The Department of Anthropology offers a PhD in Anthropology, with concentrations in Sociocultural Anthropology, Archaeology, or Biological Anthropology. The PhD in Anthropology is concerned with diverse analytic and substantive problems in the contemporary world and includes research sites across globally. For example, the PhD in Anthropology might focus on issues of political economy and finance; the dynamics of race, gender, and sexuality; psychological and medical anthropology; the study of religion and secularism; genomics and the anthropology of science and reason; folklore theory; linguistic anthropology; long term human-environment relations; cultural politics of food, energy, and space; aging and the life course; historic archaeology, archaeology of the contemporary; bioarchaeology, biocultural approaches in human biology; human evolution, cultural politics of identity, space, and the body; agrarian micropolitics; or urban anthropology.
Thank you for considering UC Berkeley for graduate study! UC Berkeley offers more than 120 graduate programs representing the breadth and depth of interdisciplinary scholarship. The Graduate Division hosts a complete list of graduate academic programs, departments, degrees offered, and application deadlines can be found on the Graduate Division website.
Prospective students must submit an online application to be considered for admission, in addition to any supplemental materials specific to the program for which they are applying. The online application and steps to take to apply can be found on the Graduate Division website.
Admission Requirements
The minimum graduate admission requirements are:
A bachelor’s degree or recognized equivalent from an accredited institution;
A satisfactory scholastic average, usually a minimum grade-point average (GPA) of 3.0 (B) on a 4.0 scale; and
Enough undergraduate training to do graduate work in your chosen field.
For a list of requirements to complete your graduate application, please see the Graduate Division’s Admissions Requirements page. It is also important to check with the program or department of interest, as they may have additional requirements specific to their program of study and degree. Department contact information can be found here.
Applicants for the Anthropology PhD are required to specify the concentration to which they wish to apply: Archaeology, Biological Anthropology, or Sociocultural Anthropology. Applicants are required to name at least two faculty with whom they wish to work.
Applicants must hold a Bachelor of Arts degree or its equivalent from an institution of acceptable standing and may hold a Master of Arts in Anthropology or another field. Previous concentration in anthropology is not required. The department does not accept applicants interested in the Master of Arts in Anthropology degree only.
Doctoral Degree Requirements
Normative Time Requirements
Normative Time to Advancement to PhD Candidacy
Total time to advancement is expected to be three years.
sTep I
The students begin to narrow down their interests to particular topical and geographical fields of specialization, a process that normally takes one year. During this time students are expected to take required core course per their programmatic speciality.
STep II
Students attend seminars, prepare three field statements in their specializations, satisfy their language requirement, and prepare for their PhD oral qualifying examination. This step lasts one to two years. With the successful passing of the orals, students are advanced to candidacy for the PhD degree.
Normative Time in Candidacy
Step III
Students undertake research for the PhD dissertation under a three-person committee in charge of their research and dissertation. Students do original field, laboratory, or library research, which generally takes a minimum of one year. The students then write their dissertations based on the results of this research. On completion of the research and approval of the dissertation by the committee, the students are awarded the doctorate. When registered during this phase, students normally enroll in ANTHRO 299 with their dissertation chair.
In addition to English, the program requires at least one other language. This language may be a language of international scholarship, a literary language, or a field language. The required language must be directly relevant to the research.
Field Statements
Field statements are bibliographical essays on areas of specialization that are to address substantive areas of anthropology. Each field statement is a critical summary and analysis of issues and debates in a field of knowledge. Students will write three field statements. Faculty sponsors will work with the student in the preparation of these field statements. All three faculty sponsors for archaeology field statements must be from within the Department of Anthropology; biological anthropology and sociocultural anthropology students may work with one faculty member from outside the department. Students normally enroll in a section of ANTHRO 298 for each statement with the professor supervising that statement.
Prospectus
The dissertation prospectus is an intellectual justification and research plan for the dissertation. Sociocultural students must get their prospectus signed by all three dissertation committee members and file it at the end of their third year before the PhD Oral Qualifying Examination. The dissertation prospectus should be between 8-10 pages. Archaeology and Biological Anthropology students must submit their dissertation prospectus before the PhD Oral Qualifying Examination, and it should be between 8-10 pages.
