Useful Fact about this Degree
Aberdeen is ranked 3rd in the UK for Anthropology and Archaeology (Guardian University Guide 2025) and in the Global Top 100 for Anthropology (QS World University Rankings by Subject 2024)
Anthropology at Aberdeen is the study of the diversity of human communities and cultures around the world. It brings together theories about ‘being human’ from a wide range of Western and non-Western thinkers to understand human action, culture and thought, as studied through long-term international research with the communities themselves.
Aberdeen is ranked 1st in Scotland for Overall Satisfaction in Anthropology (NSS 2024) and ranked 3rd in the UK for Anthropology and Archaeology (Guardian, 2025)
Our courses examine the connections among all aspects of life – family and kinship, economic systems, political and religious institutions, human-animal and ecological relations – and the way in which they come together to create whole ways of living within an increasingly global and postcolonial world.
At Aberdeen, our degree draws on the expertise of staff specialists on South America, Tibet and South Asia, the Pacific and the circumpolar North from Scotland and Siberia to Canada. It provides students with training in interview and social research skills, research design, ethnographic reporting and museum skills, culminating in a supervised fieldwork or library-based dissertation project of the student’s choice.
The skills you will develop in critical thinking and analysis will give you a deep knowledge and understanding of human behaviour which can be applied in business and many other fields. Many of our graduates now work in research, teaching, media, politics, or in business or public sector organisations in a host of roles with international and cultural contexts.
Anthropology graduates go on to careers in development, foreign affairs, journalism and research, amongst many others.
You will enjoy a special, warm welcome at the University of Aberdeen and benefit from excellent teaching, the international impact of our research, and a global experience as part of our friendly and vibrant international community. You will love our beautiful campus and great facilities for learning, sports and leisure, and many opportunities to develop extra skills, broaden your horizons, and gain the competitive advantage in the career path you choose.
Anthropology is also available as a joint degree along with a range of other subjects that you can find here.
Anthropology is a diverse field of study that will provide you with unique insights into the differences in human behaviour from a cross-cultural perspective. You'll learn about the beliefs and attitudes of societies all over the world and will study themes such as ethnicity and nationalism, anthropological approaches to religion, colonialism, society, nature and morality. This programme is taught through a selection of compulsory and optional courses adding up to 120 credits each year.
This course, which is prescribed for level 1 undergraduate students and articulating students who are in their first year at the University, is studied entirely online, is studied entirely online, takes approximately 2-3 hours to complete and can be taken in one sitting, or spread across the first 4 weeks of term.
Topics include University orientation overview, equality & diversity, MySkills, health, safety and cyber security, and academic integrity.Successful completion of this course will be recorded on your Transcript as ‘Achieved’.
15 Credit Points
Anthropology explores ways of life in societies and cultures around the world. Through fieldwork in the places people live, anthropologists connect global issues with everyday lives. In this course you’ll learn about the key topics of anthropology and its research methods. Lectures introduce anthropological research topics such as ritual, climate change and indigenous rights. Small group tutorials will allow you to debate the issues and share your perspectives.
15 Credit Points
In this course students will be offered an extended introduction to social anthropology and will focus on topics: language and culture, belief and religion, gender and sex, kinship, and race. Students will develop and refine their understanding of major issues in the discipline of social anthropology through staff lectures, tutorials, and ethnographic films.
This compulsory evaluation is designed to find out if your academic writing is of a sufficient standard to enable you to succeed at university and, if you need it, to provide support to improve. It is completed on-line via MyAberdeen with clear instructions to guide you through it. If you pass the evaluation at the first assessment it will not take much of your time. If you do not, you will be provided with resources to help you improve. This evaluation does not carry credits but if you do not complete it this will be recorded on your degree transcript.
Select a further 90 credit points from courses of choice.
30 Credit Points
This course explores some of the key questions that anthropologists have debated: what it is to be human, the nature of human interaction with other humans and with other species, the role language plays in thought and culture, and the different ways that people perceive the world and act within it. Themes that will be discussed in this course include rationality, language, species difference, race, and place and community.
