Why study Anthropology?
If you think anthropology is limited to the study of stones and old bones, think again! Though anthropology does look at stones and bones, it also examines the politics, medicine, kinship, art and religion of various peoples and times. This makes the study of anthropology a complex task, for it requires an understanding of the basics of numerous disciplines such as geology, biology, art and psychology.
Concentrations
- Cultural Anthropology
- Archaeology
- Linguistic Anthropology
- Physical Anthropology
Regardless of the specific area being studied, the essence of anthropology is in the observation of different peoples and cultures—studying them as they really are instead of how you think they should or should not behave. It is only through this detailed study of all people that we gain the full picture of what it really is to be human.
Anthropology tries to bring the world’s peoples into human focus. Anthropologists don’t come up with a theory and see if people live up to it. They live with people and see what they do.
Career Opportunities
While graduates of anthropology traditionally have found careers in museums, or teaching at the high school or college level, other possible career opportunities are emerging today. Because of a growing emphasis on Third World countries, international trade, and the changing international climate, companies are interested in employees who have knowledge about foreign countries and cultures. This new international emphasis also makes anthropology a versatile double major—possibly for a business or economics student who is interested in international trade, or for anyone who plans to live or work in a foreign country.
Graduates of anthropological studies are also in demand for projects of historical preservation, or as industrial anthropologists to study a company’s structure and its people. Additional information on career opportunities is available from the anthropology department.
Major Fields
Anthropology at PLU is composed of four fields:
- Cultural anthropology studies living human cultures in order to create a cross-cultural understanding of human behavior.
- Archaeology has the same goal as cultural anthropology, but uses data from the physical remains of past cultures to reach it.
- Linguistic anthropology studies human language to discover what it can tell us about the human past and behaviors in the present.
- Physical anthropology studies the emergence and subsequent biological adaptations of humanity as a species.
Special Offerings
Anthropology Laboratory
The departmental lab emphasizes archaeological teaching and provides an excellent opportunity for students to apply scientific methods of hypothesis testing in the context of the social sciences. Among the goals of the program are to teach archaeological recording techniques, to develop an understanding of the procedures and mastery of the techniques of specific scientific instruments, and to familiarize students with the analysis of artifactual and paleoenvironmental data.
Summer Archaeological Field School
Both the drama and the routine of an archaeological dig will be a reality for students enrolled in the summer field experience. Students will have the opportunity to participate in the excavation and analysis of a nearby site.
Anthropology Club
Anthropology students meet on a regular basis to share their interests and to expand their knowledge of diverse peoples and cultures. Activities of the club include visits to museums, movies, lectures, and travel to local archaeological sites.
J-Term Courses Off Campus
In recent years courses have been taught on both the Makah and Navajo reservations, and in Hawaii with native Hawaiians. These, and others now in planning stages, offer students the opportunity to learn from experts about their own and other cultures.
Course Requirements
Major: 36 semester hours, including 101 or 104, 102, 103, 480, 499; one course from those numbered 330–345; one course from those numbered 350–465; and eight additional hours.
Minor: 20 semester hours, including 101, 102 (103 or 104); one course from those numbered 350-490; and four additional hours in anthropology.
Course Offerings
For a list of course offerings check-out the catalog »
Faculty
Bradford Andrews, Visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology
Earned a Ph.D. from Pennsylvania State University in 1999 with an emphasis on New World archaeology. He has worked in Mexico and the United States. His special interests are in complex societies and stone technology.
Elizabeth Brusco, Associate Professor of Anthropology, Chair
Earned her Ph.D. from the City University of New York in 1986. Her areas of specialization are South America and the Pacific, and she has carried out intensive field research in Colombia. Her interests include the anthropology of gender, religious movements, modernization and development, and kinship and the family.
Greg Guldin, Professor of Anthropology
Was awarded a Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 1977. He has conducted extensive field work in China and Southeast Asia. He also works as an applied anthropologist with a wide range of business and community groups. His major research interests include East Asian Studies, Chinese and Jewish cultures, ethnicity and rural development.
David Huelsbeck, Professor of Anthropology
Received his Ph.D. at Washington State University in 1983. Specializing in faunal remains, he has done extensive field work throughout Western Washington including Olympic Peninsula sites at the Ozette and Hoko rivers. His major research interests are social economy in the late prehistoric and early historic time periods and consumer behavior in the 19th and early 20th centuries in North America.
Laura Klein, Professor of Anthropology
Earned a Ph.at New York University in 1975. A recipient of Ford Foundation and Woodrow Wilson Fellowships, she has done extensive field study with the Tlingits in Southeastern Alaska. Her professional interests include Native Americans of the Northwest Coast and Alaska, medical anthropology, ethnohistory, politics and gender.
Akiko Nosaka, Assistant Professor of Anthropology
Earned a Ph.D. from Pennsylvania State University in 1997. Her fieldwork has been in Bangladesh and in Turkey. Her interests have focused on development with special emphasis on family, age, fertility and demographics.
Judith Pine, Visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology
Earned a Ph.D. from the University of Washington in 2002. She has worked with the Lahu of Northern Thailand and specializes in linguistics and language ideology and maintenance. Her research interests focus on the upland peoples of southeast Asia and southwest China, and on ethnicity and globalization.
Steven Thomson, Assistant Professor of Anthropology
Was awarded a Ph.D. by Boston University in 2006. An interdisciplinary Africanist, his research has focused on a multiethnic community in The Gambia. His interests include development, local politics, state formation, religion, gender (especially critical masculinity studies), and folklore.
