The Department of Anthropology is a tight-knit community of faculty and students that learn from one another. As an undergraduate department with a focus on cultural anthropology, faculty and students not only work together in the classroom but also outside the classroom by hosting speakers, working groups, and a student-led Anthropology Collective. Faculty research and teaching areas of interest include human rights, legal anthropology, political ecology, postcolonialism, social movements, migration, trafficking, labor, religion, race and gender. Faculty have conducted research throughout the world. The Department’s faculty not only are active scholars but also regularly engage with policy makers, the media, and non-governmental organizations. The faculty’s scholarship and advocacy are a part of what has been termed “public anthropology.” This commitment to social justice, both in and out of the classroom, dovetails with Georgetown’s mission to understand — and take action on — issues of injustice close to home and across the globe. Anthropological thinking and methods can be used in range of settings such as in government agencies, courts, businesses, non-profit organizations, and hospitals. Anthropology courses give students the tools and analytical framework to examine the cultural logic undergirding various communities around the world. Our courses prompt questioning of how power shapes individuals’ lives and how social change happens. Some courses have a field-research component which allows students to navigate new communities in Washington D.C.
