ANTHROPOLOGY Program

Anthropology is the systematic study of humans, their practices, and the myriad ways they experience these practices. Anthropologists study humanity in its diverse cultural, social, physical, and linguistic forms. As an academic discipline, anthropology bridges the humanities and social sciences in addressing fundamental questions having to do not only with how the human world works and how people negotiate their social and cultural realities but also with what it means to be human. Anthropology draws from prehistorical, historical, and contemporary cases and is distinct in addressing all levels of sociopolitical organization and subsistence strategies ranging from foraging bands and horticultural tribes to modern industrialized states and the globalized realities of the world today. Anthropology is, by its nature, interdisciplinary and international in both theory and practice.

Our program offers students from diverse backgrounds the opportunity to thoroughly and creatively explore the world and peoples around them. Anthropology classes stress the exchange of ideas and build strength in critical thinking, communication, and intellectual exploration. An anthropological perspective will become increasingly important in the 21st century. There is today a growing demand for sensitivity to the values, beliefs, and cultural structures of other groups that might be different from one's own. In all parts of society, people progressively need the ability to live, work, and appreciate diversity while simultaneously becoming more aware of the relations that connect various groups and the commonalities they share.  

As reported by the American Anthropological Association and the Society for American Archaeology, demand for graduates with degrees in anthropology is high. Anthropology graduates work in many fields in which research on humans and their behavior is needed, including private corporations, nonprofit organizations, and government agencies. Anthropology majors commonly find employment in state and federal governments, non-governmental and other international aid organizations, education, business, human resources, social work, historical resource management/field-technicians in archaeology, and, increasingly, health care. Many anthropology majors continue to graduate school in such fields as: anthropology, history, law, geography, or medicine.  

The anthropology program at Marshall University seeks to ensure that each student develops a solid foundation in the basic principles, theories and techniques of analysis within the discipline. The curriculum ensures that students are introduced to all four disciplinary subfields: social-cultural anthropology, physical-biological anthropology, archaeology, and linguistics. Since students majoring in anthropology vary in their interests and career goals, the curriculum allows for flexibility in developing individual courses of study, including opportunities for involvement in faculty research through course offerings and independent study.  

To see how anthropology makes it regularly into the global news, visit the Anthropology Global News Feed.  To learn more about what our students are doing beyond our campus, see our feature section Tales from the Field.

Major in Anthropology

To graduate with a major in anthropology, a student must take 39 credits of required core classes and electives as described below.  The required core of the anthropology major consists of 24 credits (8 classes):

  • ANT 201 Cultural Anthropology

  • ANT 322 Archaeology

  • ANT 331 Physical Anthropology

  • ANT 478 Introduction to Sociolinguistics (cross listed with ENG 478)

  • ANT 361 Ethnographic Methods

  • ANT 391 Junior Seminar

  • ANT 491 Theory in Ethnology

  • ANT 492 Anthropological Analysis (Capstone)

An additional minimum of 15 credits of electives must be chosen from classes with the ANT prefix; these electives must include a minimum of 3 credits archaeology and 3 credits socio-cultural anthropology. All classes numbered ANT 320-329 and ANT 420-429 count as archaeology. All classes numbered ANT 350-369, ANT 410-419 and ANT 450-469 count as socio-cultural anthropology. Classes with an area study focus (ANT 440-449) count as socio-cultural anthropology, except ANT 440 African Cultures, ANT 441 Oceania, and ANT 442 Native Americans, which each counts as 1½ credit archaeology and 1½ credit socio-cultural anthropology.

A student with a particular anthropological interest that can be best served by courses without the ANT prefix may suggest a coherent selection of up to 9 credits from such classes to be counted towards the major as electives. A plan for such a selection must be presented to and approved by the student's advisor and the department chair in the student's junior year or, for those students entering the program at the junior level, at a time stipulated by the chair.

Minor in Anthropology

A minor in anthropology requires 15 credits. As listed below, 9 of these credits constitute the core of the minor. The reminder of the required credits can be taken from any class with the ANT prefix. A maximum of 6 credits below 300-level can be counted towards the minor.  The required core of the anthropology minor consists of 9 credits (3 classes):

  • ANT 201 Cultural Anthropology

  • ANT 322 Archaeology

  • ANT 361 Ethnographic Methods or ANT 491 Theory in Ethnology

 

Marshall Plan Computer Competency requirement

By successfully completing ANT 492, anthropology majors fulfill the Computer Competency requirement.

 

Marshall Plan Capstone requirement

By successfully completing ANT 492, anthropology majors fulfill the Capstone requirement.

