Course summary

If studies of the mind and mental health interest you, this socially and culturally focused course may provide a rich alternative to more scientific studies in psychology and psychiatry. Study this course and you will investigate psychological and psychiatric issues from an anthropological perspective, addressing issues at the forefront of debates in social policy, morality, personal identity, and mental health. By considering cases from around the world you’ll explore how person, consciousness, and experience are shaped through cultural practices and political realities. Examining world ethnography (including the UK), you’ll learn about selfhood, emotion, personality, and understandings of ‘madness’ and mental illness in cultural context. Brunel students come from varied professional and academic backgrounds, many taking time out for professional development. If you haven’t studied anthropology before, you’ll be offered introductory modules in anthropological theory to help prepare you for the rest of the course. Anthropology at Brunel is well-known for its focus on ethnographic fieldwork and you will be expected to get out of the library and undertake your own, original research – whether in the UK or overseas – and to present your findings in a dissertation. Your fieldwork can be taken anywhere in the world, locally, previous students have explored psychic training, Pentecostal churches, and mental health charities, and internationally, students have explored subjects like funerals in Iran, Amazon neoshamanism, and autism programmes in Belgium. A 30 month part-time option of the course is also available. If you wish to be considered for the part-time 30 month version, please make your application for the 24 month part-time route and then contact the Admissions team to request the change to the 30 month duration.