Anthropology
Master of Arts
Department of Anthropology
UBC is home to the second oldest anthropology program in Canada, founded in 1947 by Harry Hawthorn. The first MA in anthropology was awarded in 1954. By 1960, six anthropology MAs had been awarded and the first doctorates were awarded in 1970, making UBC the second university in Canada to offer a PhD in anthropology. In 1976, the Museum of Anthropology moved into its new quarters designed by Arthur Erickson and the Department took up residence in an enlarged and renovated space next door.
Affiliated with the Department of Anthropology, the Museum of Anthropology is world-renowned for its collections, research, teaching, public programs and community connections. The MOA maintains an impressive collection focusing on the First Nations of British Columbia. It provides educational and research opportunities for students and faculty with several faculty members holding cross-appointments in the MOA.
Graduate Degree Programs
Research Supervisors
| Name | Research Interests |
|---|---|
| Alaica, Aleksa | Other agricultural sciences; Archaeology; human-animal interactions; Moche Perceptions and Use of Animals; Food Security and Interregional Interaction during Wari State Expansion; Colonization, Diet and Animal Management |
| Barnett, Kristen | intersection of Indigenous and western science; research and data sovereignty; Indigenous feminisms; decolonizing; reframing archaeology |
| Blackburn, Carole | relationship between Indigenous peoples and settler states; how Indigenous nations assert their rights and sovereignty in struggles over land and political recognition, and the consequences for Indigenous people of engaging states in legal and political arenas. |
| Bloch, Alexia | Social sciences; migration; Gender; Eurasia; Russia; ethnography |
| Creighton, Millie | Japan, Japanese descent communities (Nikkei or Nikkeijin), Korea, Inter-Asian Relations, Identity, Consumerism, Popular and Mass Culture, Gender, Minorities, Work and Leisure |
| Gordillo, Gaston | Space and violence, affect, ruins and ruination, critical theory and continental philosophy, object-oriented ontologies, resistance to agribusiness, Latin America, Argentina, the Gran Chaco |
| Gusterson, Hugh Phillimore | |
| Hayat, Zahra | Pharmaceutical pricing; Quality and intellectual property |
| Heatherington, Tracey | Social and cultural anthropology; Environment, space and place; Anthropocene studies; Environmental anthropology; Critique of neoliberalism; Critical approaches to energy transition; Sustainable food systems; Human and cultural perspectives on the climate and nature emergency; Political ecology of nature conservation; Power, resistance and justice; Multispecies ethnography; Anthropological engagements with fiction; Ethnographic writing and reflexivity |
| Jing, Zhichun | Prehistoric archaeology; Archaeometry; Archaeological theory; Archaeology; Anthropology; Early China; Shang Civilization; Archaeological Science; Early Urbanism; Geoarchaeology |
| Kamat, Vinay Ramnath | Anthropology; Global Health and Emerging Diseases; Dispossession; East Africa; ethnography; Extractive Industry; Global Health; India; Malaria; marine conservation; Medical Anthropology; Outsourcing of Clinical Trials; political ecology; Tanzania |
| Kramer, Jennifer | Visual culture and art of the First Nations |
| Levell, Nicola | interdisciplinary folds of anthropology, theoretical museology, material culture and critical curatorial studies |
| Martindale, Andrew | Social sciences; Indigenous Archaeology; Northwest Coast; Oral Traditions; Spatial Analyses; Archaeology and the Law; Political economy; Radiocarbon Dating; Indian Residential Schools |
| Menzies, Charles | Social sciences; Indigenous studies; Natural Resource Management; Maritime Anthropology; Western Europe; Ethnographic Film |
| Moore, Patrick | Anthropological linguistics, languages of North America, sub-Arctic ethnography, ethno-history, gender, First Nations Languages, Literacy and Orality, Oral Traditions, Dene (Athbaskan Languages and Cultures), Codeswitching, Gender, Indigenous Activism, and the Anthropology of Media |
| Muehlmann, Shaylih | Environmental politics, linguistic anthropology, drug trafficking, indigeneity, water scarcity, the anthropology of the awkward, US-Mexico borderlands, Mexico |
| Robertson, Leslie | Indigenous and settler historiographies, colonial regimes of difference, spectacle and narrative, and political histories of resistance in settler nations, afterlife of historical colonialism, forms of power and representation in the context of urban marginalization (drug use, sex work, health, and violence) |
| Rosenblum, Daisy | multi-modal documentation and description of indigenous languages of North America, with an emphasis on methods, partnerships, and products that contribute to community-based language revitalization |
| Rowley, Susan | Anthropology, n.e.c.; repatriation; museums; material culture; Cultural Heritage; arctic archaeology; heritage management |
| Rowley, Susan | Anthropology, n.e.c.; repatriation; museums; material culture; Cultural Heritage; arctic archaeology; heritage management |
| Sari, Elif | transnational sexualities; migration; asylum; humanitarianism; queer and critical race theory |
| Shneiderman, Sara | Social and cultural anthropology; Indigenous issues; Disaster response and preparedness; Citizenship; migration |
| Speller, Camilla | Anthropology; Archeological Data Analysis; Molecular Genetics; Ancient DNA Analysis (paleogenetics); Ancient proteins (paleoproteomics); Animal Domestication; Bioarchaeology; Environmental Archaeology; Marine Ecosystems |
| Turin, Mark | Anthropology; Cultural Institutions (Museums, Libraries, etc.); Lexicography and Dictionaries; Language Contact and Linguistic Changes; Language Rights and Policies; Language Interactions; Political Culture, Society and Ideology; Bella Bella; Bhutan; First Nations; Heiltsuk; Indigeneity; Nepal; Sikkim; Tibet |
| Weston, Darlene | Anthropology; Archeological Data Analysis; Bioarchaeology; Biological Anthropology; Osteoarchaeology; Paleodemography; Paleopathology |
| Zeweri, Helena | Anthropology; Mobility; migration; Critical refugee studies; settler colonialism; Anthropology of care, policy, social movements, empire |