30 Credit Points
This course will explore contemporary colonial expressions from an anthropological perspective. It will be split into two main themes: Material Histories; and Mediated Histories. Within these themes it will address topics such as the "capturing" of cultures in museums, kinship and politics, gendered colonialism, economic development, media, aboriginal rights and contemporary resistance movements.
Select a further 60 credit points from courses of choice.
30 Credit Points
This course explores theoretical issues and key debates in contemporary anthropology. We begin with the questioning of the central concepts of culture and society in anthropology during the 1980s. Following this, we ask: how can anthropology proceed if the targets of its investigation can no longer be understood as objective entities? How can anthropology proceed if the anthropologist themselves is inevitably implicated in and part of those very targets? To look for possible answers, the course examines current anthropological interest in power and history, political economy and phenomenology, experience, embodiment and practice, ontology and things that speak.
30 Credit Points
This course acquaints students with the practical, methodological and theoretical issues involved in anthropological research. It is particularly useful for students planning a fieldwork-based dissertation. The course focuses on methodological approaches and the relation between fieldwork experience and ethnographic production. It is taught through lectures, tutorials, class discussions and practical workshops, and covers research planning, fieldwork techniques and ethnographic interpretation.
Select one of:
AND one of:
NOTE: You are required to gain at least 210 credits from courses in Anthropology across levels 3 and 4.
30 Credit Points
In this course students will be introduced to the topical themes in contemporary anthropology: roads, automobility, car cultures, migration, road narratives, and roads in film and literature. The course is based on the notions of movement and mobility and will incorporate the ethnographic material from the North, including Scotland and Siberia. During the course students will conduct their own research on the road of their choice. The course includes: a fieldwork element, screenings of documentary films about roads, and weekly student-led discussions.
30 Credit Points
Through a series of lectures and a mix of tutor and student led tutorials, this course focuses on the sometimes difficult history of anthropology and the circumpolar north. Misconceptions (sometimes intentionally created) about the people who live there and their relationships to the environment have informed both state policy and anthropological theory and now is the time for a new anthropology of the north to set the record straight. Students will be encouraged and expected to do their own research on topics of their own choosing and bring these insights back to the course through lively tutorial discussions.
30 Credit Points
This course will examine anthropological theories of the state, political organization and violence. Through an analysis of both modern and historical case studies from Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas, we will critically examine theories of state of modern and non-modern state formation and organisation, and the nexus of religion and colonial history. In the second half of the course, particular attention will we paid to the ethnography of violence as a mode of state and proto-state political action.
30 Credit Points
This course addresses the anthropological study of emotion and self. It covers the different theoretical approaches to emotion, self and subjectivity. The broad questions addressed revolve around the cultural construction of emotion and self, and the entanglement of psychodynamic processes and power in the formation of the subject. The topics covered include anger and fear, grief and compassion, personhood, technologies of self and subjectification, identification and melancholia.
30 Credit Points
Indigeneity is one of the more controversial relations created by globalisation. Widely criticised for being ‘essentialist’ and ‘anti-liberal’, it is one of the more quickly growing identities recognized by the United Nations and defended in the constitutions of many nation-states. Using anthropological insight, this course survey the history of the term, study its expansion from the ‘salt-water colonies’ and ‘settler states’ to the heartland of Europe, and explore some of the challenges and advantages of the term. The seminar will explore how the term has come to be used in different post-colonial situations from the classic “heartlands” of indigeneity in North America, Latin America, and Northern Fennoscandia, to new contexts in China, India, Africa. The course will also explore how the politics of aboriginal rights has become closely linked to struggles for recognition, environmentalism, and collective struggles against neo-liberalism. The course is run in a seminar format with students encouraged to weigh and evaluate the results of their reading.
30 Credit Points
This course explores new directions in how we think about humans and other species. Recent years have seen an upsurge in interest in how the social sciences and humanities deal with animals, plants and other organisms and we scrutinise these cutting edge ideas in depth. A lot of emphasis is placed on trying to think through real life encounters and issues, from a walk in the park to new revelations about life from the bottom of the ocean. Although the focus is on anthropological work, the course should appeal to students from a wide range of backgrounds.
30 Credit Points
This course will build on the initial research design students built during Research Project Part 1 towards their undergraduate research project in anthropology.
