Lower-Division Courses
ANTH 1: Introduction to Socio-cultural Anthropology [4]
Introduction to human culture and cultural diversity, including the methods by which anthropology via the study of social institutions, shared practices, and collective meanings; seeks to understand how people adapt to, make sense of, and transform their worlds. [Offered annually during Spring semester]
ANTH 3: Introduction to Anthropological Archaeology [4]
Survey of theory, field and analysis methods, and objectives of anthropological archaeology. Examines how intellectual perspectives guide the ways in which archaeologists undertake their work and the types of materials they collect and analyze to study issues such as technology, exchange, subsistence, settlement, social organization, and ideology. [Offered annually during Spring semester]
ANTH 5: Introduction to Biological Anthropology [4]
Introduction to evolution and how natural selection has shaped modern human variation. Examination of non-human primate behavior and how analogous it might to that of early humans. Discussion of culture, the fossil evidence, genetics, and inheritance. [Offered annually during Fall semester]
ANTH 10: Quantitative Methods in Anthropology [4]
Introduces students to quantitative methods used in the field of anthropology. Students learn the fundamentals of study design, descriptive statistics and statistical testing, and sampling strategies. Students also learn to use software tools used in quantitative methods including spreadsheets, statistical analysis software, and computer programming. These concepts and tools are brought together to analyze anthropological data throughout the course.
ANTH 11: Cultural Heritage in Crisis: Introduction to Heritage Studies (Crosslisted with HS 001) [4]
Introduces anthropological and heritage studies perspectives on the world’s cultural heritage, whether tangible, intangible, or natural. Students will identify domestic and international mechanisms for cultural heritage declaration and explore how historical contingencies, governments, and community action constructs and constrains heritage management policies and practices. Students will investigate heritage in specific cultural and geopolitical contexts, debate major ethical issues in heritage preservation/conservation, and prepare/present virtual exhibitions on selected cases.
ANTH 90X: Freshman Seminar [1]
Examination of a topic in Anthropology.
ANTH 92: Internship in Anthropology [1-4]
Provides oversight and structure for a student’s internship in a field related to anthropology in community organizations, professional research projects, etc. connected to the study of anthropology. Students are required to write an original research paper or relevant product that demonstrates how the internship advanced their knowledge of anthropology. Permission of instructor required. Pass/Fail only. Course may be repeated 2 times for credit.
ANTH 95: Lower-Division Undergraduate Research [1-5]
Supervised research. Permission of instructor required.
ANTH 98: Lower-Division Directed Group Study [1-5]
Permission of instructor required. P/NP grading only.
ANTH 99: Lower-Division Individual Research [1-5]
Permission of instructor required. P/NP grading only.
Upper-Division Courses
ANTH 100: History of Anthropological Thought and Practice [4]
Historical overview of key individuals and ideas influencing the practice of anthropology and the production of anthropological knowledge. Topics may include the disciplining of anthropology into related subfields; social evolutionism, historical particularism; British structural functionalism; French structuralism; cultural ecology; sociobiology; symbolic and interpretive anthropology; feminist and other critiques of anthropology. Prerequsite: ANTH 001 and (ANTH 003 or ANTH 005 or ANTH 005H) [Offered annually during Fall semester]
ANTH 110: Migration, Diaspora, and Transnational Belonging [4]
Exploration of modern, global movements of people with a focus on the conditions, processes, and practices of contemporary national and transnational belonging. Topics include globalization, migration, immigration, Diaspora, the nation-state, national identities and cultural citizenship.
ANTH 111: Globalization: Interconnection and Inequality [4]
Introduces anthropological approaches to the phenomenon known as “globalization.” Explores the political, social, cultural and subjective processes that accompany neoliberal economic globalization by exploring weekly research themes and case studies carried out by anthropologists.
ANTH 112: Political Anthropology [4]
Political anthropology involves the study of formal political institutions as well as the manifestation of power in everyday life. Topics may include: the state and other forms of political authority; social inequality; political competition and conflict; indigenous responses to colonialism; social movements; citizenship; nationalism and ethnicity; genocide; governmentality; and globalization.
ANTH 113: Cities, Culture, and Capitalism [4]
Examines the development of urban anthropology and major themes and research questions in the field of urban anthropology. Three core frames include the possibilities and limits of cities as global and local ethnographic sites; the past, present and future of cities; and issues of scale.
