Degree: Bachelor of Arts (BA)
Major: Anthropology

Program Overview

As a student in the anthropology program at Case Western Reserve University, you will be challenged to form a unique perspective on human behavior, institutions, and biology. Skills of investigation, discovery, and critical thinking will prepare you for a wide range of careers, including health, international affairs, public service, education, law, management, and industry. An undergraduate degree in anthropology can lead to further study in medicine and law, or to advanced study in various academic programs. Just a few examples of the exciting opportunities open to anthropologists include working with local police forensic departments, studying health issues for hospitals or medical centers, and consulting for companies that develop software and electronics.

Students pursuing a major or minor in anthropology may choose one of four areas of concentration: general anthropology, biological anthropology, archaeology, or medical anthropology. Each of these emphases enables you to develop the qualitative and quantitative analytic skills necessary for both a career and further academic study.

Learning Outcomes

• Students will be able to develop a global and cross-cultural perspective on human cultural diversity and will have an understanding of theories about culture, human cultural diversity, and the sociocultural context as shaping human experience and behavior.
• Students will be able to develop an understanding of the evidence for and evolutionary explanation of human evolution over the past 7 million years and contemporary human biological diversity.
• Students will be able to learn about at least one specific geographic/cultural area in-depth.
• Students will be able to think critically and effectively communicate, particularly about key anthropological data and concepts.

Undergraduate Policies

For undergraduate policies and procedures, please review the Undergraduate Academics section of the General Bulletin.

Accelerated Master's Programs

Undergraduate students may participate in accelerated programs toward graduate or professional degrees. For more information and details of the policies and procedures related to accelerated studies, please visit the Undergraduate Academics section of the General Bulletin.

Program Requirements

Students seeking to complete this major and degree program must meet the general requirements for bachelor's degrees and the Unified General Education Requirements. Students completing this program as a secondary major while completing another undergraduate degree program do not need to satisfy the school-specific requirements associated with this major.

The undergraduate major requires a minimum of 30 credit hours in anthropology. The undergraduate program provides a cross-cultural perspective on human behavior, culture, and biology. Students may choose from four major concentrations: General Anthropology, Medical Anthropology, Biological Anthropology, and Archaeology.

Departmental Honors

This program is open to qualified majors in anthropology who have completed 15 credit hours of anthropology with a 3.25 GPA and who have an overall 3.0 GPA. Students should apply for the program in the fall semester of their junior year and, if approved, register for ANTH 391 in the spring of their junior year and ANTH 392 in the fall of their senior year.

Honors students are required to undertake a research project under the supervision of one or more faculty members and to complete a research paper in the fall semester of their senior year. Students interested in the program should contact one of the department’s undergraduate advisors.

Concentration Requirements 

General Anthropology Concentration

The General Anthropology Concentration provides training in three subdisciplines of anthropology. The first, sociocultural anthropology, emphasizes relationships among socioeconomic institutions, cultural ecology, health and medicine, religion and symbolism, individual psychological variables, and language. The second, biological anthropology, emphasizes human ecology and adaptability, human growth and development, nutritional adaptation, epidemiology, and human and nonhuman primate evolution. The third, archaeology, deals with the long sequences of independent sociocultural, technological, and ecological evolution that have taken place under diverse conditions.

Medical Anthropology Concentration

The Medical Anthropology Concentration provides training in the three subdisciplines discussed above, but with a focus on their relationship to physical and mental health, illness, disease, and medicine.

Biological Anthropology Concentration

The Biological Anthropology Concentration deals with the biological nature of humans past and present. Biological anthropologists look beyond purely biological phenomena to understand how biology, behavior, and environment interact. Most course work is in the subdiscipline of human biology, which seeks to understand those interactions by studying physiology, genetics, nutrition, and epidemiology in modern human populations throughout the world. The concentration also provides training in paleoanthropology, which documents the biological history of humans and, in conjunction with archaeology, analyzes those interactions for past humans.

Archaeology Concentration

The Archaeology Concentration focuses on the customs and daily life of people who lived in the past. Anthropologists excavate and analyze the material remains of the sites of human occupation. At the same time, archaeological research seeks to understand the evolution of culture and society by determining how and why changes in human society have occurred.