Apr 19, 2024  
2022-2023 Graduate Catalog 
    
2022-2023 Graduate Catalog [Not Current Academic Year. Consult with Your Academic Advisor for Your Catalog Year]

Anthropology, MA


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College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences  > Department of Comparative Cultural Studies  > Anthropology, MA.

The Anthropology program in the Department of Comparative Cultural Studies offers a Master of Arts degree in anthropology.  Anthropology is a holistic discipline studying humans past and present and teaches students how to navigate our multicultural complexities of our global society. The program is a thesis-driven combination of advanced coursework and original research through which students can concentrate on any of the areas of anthropological research offered by program faculty. Graduate training at the Master’s level enables students with varied humanistic interests to pursue a wide range of post-graduate careers, such as: education, museum work or cultural resource management, non-profit organizational work and advocacy, qualitative research in business and government, and so on, as well as further study at the doctoral level.

Please see: http://www.uh.edu/class/ccs/anthropology/graduate/.

Admission Requirements


An applicant should have completed a Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Science degree, preferably with a social science background but many majors are acceptable. An anthropology undergraduate major is not required, but the student should have a GPA of 3.0 out of 4.0 in the last 60 hours of the undergraduate degree. The applicant should submit an official transcript with degree posted, three letters of recommendation, a writing sample, and GRE test scores, plus a $50 application fee for domestic applicants/$125 for international applicants. Information on additional requirements for international applicants can be found on the Graduate School website.

The GRE requirement is waived for applicants to the MA program who have at least one of the following from an institution accredited by one of the six regional accrediting associations as specified in the UH Minimum Qualifications for Admission to Masters and Doctoral Programs (General Admission Policy ):

  • an overall undergraduate grade point average of 3.00 or higher (on a 4‐point scale), or
  • a master’s or terminal degree.

Degree Requirements


Credit hours required for this degree: 36.0 (30 credit hours and six credit hours of master’s thesis)

Subdiscipline Option (6.0 credit hours)


It is expected that students will concentrate on one of the subdisciplines of Anthropology that are offered by the graduate faculty. Complete six credit hours from one of the following three lists:

Archaeology/Bioarchaeology


Physical (Biological) Anthropology


Elective Course Options (15.0 credit hours)


The remaining 15.0 credit hours can be taken as electives from other graduate-level courses offered in anthropology. Six credit hours can be taken outside the department, if approved by the graduate advisor and relevant to the student’s thesis research. These may include courses in Biology, Geographic Information Systems, Sociology, and graduate anthropology courses at Rice University that do not have equivalents in our program. For information on requesting permission to take courses at Rice, visit Inter-Institutional Agreement .

Besides course work, students must pass a three-part comprehensive exam based on anthropological theory and two of the subdiscipline courses listed above. This comprehensive examination is given in Fall and Spring in the 5th week and involves a three-hour period to answer a question posed by the graduate faculty.

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