 

General Education Requirements Notice:  Students majoring or minoring in anthropology are strongly encouraged to discuss with an advisor (in the department and/or in the office of the dean of the College of Liberal Arts) ways in which the requirements in the major/minor simultaneously cover parts of the general education requirements in the College of Liberal Arts and/or the Marshall Plan.

Despite its relatively small size, the Anthropology Program at Marshall University incorporates a number of resources typically expected of much larger departments.  These include an Archaeological Laboratory, where materials from the annual summer field school are stored and analyzed.  The program also owns an extensive collection of ethnographic artifacts from all over the world (formerly of the Sunrise Museum in Charleston, WV).  We are a vital part of the ongoing work of the Center for Ethnographic and Oral History Research and its archival arm known as the Oral History of Appalachia Collection, which is a vast oral history archive comprised of thousands of interviews conducted in Appalachia over the last 40 years.   No other anthropology program in West Virginia can boast such resources, available for research to both students and faculty, in and out of state. 

ANTHROPOLOGY COURSE CATALOG [Current as of Fall 2009]

STUDENT ADVISING SHEET [2009-2010]

Anthropology Faculty

Nick Freidin, Professor

DPhil Archaeology University of Oxford (Keble College)

Director of Summer Archaeology Field School

 

Brian Hoey, Associate Professor

PhD University of Michigan

Migration, Identity Politics, Work & Family; Methods

Director of the Center for Ethnographic & Oral History Research

http://www.brianhoey.com/         

                  

Anders Linde-Laursen, Professor

PhD Lund University, Sweden, and
PhD, Copenhagen University, Denmark

Department Chairperson

  

ARCHAEOLOGICAL FIELDSCHOOL

Archaeology, the science of reconstructing and understanding past and present cultures from their material remains, is taught in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Marshall University, in the classroom, in the laboratory, and also in the field.  Hands-on instruction is strongly encouraged.  The department provides the opportunity for students to learn the basic techniques of surveying, excavation and recording, to experience the thrill of discovery, by offering an annual archaeological field school, a three to six credit course (ANT 323), during Summer Session 5.  This kind of practical experience is a big asset for those who wish to continue in archaeology as a career. 

The sites investigated by the field school in the last twenty plus years cover the span of human occupation in West Virginia, from the Early Archaic, at St-Albans (ca. 6000 BCE, Kanawha County), through the Late Prehistoric, at Snidow (ca. 1250 CE, Mercer County) and Clover (ca. 1580 CE, Cabell County), to the historic period, at the Madie Carroll House in Guyandotte (ca. 1850 CE, Cabell County).  In addition to gaining practical knowledge of archaeological field techniques, students learn about our state’s long past, from the earliest Native American nomadic foragers and their journey towards becoming settled farmers, to the first Euro-American and African-American colonists who established the communities we live in today. 

No previous experience is required to enroll in ANT 323, only an interest of things past, a curiosity of how we got to where we are today, and a taste for detective work.  And yes, getting very dirty in the process.  It is hard work, often tedious, but always rewarding. 

For more information, contact Dr. Nicholas Freidin, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Smith Hall Room 428/424 or call (304) 696-2794.  The Marshall University Archaeological Field School as been written up.  Check out the MU-AFS in the Parthenon.

New Journal Launched at Marshall

Collaborative Anthropologies is a journal meant to engage the growing and ever-widening discussion of collaborative research and practice in anthropology and in closely related fields.  Published annually, the journal:

  • facilitates dialogue about collaborative anthropologies, including but not limited to those between and among researchers and their interlocutors, anthropologists and other scholars/practitioners, academics and other professionals, universities and local communities, faculty and students;
  • embraces a special focus on the collaborative research between and among researchers and communities of informants/consultants/collaborators, but is by no means limited to this focus;
  • promotes discussion about new forms of collaborative research that are engendering new kinds of collaborative anthropologies;
  • charts new theoretical and methodological approaches, especially those that theorize collaboration and imagine new intellectual spaces for collaborative anthropologies;
  • invites essays that are descriptive as well as analytical/interpretive/exploratory;
  • solicits works from all subfields of anthropology (and closely related disciplines);
  • encourages interdisciplinary inquiry into collaborative anthropologies, especially those that connect collaborative anthropologies with other modes of collaborative research practices;
  • seeks a diversity of perspectives on collaborative research, including those academic, applied, and pedagogic;
  • considers scholarship from single to multi-sited in scope and from all parts of the world; and
  • includes book/media/exhibit reviews that chronicle the creative and innovative use of collaboration in anthropology and closely related fields.

 

Edited by Luke Eric Lassiter, Director of the Graduate Humanities Program at the Marshall University Graduate College in Charleston, WV.  Dr. Lassiter is an affiliate of the Anthropology Program.

 

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