Time in Candidacy
Fieldwork and Dissertation Writing
After advancing to candidacy for the PhD, students are expected to conduct dissertation fieldwork, typically for about a year. Students then return to analyze their findings and begin writing their dissertations. Some use this period to gain more experience in teaching as well.
Dissertation Presentation/Finishing Talk
There is no formal defense of the completed dissertation. Archaeology students are required to publicly present a talk about their dissertation research in their final year, normally as part of the Wednesday brown bag lunch lecture series of the Archaeological Research Facility.
Required Professional Development
Presentations
All Archaeology graduate students are expected to attend Wednesday brown bag lunches held at 2251 College Avenue, organized by faculty affiliates of the Archaeological Research Facility, and they may regularly present research talks there.
Other
All Anthropology graduate students not yet advanced to candidacy are required to enroll in ANTHRO 290, each semester until they are advanced to PhD candidacy. All in-residence archaeology students are expected to register in ANTHRO 291 to participate in the Archaeology Outreach Program, which includes school and community group talks and other activities.
5th Year Master's Degree
This coursework-based masters' program offers selected outstanding Berkeley undergraduates already engaged in mentored research with archaeology faculty the opportunity to consolidate their knowledge while participating in graduate seminars with doctoral students. The masters' degree is a desirable employment credential in Cultural Resource Management (CRM), so that students completing this degree will have immediate employment potential. It can also serve as the first step toward a doctoral program in anthropological archaeology. This program is only open to University of California, Berkeley, undergraduates pursuing a degree in Anthropology, ideally applying in their senior year.
Research Resources
The department administers three endowments, the Lowie and the Olson Funds, which are designed for student research support, and the Brandes Fund, for ethnographic research. Graduate students are eligible to apply for these funds for research and conference travel and other related expenses over the course of their graduate career. Please consult the Graduate Programs page on the departmental website for further details.
Teaching Opportunities
The department strives to provide every student with an opportunity to gain teaching experience. Every year, students work as teaching assistants responsible for small discussion or laboratory sections (graduate student instructors, or GSIs) and serve as readers assisting with grading but not conducting independent teaching. Students who have advanced to candidacy and have taught at least two, and ideally four, semesters, may be appointed to teach Anthro R5B: Reading and Composition in Anthropology on topics of their own design with approved content. In preparation for teaching, each fall the department offers a pedagogy seminar Anthro 375, required before or concurrent with the first GSI assignment, on teaching in anthropology.
Courses
Anthropology
Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2023, Spring 2023
Advanced topics in biological anthropology, including both contemporary and ancestral human populations, such as biology of the life course, health and disease, violence and trauma, cognition and symbolic communication, and other anthropological topics viewed from the perspective of human biology. Special Topics in Biological Anthropology: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2019, Spring 2018, Spring 2016
This course juxtaposes discourse analysis and approaches to health and biomedicine, querying how ideologies of language and communication provide implicit foundations for work on health, disease, medicine, and the body and how biopolitical discourses and practices inform constructions of discourse. Discourse and of the Body: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2024, Fall 2018, Fall 2014
Comparative study of mental illness and socially generated disease: psychiatric treatment, practitioners, and institutions. Topics in Medical Anthropology: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2013, Fall 2011, Fall 2009
Various topics and issues in the methods of archaeological analysis and interpretation: style, ceramics, architectural analysis, lithic analysis, archaeozoology, etc. Archaeological Method: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2022, Fall 2020
Required for all first and second year graduate students in archaeology. Three hours of seminar discussion of major issues in the history and theory of archaeological research and practice (229A), and of the research strategies and design for various kinds of archaeological problems (229B). To be offered alternate semesters. Archaeological Research Strategies: History of Theory in Anthropological Archaeology: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2025, Fall 2023, Spring 2021
Required for all first and second year graduate students in archaeology. Three hours of seminar discussion of major issues in the history and theory of archaeological research and practice (229A), and of the research strategies and design for various kinds of archaeological problems (229B). To be offered alternate semesters. Archaeological Research Strategies: Research Design: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2014, Fall 2010, Fall 2009
This seminar is intended to guide students in the definition of a field within archaeology, from initial conceptualization to writing of a field statement, dissertation chapter, or review article. Writing the Field Statement in Archaeology: Read More [+]
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Fall 2023, Spring 2011, Spring 2009
This advanced seminar course explores how we reconstruct past lifeways from archaeological skeletal remains. It deals with the skeletal biology of past populations, covering both the theoretical approaches and methods used in the analysis of skeletal and dental remains. Advanced Topics in Bioarchaeology: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2023, Fall 2022
Anthropological theory and practice--following the rest of the world--have been undergoing important restructuring in the past decade. The course is organized to reflect this fact. We will begin by looking at recent debates about the nature and purpose of anthropology. This will provide a starting point for reading a series of classic ethnographies in new ways as well as examining some dimensions of the current research agenda in cultural anthropology. Fundamentals of Anthropological Theory: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Enrollment is strictly limited to and required of all anthropology and medical anthropology graduate students who have not been advanced to candidacy
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 4-6 hours of seminar per week
Additional Details
Subject/Course Level: Anthropology/Graduate
Grading: Letter grade.
