This page contains a catalogue of the courses that have been offered under the Anthropology major/minor in recent years. It also provides a short description of the core courses that all Anthropology majors are required to take as part of their degree requirements.

Introduction to Anthropology

This required course offers students an introduction to the disciplinary concerns, practices, theories, and methods common to Cultural Anthropology—an academic discipline that takes as its subject the study of human cultures and cultural difference. Topics concerning anthropological subfields such as kinship and family, politics, economy and exchange, gender and sexuality, medicine and health, food and food security, religion, education, media, and more will be addressed. 

Ethnography

In this required methods course, students will understand what constitutes ethnographic field methods, what makes ethnographic writing different from other kinds of nonfiction writing, and the ethical and theoretical considerations within ethnographic research. Over the semester, students will conduct their own, small-scale ethnographic fieldwork, interviews and participant observation based in Singapore.

The Anthropological Imagination

The Anthropological Imagination offers an insight into the practice and creative power of anthropology. The aim of the course is to offer an introduction to how anthropologists, past and present, have viewed the world and approached the study of the human condition. The first half of the course examines foundational figures and moments in the history of the discipline. The second half of the course is geared toward an exploration of recent anthropological writings on topics such as power, representation, history, gender, the Anthropocene, and post-human anthropology.