ANTH 114: Social Memory [4]
Introduction to the practices, spaces, artifacts and media through which social memory is formed, maintained and reproduced. Topics may include: how societies remember; how the past and its representation is bound up with national or other shared identities; commemoration; heritage; and the link between history, memory and social justice.
ANTH 116: Indigenous Activism in the Americas [4]
Focusing on the contemporary struggles of Indigenous peoples for rights; self-determination; social, political, and environmental justice and/or increased nation-state participation. Examines how the mobilization of indigenous peoples is strengthened through regional, hemispheric and global solidarities; and how international law, media, and technology support indigenous actions for change.
ANTH 120: Introduction to Medical Anthropology [4]
Provides knowledge about medical anthropology, how different cultures understand human physiology and health, definitions of sickness, types of medical systems and practitioners, how cultural practices affect health, issues in gender environmental health, and how medical anthropology influences health policy.
ANTH 121: Roots and Remedies: An Introduction to Ethnomedicine [4]
Provides knowledge of medical systems cross culturally including the three ancient literary systems (Chinese, Ayurvedic, Greco-Arabic), shamanism, folk medicine, and biomedicine. Readings focus on the beliefs and organization of each system, types of practitioners, types of sicknesses treated, and how anthropologists research and understand these phenomena.
ANTH 122: Anthropological Perspectives on Religion and Healing [4]
Introduces students to religion from a cross cultural perspective, and provides them with analytical techniques to understand religious phenomena. Includes fundamental constituents such myth, symbol, and ritual; consideration of how religions differently define bodies and spirits; and religion as personal and political identity.
ANTH 124: Mind Meets Culture: Exploring the World of Ethnopsychology [4]
Covers anthropological perspectives on mental states, experience of emotions, and concepts of mental normality in a variety of cultural settings. Lectures and readings will focus especially on the relationship between individual and society, the role of emotions, and the definition of psychological phenomena cross culturally.
ANTH 126: Anthropological Approaches to Gender [4]
Examines gender and sexuality cross-culturally: cultural aspects of gender, sexuality, reproduction, and gender identity. Readings will explore definitions of male and female roles, sexual mores, issues in human reproduction, variations in definitions of sexual identity, and cultural, economic and religious aspects of gender, marriage, and family.
ANTH 129: Topics in Sociocultural Anthropology [4]
Explores a timely topic in socio-cultural anthropology. Topics will vary. Any iteration will include: 1) historical background on the subject, 2) its relevance to anthropology and other disciplinary contexts and the public, 3) in-depth study of current primary literature on the topic, and 4) case studies. Students will consider the larger social and disciplinary contexts, intellectual perspectives employed, the ethnographic and other methods utilized, and analyze case study findings and implications. Topics vary and course may be repeated for credit if topics differ.
ANTH 130: From Stone to Silk: How Objects Shape Us [4]
Examines the role that material objects play in human social relations, identity, and economy, including archaeological application of such knowledge to past societies. We explore the range of production and use of material objects, including theories of material culture, technology, style, meaning, memory, and agency.Prerequisite: ANTH 3 or Junior standing.
ANTH 131: The Power of Place: How Space Shapes Our Lives and Cultures [4]
Examines how space is theorized in anthropology, archaeology, and geography. Students learn multiple perspectives in thinking about spaces including how histories and identities are attached to places and landscapes, thus creating powerful or sacred symbols.
ANTH 132: Decoding History: The Shifting Lens of Archaeological Interpretation [4]
Survey of the history of archaeological interpretation and the schools of thought from which they were derived. Students develop an appreciation of the close relationship between method, theory, and interpretation in archaeological practice Prerequisite: ANTH 3.
ANTH 134: Dynamics of Small-scale Societies [4]
Examines ethnographic and archaeological literature on small-scale hunter-gatherer-fisher and horticultural societies, and explores how these data contribute to study of subsistence and settlement strategies, technology, exchange, demography, and social relations in the past and present. Prerequisite: ANTH 3 or Junior standing.
ANTH 135: Trowel to Test Tube: Science in Archaeology [4]
Introduces major lines of chemical, biological, geological, and geospatial data used in Anthropological and Archaeological investigations through case studies from global modern, historic, and prehistoric contexts. Students learn to identify anthropologically- or archaeologically-meaningful research questions (e.g., reconstructing mobility, diet, or settlement patterns) and appropriate methods for answering them. Students practice scientific techniques such as: Quantitative data analysis and visualization, digital curation, geospatial analysis, statistical hypothesis testing, R language, and biogeochemical analysis.