Plus, select a further 60 credit points from level 4 Anthropology courses of choice, and a further 30 credit points from level 3 or 4 courses of choice.
NOTE: You are required to gain at least 210 credits from courses in Anthropology across levels 3 and 4.
30 Credit Points
In this course students will be introduced to the topical themes in contemporary anthropology: roads, automobility, car cultures, migration, road narratives, and roads in film and literature. The course is based on the notions of movement and mobility and will incorporate the ethnographic material from the North, including Scotland and Siberia. During the course students will conduct their own research on the road of their choice. The course includes: a fieldwork element, screenings of documentary films about roads, and weekly student-led discussions.
30 Credit Points
Through a series of lectures and a mix of tutor and student led tutorials, this course focuses on the sometimes difficult history of anthropology and the circumpolar north. Misconceptions (sometimes intentionally created) about the people who live there and their relationships to the environment have informed both state policy and anthropological theory and now is the time for a new anthropology of the north to set the record straight. Students will be encouraged and expected to do their own research on topics of their own choosing and bring these insights back to the course through lively tutorial discussions.
30 Credit Points
This course will examine anthropological theories of the state, political organization and violence. Through an analysis of both modern and historical case studies from Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas, we will critically examine theories of state of modern and non-modern state formation and organisation, and the nexus of religion and colonial history. In the second half of the course, particular attention will we paid to the ethnography of violence as a mode of state and proto-state political action.
30 Credit Points
This course addresses the anthropological study of emotion and self. It covers the different theoretical approaches to emotion, self and subjectivity. The broad questions addressed revolve around the cultural construction of emotion and self, and the entanglement of psychodynamic processes and power in the formation of the subject. The topics covered include anger and fear, grief and compassion, personhood, technologies of self and subjectification, identification and melancholia.
30 Credit Points
Indigeneity is one of the more controversial relations created by globalisation. Widely criticised for being ‘essentialist’ and ‘anti-liberal’, it is one of the more quickly growing identities recognized by the United Nations and defended in the constitutions of many nation-states. Using anthropological insight, this course survey the history of the term, study its expansion from the ‘salt-water colonies’ and ‘settler states’ to the heartland of Europe, and explore some of the challenges and advantages of the term. The seminar will explore how the term has come to be used in different post-colonial situations from the classic “heartlands” of indigeneity in North America, Latin America, and Northern Fennoscandia, to new contexts in China, India, Africa. The course will also explore how the politics of aboriginal rights has become closely linked to struggles for recognition, environmentalism, and collective struggles against neo-liberalism. The course is run in a seminar format with students encouraged to weigh and evaluate the results of their reading.
30 Credit Points
This course explores new directions in how we think about humans and other species. Recent years have seen an upsurge in interest in how the social sciences and humanities deal with animals, plants and other organisms and we scrutinise these cutting edge ideas in depth. A lot of emphasis is placed on trying to think through real life encounters and issues, from a walk in the park to new revelations about life from the bottom of the ocean. Although the focus is on anthropological work, the course should appeal to students from a wide range of backgrounds.
We will endeavour to make all course options available. However, these may be subject to change - see our Student Terms and Conditions page.
The Anthropology programme combines a flexible combination of lectures, small-group seminars and personal supervision of individual project work.
Students are assessed by any combination of three assessment methods:
The exact mix of these methods differs between subject areas, years of study and individual courses.
Honours projects are typically assessed on the basis of a written dissertation.
The information below is provided as a guide only and does not guarantee entry to the University of Aberdeen.
SQA Highers
Standard: AABB
Applicants who have achieved AABB (or better), are encouraged to apply and will be considered. Good performance in additional Highers/ Advanced Highers may be required.
Minimum: BBB
Applicants who have achieved BBB (or are on course to achieve this by the end of S5) are encouraged to apply and will be considered. Good performance in additional Highers/Advanced Highers will normally be required.
Adjusted: BB
Applicants who achieve BB over S4 and S5 and who meet one of the widening access criteria are guaranteed a conditional offer. Good performance in additional Highers/Advanced Highers will be required.
More information on our definition of Standard, Minimum and Adjusted entry qualifications.
A LEVELS
Standard: BBB
Minimum: BBC
Adjusted: CCC
More information on our definition of Standard, Minimum and Adjusted entry qualifications.
