This course examines the nature and structure of language, and analyses language within human social worlds. It explores sociolinguistics -how linguistic behaviour is shaped by socio-cultural factors -and also metaphor and the problems of cultural interpretation and translation. It also examines a range of symbols in society, the language not just of words but of clothing, material goods, popular culture and political discourse, to understand how cultural symbols are socially constructed, performed and contested. Language and symbols and their social use form a central topic of anthropological inquiry; this course will explore and explicate this topic. Students will write a research paper using course readings and additional research to explicate areas of contemporary symbolic usage that match their own interests.