Social Anthropology

Social anthropology is the comparative study of human societies and cultures, asking what makes human social life similar and different across the enormous diversity of ways in which people have organised communities, built kinship systems, constructed meanings, and navigated power. The discipline is rooted in ethnographic fieldwork, the patient and detailed study of specific communities through immersion and participation, and it uses those accounts to build general understanding of how social life works and why it takes the forms it does. Anthropology is a discipline that consistently challenges assumptions about what is natural, universal, or inevitable in human experience.

At the University of St Andrews, this four-year programme leads to an MA (Hons) in Social Anthropology and is recognised internationally as one of the strongest places to study the discipline. You will engage with ethnographic writing from across the world, develop your own capacity for rigorous analytical thinking about social phenomena, and build an understanding of the theoretical traditions that have shaped anthropological inquiry. The programme includes a year abroad, which may involve studying at a partner institution or undertaking fieldwork-related activity, extending your engagement with the discipline beyond the UK and developing the cross-cultural competence that anthropology makes its core concern.

Graduates from social anthropology programmes work in international development, NGOs, humanitarian organisations, cultural consultancy, market research, public policy, journalism, education, and the cultural sector. The ethnographic skills and cross-cultural understanding that anthropology develops are particularly valued in roles that require working across cultural boundaries or understanding communities whose experience differs from mainstream assumptions. Postgraduate study in social anthropology, development studies, global health, or related disciplines is a common route for those who want to build specialist expertise or pursue academic careers.