Anthropology (Minor)

Program Summary

The anthropology minor provides an interesting and rigorous course of study for students seeking to understand the human cultural and biological experience through time and space. Students pursuing the anthropology minor at SUU will be exposed to a four-field approach that emphasizes anthropology’s dominant sub-disciplines: archeology, cultural anthropology, linguistics, and biological anthropology. They will master a broad range of research, critical reasoning, and oral and written communication skills designed to prepare them for life and work in an increasingly multicultural world. Through courses dealing with human evolution, prehistoric culture change, linguistics, and the cultural and biological diversity of contemporary humans, students will be taught to question and examine the significance of ethnocentric beliefs, attitudes, and prejudices and to understand the incredible biological and cultural diversity that characterizes the human species.

Program Learning Outcomes

• Students will possess factual knowledge in the fields of anthropology and/or archeology, including the role of culture and social structures in shaping individual lives and human societies.
• Students will have the ability to understand, describe, and critically assess theories, principals, and concepts central to the anthropological and/or archaeological fields.
• Students will demonstrate effective oral and written communication skills.
• Students will demonstrate the ability to design ethical anthropological/archaeological research and to apply anthropological/archaeological concepts and methods in field research or other forums.
• Students will possess and demonstrate critical and analytical thinking and reasoning skills to understand, describe, and critically assess the role of culture and social structures in shaping individual lives, and to understand, describe, and critically assess inequalities based on race, ethnicity, class, gender, sexualities, immigration status, etc.
• Students will analyze personal experiences (inclusive of educational experiences), including experiential learning projects, using the anthropological/archaeological imagination.

Program Information

• All courses must be passed with a “C-” (1.7) or better to be counted in the minor.
• Students must maintain an overall GPA of at least 2.0 in the minor.
• No more than nine (9) credits of lower-division anthropology courses may be counted toward the credit requirement of the minor.
• Students may apply up to six (6) credits of ANTH 4960 - Archaeology Field Methods  toward the Anthropology minor.