International Baccalaureate
32 points, including 5, 5, 5 at HL.
Irish Leaving Certificate
5H with 3 at H2 AND 2 at H3.
Entry from College
Advanced entry to this degree may be possible from some HNC/HND qualifications, please see www.abdn.ac.uk/study/articulation for more details.
SQA Highers
Standard: BBBB
Applicants who have achieved BBBB (or better), are encouraged to apply and will be considered. Good performance in additional Highers/ Advanced Highers may be required.
Minimum: BBC
Applicants who have achieved BBC at Higher and meet one of the widening participation criteria above are encouraged to apply and are guaranteed an unconditional offer for MA, BSc and BEng degrees.
Adjusted: BB
Applicants who have achieved BB at Higher, and who meet one of the widening participation criteria above are encouraged to apply and are guaranteed an adjusted conditional offer for MA, BSc and BEng degrees.
We would expect to issue a conditional offer asking for one additional C grade at Higher.
Foundation Apprenticeship: One FA is equivalent to a Higher at A. It cannot replace any required subjects.
More information on our definition of Standard, Minimum and Adjusted entry qualifications.
A LEVELS
Standard: BBC
Minimum: BCC
Adjusted: CCC
More information on our definition of Standard, Minimum and Adjusted entry qualifications.
International Baccalaureate
32 points, including 5, 5, 5 at HL.
Irish Leaving Certificate
5H with 3 at H2 AND 2 at H3.
Entry from College
Advanced entry to this degree may be possible from some HNC/HND qualifications, please see www.abdn.ac.uk/study/articulation for more details.
The information displayed in this section shows a shortened summary of our entry requirements. For more information, or for full entry requirements for Arts and Social Sciences degrees, see our detailed entry requirements section.
To study for an Undergraduate degree at the University of Aberdeen it is essential that you can speak, understand, read, and write English fluently. The minimum requirements for this degree are as follows:
IELTS Academic:
OVERALL - 6.0 with: Listening - 5.5; Reading - 5.5; Speaking - 5.5; Writing - 6.0
TOEFL iBT:
OVERALL - 78 with: Listening - 17; Reading - 18; Speaking - 20; Writing - 21
PTE Academic:
OVERALL - 59 with: Listening - 59; Reading - 59; Speaking - 59; Writing - 59
Cambridge English B2 First, C1 Advanced or C2 Proficiency:
OVERALL - 169 with: Listening - 162; Reading - 162; Speaking - 162; Writing - 169
Read more about specific English Language requirements here.
The University of Aberdeen International Study Centre offers preparation programmes for international students who do not meet the direct entry requirements for undergraduate study. Discover your foundation pathway here.
You will be classified as one of the fee categories below.
Fee category | Cost |
---|---|
RUK | £9,250 |
Tuition Fees for 2025/26 Academic Year | |
EU / International students | £20,800 |
Tuition Fees for 2025/26 Academic Year | |
Home Students | £1,820 |
Tuition Fees for 2025/26 Academic Year |
Students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland, who pay tuition fees may be eligible for specific scholarships allowing them to receive additional funding. These are designed to provide assistance to help students support themselves during their time at Aberdeen.
View all funding options in our Funding Database.
The critical thinking and analysis skills that you develop from studying Anthropology at Aberdeen will enable you to work with people in a variety of cultural contexts. Many of our graduates now work in research, teaching, media and politics for private and public sector organisations. Alongside support from the University Careers and Employability Service, the valuable skills you will learn at Aberdeen will give you a competitive advantage in the career marketplace.
You will be taught by a range of experts including professors, lecturers, teaching fellows and postgraduate tutors. However, these may be subject to change - see our Student Terms and Conditions page.
This programme is delivered by a team of experienced staff and as such, the Anthropology department at Aberdeen is one of the fastest-growing in the UK. By studying Anthropology at Aberdeen, you will benefit from having access to staff and researchers who are Key Opinion Leaders. You will be taught by people who have experience working in anthropological fields and will gain valuable insight into how current issues are perceived by different cultures.
Discover Uni draws together comparable information in areas students have identified as important in making decisions about what and where to study. You can compare these and other data for different degree programmes in which you are interested.