Course summary

Social anthropology examines human societies and cultures in a broad comparative perspective. Social anthropologists try to explain the causes of variation in social and cultural behaviour, and also to understand what it means to belong to a cultural group whose values and rules may be very different from those familiar to you. Studying anthropology will provide a framework to help you see what is universal to all human societies and what is variable. The programme aims to build your capacity to analyse social and political relations and so to engage productively in major contemporary debates concerning social justice, multiculturalism and the direction of political and economic change in today's world.