Instructor: Required of all graduate students in social/cultural anthropology.
Terms offered: Spring 2025, Spring 2024, Spring 2023
Anthropological theory and practice--following the rest of the world--have been undergoing important restructuring in the past decade. The course is organized to reflect this fact. We will begin by looking at recent debates about the nature and purpose of anthropology. This will provide a starting point for reading a series of classic ethnographies in new ways as well as examining some dimensions of the current research agenda in cultural anthropology. Fundamentals of Anthropological Theory: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Enrollment is strictly limited to and required of all anthropology and medical anthropology graduate s tudents who have not been advanced to candidacy
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 4-6 hours of seminar per week
Additional Details
Subject/Course Level: Anthropology/Graduate
Grading: Letter grade.
Instructor: Required of all graduate students in social/cultural anthropology.
Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2023, Fall 2022, Fall 2014, Fall 2013
This course provides a strong foundation for graduate work in STS, a multidisciplinary field with a signature capacity to rethink the relationship among science, technology, and political and social life. From climate change to population genomics, access to medicines and the impact of new media, the problems of our time are simultaneously scientific and social, technological and political, ethical and economic. Topics in Science and Technology Studies: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2011, Summer 2006 10 Week Session, Spring 2006
This course examines a broad range of theories that elucidate the formal, structural, and contextual properties of narratives in relation to gestures, the body, and emotion; imagination and fantasy; memory and the senses; space and time. It focuses on narratives at work, on the move, in action as they emerge from the matrix of the everyday preeminently, storytelling in conversation--as key to folk genres--the folktale, the legend, the epic, the myth. Theories of Narrative: Read More [+]
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Summer: 6 weeks - 10 hours of lecture per week 8 weeks - 7.5 hours of lecture per week
Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2023, Fall 2022, Fall 2021
This seminar explores the emergence of notions of tradition and modernity and their reproduction in Eurocentric epistemologies and political formations. It uses work by such authors as Anderson, Butler, Chakrabarty, Clifford, Derrida, Foucault, Latour, Mignolo, Pateman, and Poovey to critically reread foundational works published between the 17th century and the present--along with philosophical texts with which they are in dialogue--in terms of how they are imbricated within and help produce traditionalities and modernities. Theories of Traditionality and Modernity: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Graduate standing or consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit with instructor consent.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2025, Spring 2024, Spring 2023
This seminar explores the emergence of notions of tradition and modernity and their reproduction in Eurocentric epistemologies and political formations. It uses work by such authors as Anderson, Butler, Chakrabarty, Clifford, Derrida, Foucault, Latour, Mignolo, Pateman, and Poovey to critically reread foundational works published between the 17th century and the present--along with philosophical texts with which they are in dialogue--in terms of how they are imbricated within and help produce traditionalities and modernities. Theories of Traditionality and Modernity: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit with instructor consent.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Fall 2022, Fall 2017, Fall 2014
Intensive introduction to the study of language as a cultural system and speech as socially embedded communicative practice. This is the core course for students wishing to take further coursework in linguistic anthropology. Seminars in Linguistic Anthropology: Fundamentals of Language in Context: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2025, Spring 2024, Spring 2023, Spring 2022, Spring 2017, Spring 2016, Spring 2015
This course will cover methods and approaches for students considering professionalizing in the field of STS, including a chance for students to workshop written work. Science and Technology Studies Research Seminar: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Additional Details
Subject/Course Level: Anthropology/Graduate
Grading: Offered for satisfactory/unsatisfactory grade only.