ANTH 140: Cultural Resource Policy and Practice [4]
Critical examination of the legal, practical, and ethical aspects of cultural heritage management in the United States and abroad. Topics include cultural resource management in public and private contexts, participation of stakeholders, the application of anthropological knowledge, and public outreach.
ANTH 142: Archaeology of Colonialism [4]
Examines theoretical perspectives, issues, and interpretations in archaeological study of the interaction between indigenous peoples, European colonists, and enslaved Africans. Topics include disease, power, resistance, colonial institutions, multi-ethnic communities, and gender relations in diverse native engagements with colonists and others from a variety of homelands.
ANTH 144: Shamans, Priests, and Cults [4]
Examines ritual, religion, and cosmology in the archaeological record and explores theories that inform research and contribute to archaeological inferences. Takes a broad comparative approach and holistic perspective for the investigation of their historical, environmental, and social contexts.
ANTH 149: Topics in Anthropological Archaeology [4]
In-depth exploration of a timely topic in anthropological archaeology. Topics will vary. Any iteration will include: (1) historical background on the subject; (2) its relevance to anthropology and other disciplinary contexts and the public; (3) in-depth study of current primary literature on the topic; and (4) case studies. Students will consider the larger social and disciplinary contexts, intellectual perspectives employed, archaeological field and laboratory methods utilized, and case study findings and implications. Topics vary and course may be repeated for credit if topics differ. Prerequisite: ANTH 3.
ANTH 150: Race and Human Variation [4]
Investigation of how human biological variation is studied and how the definition of such variation differs between the scientific community and the public. Topics include historical perspectives on race and eugenics, how scientific racism has shaped national policy, and how genetic diversity and the Human Genome Project have informed such issues.
ANTH 151: Human Adaptability [4]
Investigation of how human biological variation is studied and how the definition of such variation differs between the scientific community and the public. Topics include historical perspectives on race and eugenics, how scientific racism has shaped national policy, and how genetic diversity and the Human Genome Project have informed such issues.
ANTH 152: Dying, Death, and Dead Persons [4]
Examination of the multiple cultural meanings of death and the dead person, including hospice, reactions to death, memorial gestures, rights to and constructions of the dead body in the U.S. legal system, cadavers in education and research, dead persons in mass disasters and human rights cases, archaeological examples, and repatriation issues.
ANTH 153: Spatial Patterns of Disease [4]
Introduces key questions, concepts, theories, and methods in spatial epidemiology, drawing on interdisciplinary approaches in anthropology, geography, social, and biomedical sciences. Examines social, temporal, environmental, and geographic predictors of disease, emphasizing data acquisition, visualization, and GIS-based hypothesis testing. Readings and computer labs from modern and past contexts equip students to develop research questions, locate and aggregate disparate data, and conduct spatial-statistical analyses to test hypotheses about differential distribution and experience of disease.
ANTH 159: Primate Behavior, Biology, and Ecology [4]
Explores the behavior and biology of nonhuman primates, emphasizing the adaptive significance of primate social behaviors and anatomical specializations within an ecological context. Students will examine field and laboratory methods used by primatologists. Major themes in primatology addressed in this course may include primate social organizations, diet, locomotion, sex and reproduction, avoiding predation and disease, and nonhuman primate communication. Prerequisite: ANTH 005 or ANTH 005H.
ANTH 160: Human Origins and Evolution [4]
Explores the biological heritage of humans by providing students with a rigorous grounding in modern evolutionary theory and undertaking detailed study of the phylogeny, morphology, and paleoecology of the Hominini. In addition, this course uses the fossil record to reveal the truly unique features of Homo sapiens. Prerequisite: ANTH 005.
ANTH 162: Growth, Development, and Human Evolution [4]
Applies modern life history theory to understand how evolution of growth patterns contributed to divergence in adult morphology among human ancestors, as revealed by the fossil record of hominin species. We also examine the uniquely human phenomenon of childhood, and the geographic diversity observed among modern human beings.
ANTH 169: Topics in Biological Anthropology [4]
Explores current trends in biological anthropology. Course material will vary. Possible topics may include: isotopic analysis of human nutrition; genetic studies of human variation and adaptability; life history and population studies of health and disease; studies of the interaction of the environment, human behavior, and human biology; and ethics. Prerequisite: ANTH 005 or ANTH 005H.
