Overview

The Department of Anthropology pursue this aim through excellence in research, teaching, and community collaboration, grounded in multiple analytical and interpretive methods that share a commitment to field-based inquiry. 

Interdisciplinary contacts are encouraged, and links are maintained with departments and programs such as Asian Studies, the Institute of Asian Research, Linguistics, History, Geography, Sociology, and the Centre for Women's and Gender Studies.

We are the second oldest anthropology program in Canada, with more than six decades of research and teaching to our name. Our students are supported by a dedicated staff and faculty and access to outstanding research resources, such as the Museum of Anthropology and Laboratory of Archaeology. Today, UBC anthropology faculty and students conduct original research throughout BC and around the world.

The PhD program provides students with the opportunity to structure a course of study towards specific intellectual and practical interests. Students extend their knowledge of domains of anthropological theory and current research that are appropriate to these interests. PhD students design and carry out a major research project that forms the basis of their dissertation. The PhD degree proceeds in two stages.