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Curriculum

Anthropology is the holistic and comparative study of human beings. Anthropologists study people from a variety of perspectives--historical, biological, social, and cultural.

At Haverford we teach socio-cultural anthropology: the comparative study of social organization, family life, subsistence, exchange, politics, ritual, religion, and expressive culture in diverse human communities. Socio-cultural anthropologists aim to promote knowledge and broaden intercultural understanding through sustained participant-observation fieldwork; they study small-scale indigenous and rural communities, state societies and urban populations, and, increasingly, transnational polities and cultures.

Anthropology at Haverford

The Anthropology Major at Haverford teaches students the methods of social and cultural analysis and introduces them to the history of Anthropology through a combination of courses in social theory and ethnography. Students are encouraged to think critically and self-reflectively about several areas of theoretical concern and intellectual inquiry, including:

1. The problem of ethnography: the interpretive skills, analytic frameworks, and descriptive genres through which anthropologists have sought to represent their own and other societies.
2. Comparative social structure and comparative social process: how persons are linked, related or opposed in various social orders or social fields, and how such relations are reproduced over time; modes of production, power, and knowledge.
3. The "person" as understood or constituted in various cultural systems: gender and sexuality, age and generation, caste, ethnicity, national affiliation, and race.
4. Meaning, communication, and symbolic process: the department encourages interest in material culture and visual anthropology (e.g., art, architecture and spatial order, film, video and cassette media, etc.).
5. Anthropological understandings of history: problems of historical transformation, and the intellectual legacies and limitations of social evolutionist models, including theories of progress, development and modernization.

The Haverford Department of Anthropology does not teach archaeology or physical/biological anthropology. Courses in those areas may be taken at Bryn Mawr College.

Major Requirements

Students are required to take a total of 11 courses in the major, including five required courses within the department. Individual programs require the advisor’s approval.

1. One 100-level introductory course, either: Anthropology 103a, Introduction to Anthropology (fall) or BMC Anthropology 102 (spring), Introduction to Anthropology; or Anthropology 110b, Anthropology of Food and Eating; or Anthropolgoy 155a, Themes in the Anthropology of Religion.
2. Anthropology 210b, History and Theory of Anthropology.
3. One area course, such as Anthropology 241, Mediterranean; Anthropology 245, Africa; Anthropology 243, East Asia; or a similar course on another campus.
4. One other 200-level course in this department.
5. One 300-level course in this department.
6. Anthropology 450a and 450b Senior Thesis Seminars. The remaining courses may be courses offered in the department, in an anthropology department on another campus, or in approved related fields. Courses outside the department must be approved by the student’s advisor (Note: When required courses are not offered, equivalents will be designated). Students are expected to familiarize themselves with the use of e-mail, Blackboard, and the faculty server.

Minor Requirements

The minor in anthropology consists of six courses, including: an Introduction to Anthropology (this requirement may be satisfied by an Introduction to Anthropology at either campus, or by other introductory courses); ANTH 303b, History and Theory of Anthropology; an ethnographic area course; and three other courses at the 200 or 300 level, including one course at the 300 level. As a general rule, a minimum of three courses must be taken in the Haverford department.

Requirements for Honors

Honors are decided at the discretion of the faculty in the department of Anthropology. They are based upon overall excellence in the major. “Excellence” is defined by three criteria: outstanding work in the senior thesis (final written work and oral presentation), strong cumulative performance in all anthropological coursework (typically a grade point average of 3.7 or higher), and a record of consistent intellectual commitment and participation in the department. High Honors will be awarded, upon occasion, for exceptional contributions in all areas.