Anthropological Research

Entry requirements

Minimum UK 2:1 (or overseas equivalent) in social anthropology or in a degree where social anthropology formed a major component.

When assessing your academic record we consider your degree subject, grades you have achieved and the standing of the institution where you studied your qualification.

Months of entry

September

Course content

The MA Anthropological Research course is designed to prepare you to carry out doctoral level research in social anthropology. It provides training in a wide range of research methods and teaches you how to develop a substantive research project in a theoretically and methodologically informed way.

Note that although the MAAR is listed as a taught MA, it is in actuality like a first year PhD programme. This means that MAAR students take classes with first year PhD students. MAAR students should also have a fairly clear idea of their dissertation topic by the time they arrive, although this can change in the course of the programme. Normally, there are only two or three MAAR students per year so you will have a small cohort.

Although, primarily intended as preliminary to doctoral research, the course is also available as a stand-alone taught master's degree to improve your social research skills and gain an in-depth understanding of ethnographic methods and approaches.

You will work closely with an expert supervisor in social anthropology, with further guidance from a second supervisor. All students attend the following core course units:

• Issues in Ethnographic Research I andII;
• Postgraduate ResearchSeminar;
• Independent Theoretical and Ethnographic Analysis I; and
• Introduction to Quantitative Methods.

In consultation with your supervisor, you will also select threeshort, five credit units in qualitative or quantitative research methods. Computer training is also available.

You may then select two specialist course units, of which one must be within social anthropology (options vary from year to year) and one may be elsewhere in the University.