Terms offered: Spring 2021, Spring 2020, Fall 2012
Courses will vary from year to year. See Departmental Internal Catalogue for detailed descriptions of course offerings for each semester. Seminars in Area Studies: Africa: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Fall 2017, Spring 2013, Fall 2010
Courses will vary from year to year. See Departmental Internal Catalogue for detailed descriptions of course offerings for each semester. Seminars in Area Studies: South Asia: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2016, Spring 2015, Spring 2012
Courses will vary from year to year. See Departmental Internal Catalogue for detailed descriptions of course offerings for each semester. Seminars in Area Studies: China: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2 hours of seminar per week
Terms offered: Spring 2025, Fall 2024, Spring 2024
Required each term of all registered graduate students prior to their advancement to Ph.D. candidacy. Survey of Anthropological Research: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 8 weeks - 2 hours of colloquium per week
Additional Details
Subject/Course Level: Anthropology/Graduate
Grading: Offered for satisfactory/unsatisfactory grade only.
Terms offered: Spring 2023, Spring 2021
Collaboration in ethnographic praxis on a local and global scale in folkloristics, sociocultural, linguistic, media, and medical anthropology, producing projects grounded in meaningful engagement with communities. Graduate students, working with lay mentors and faculty, will design and begin implementation of projects that break through infrastructures of theory, research, pedagogy, and practice that reproduce racial hierarchies and that erase anti-racist alternatives.
Terms offered: Prior to 2007
Collaboration in ethnographic praxis on a local and global scale in folkloristics, sociocultural, linguistic, media, and medical anthropology, producing projects grounded in meaningful engagement with communities. Graduate students, working with lay mentors and faculty, will design and begin implementation of projects that break through infrastructures of theory, research, pedagogy, and practice that reproduce racial hierarchies and that erase anti-racist alternatives.
Terms offered: Spring 2016, Fall 2015, Spring 2015
Practice in original field research under staff supervision. One unit of credit for every four hours of work in the field. Supervised Research: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2-12 hours of fieldwork per week
Terms offered: Spring 2024, Spring 2020, Spring 2019
Individual conferences intended to provide directed reading in subject matter not covered by available seminar offerings. Directed Reading: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 1-8 hours of independent study per week
Terms offered: Spring 2024, Summer 2022 Second 6 Week Session, Summer 2021 First 6 Week Session
Individual conferences to provide supervision in the preparation of an original research paper or dissertation. Directed Research: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Prerequisites: Consent of instructor
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 2-8 hours of independent study per week
Terms offered: Spring 2022, Spring 2021, Fall 2018
Group consultation with instructor. Supervised training with instructor on teaching undergraduates. Professional Training: Teaching: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit up to a total of 12 units.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3-18 hours of independent study per week
Additional Details
Subject/Course Level: Anthropology/Professional course for teachers or prospective teachers
Grading: Offered for satisfactory/unsatisfactory grade only.
Terms offered: Fall 2024, Fall 2023, Fall 2022
Training in both the logistics and the pedagogical issues of undergraduate teaching. Graduate Pedagogy Seminar: Read More [+]
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 3 hours of seminar per week
Additional Details
Subject/Course Level: Anthropology/Professional course for teachers or prospective teachers
Grading: Offered for satisfactory/unsatisfactory grade only.
Terms offered: Fall 2018, Spring 2018, Fall 2017
In preparation for Ph.D. examinations. Individual study in consultation with adviser. Intended to provide an opportunity for qualified students to prepare themselves for the various examinations required of candidates for the Ph.D. May not be used for unit or residence requirements for the degree. Individual Study for Doctoral Students: Read More [+]
Rules & Requirements
Repeat rules: Course may be repeated for credit without restriction.
Hours & Format
Fall and/or spring: 15 weeks - 1-8 hours of independent study per week
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