We offer an expansive outlook on human cultures, providing multiple opportunities for hands-on anthropological fieldwork, including field-based courses and lengthy field trips. The block system promotes creative teaching and rigorous expectations for reading, writing, and critical qualitative and quantitative analysis in anthropology. All four sub-fields of American anthropology are represented in our department: archaeology, which focuses on the material cultures and peoples of the past; biological anthropology, which concentrates on the relationships between culture and biology in the lives of humans and our evolutionary relatives; linguistic anthropology, which addresses both the formal complexity of linguistic systems and the role they play in regulating and negotiating social life; and sociocultural anthropology, which concentrates on contemporary peoples and their values, practices and organization. Students study all four sub-fields in introductory courses, and pursue advanced-level courses in at least two sub-fields. ArcheologyAnthropology majors aspire to careers in the arts, business, and a variety of professions and service agencies as well as anthropology. As a result, no single set of requirements is sufficient. The introductory and most intermediate (200-) level courses are open to all students, have no prerequisites, and generally satisfy certain all-college requirements in addition to requirements for the anthropology major. Intermediate courses explore anthropological perspectives on questions that are also central to other academic disciplines. With appropriate prerequisites, most advanced courses are also open to non-majors. Recognizing Colorado College’s role as a liberal arts institution, the Department of Anthropology encourages its majors to work out a program of all-college study that complements their interest in anthropology.

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