-3 days - Amazon Price: $12.50.
Theme 3 - Simulations - Growing Artificial Societies: Social Science from the Bottom Up (Complex Adaptive Systems) - Joshua M. Epstein and Robert Axtell; 1996. Paperback Usually ships 24 hours - Amazon Price: $20.00.

Theme 4 - Simulations of Evolutionary Dynamics (ED)
see: Simulations: Evolving Artificial Moral Ecologies - Theoretical Background - Notes - Simulations - Simulators predprey - Patch Simulator- instructions

Course with list of courses with similar content

Instructor: Douglas R. White
Office: 4169 Social Science Plaza A
Office Hours: Tues/Th 11:00-12:00 or by Appt, x8495 (Lin 3175 SSPA)
Phone: (949) 824-5893
Email: drwhite[.at.]uci.edu

Welcome to Anthro 179a! Social networks and dynamics, as an approach to understanding society and dynamical problems in social science, is studied through complexity theory and modeling interactions in social networks of various kinds of entities. In this course you will come to understand methods of dynamical analysis, the grounding of complexity theory in the sciences, learn the contributions of evolutionary game theory and coevolutionary theory, learn how computer programs are used to do network analysis and/or simulate multi-agent interaction, and read a variety of articles that use a dynamical, network or complex systems approach. In addition, you will write an exploratory research paper on a topic such as using dynamical methods to model a collection of actors interacting over time.

Important Note: Please check the pages in this website frequently for updates. The date on the bottom of this page indicates the date the site was most recently revised. This site will contain a copy of the course syllabus, schedule, reading assignments, homework assignments, grades, and links for further information. In addition, a copy of all electronic announcements will be maintained and linked to the course web page. Please check this web site frequently.

If you have not yet activated your UCI e-mail account, please do so as soon as possible. Directions for UCINetID and student EA account activation can be found at The Office of Academic Computing Website. If you wish to have a printed copy of anything on the Anthro 179a site, you can get it at Clone Copy.

UCI / Electronic Education Environment / Social Sciences Class Websites / UCI Anthro Informatics / UCLA Center for Computational Social Science / School of Social Sciences / Eclectic Server /

sites under construction

Updated 10-Oct-2002 08:37:45 PST

The syllabus for this course (2002-forward) has been viewed

times since Sept 29, 2002
FastCounter by bCentral