ANTH 170: Ethnographic Methods [4]
Training in how to conduct field based qualitative research including learning about ethics, training in human subjects protection, skills of participant-observation, interviewing, taking field notes, and the analysis and presentation of research results. Through discussion section activities, individual research projects are designed and operationalized and preliminary research conducted. Prerequisite: ANTH 1 or junior/senior standing. [Offered annually during Spring semester]
ANTH 171: Introduction to Data Science for Demography [4]
Introduces students to large-data and survey approaches to contemporary human population dynamics, mobility, and studies of human identity and culture change. Students learn to approach issues of cultural variability, human migration, identity, and inequality through basic quantitative data analysis and visualization, and to reflect on the limits of such approaches and how they fit within a broader range of anthropological approaches to sociocultural issues. Prerequisite: ANTH 1 or HS 4.
ANTH 172: Ethnohistory [4]
Examines the critical use of historical documents, journals, and visual images; archives; and oral history to understand past cultures and culture change. Analysis of case studies and original archival research demonstrate how these sources complement data collected through ethnographic, archaeological, or biological methods. Prerequisite: ANTH 001, ANTH 003; or junior/senior standing.
ANTH 174: Lithic Artifact Analysis [4]
Systematic consideration and practical application of analytical laboratory and data recording techniques used to study stone tools and manufacturing debris. Topics include procurement; production and reuse; style and function; the organization of technology with respect to settlement and gender; and craft specialization. Prerequisite: ANTH 003; and ANTH major/minor only.
ANTH 176: Archaeological Field Methods [4]
Introduction to the goals and methods of archaeological surface survey, excavation, and various forms of field documentation. The integration of research issues and methods is addressed through both classroom and field activities. Prerequisite:ANTH 003 or Junior standing in the Major.
ANTH 177: Forensic Anthropology [4]
Provides an introduction to the practice of forensic anthropology. Forensic anthropology is an applied subfield of biological anthropology. Forensic anthropologists are often crucial in identifying victims of mass fatalities resulting from both natural and human-made disasters, homicides (both historic and recent), human rights abuses, and war deaths. Introduces the underlying theory and the applied techniques that forensic anthropologists use to recover and identify individuals and assess what happened to the individual before and after death. Through both lecture and lab sessions, topics will include skeletal biology, disease and trauma that can be seen on bone, methods used by forensic anthropologists, and the ethical concerns that arise when working with human remains in a medicolegal context. Prerequisite: ANTH 5.
ANTH 178: The Human Skeleton [4]
This course allows students to develop a basic familiarity with human skeletal remains, including the identification of the bones of the skull, dentition, and axial and appendicular skeletons. Identification of side (i.e., left, right) and element of both intact and fragmentary remains will be considered. Prerequisite: ANTH 005; and ANTH major/minor only. [Offered Spring semester every odd academic year]
ANTH 179: Archaeology of the Skeleton [4]
Study of human skeletal remains from archaeological contexts. Theoretical and thematic approaches in contemporary research. In-depth consideration of bioarchaeological methods used to explore pathology, occupation, geographic origins, etc. from human skeletal remains. Anthropometrics, disease, and trauma are considered, preparing students for anthropological study of both individual remains and skeletal populations. Prerequisite: ANTH 005; and ANTH major/minor. [Offered Spring semester every even academic year]
ANTH 190: Topics in Anthropology [4]
Exploration of a special topic or problem within or between fields in anthropology. Topics vary and course may be repeated for credit if topics differ. Prerequisite:ANTH 001 or ANTH 003 or ANTH 005 or ANTH 005H or Junior/Senior standing
ANTH 192: Internship in Anthropology [1-4]
Provides oversight and structure for a student’s internship in a field related to anthropology in community organizations, professional research projects, etc. connected to the study of anthropology. Students are required to write an original research paper or relevant product that demonstrates how the internship advanced their knowledge of anthropology. Open only to standing(s): Junior, Senior. Permission of instructor required. Pass/Fail only. Course may be repeated 2 times for credit.
ANTH 195: Upper Division Undergraduate Research [1-5]
Supervised Research. Permission of instructor required. Letter grade only.
ANTH 198: Upper Division Directed Group Study [1-5]
Permission of instructor required. P/NP grading only.
ANTH 199: Upper Division Directed Individual Study [1-5]
Permission of instructor required. P/NP grading only.
Updated 2026
