What makes us attracted to certain people and not others? Why do we like spending money? Why do people follow religions? Human behaviour, culture and society pose many questions for all of us and through the discipline of anthropology – the study of humans – we can reveal important insights into language, race, marriage, religion, sex and other defining features of our humanity.

As a discipline, anthropology is concerned with understanding what constitutes ‘human nature’ and the underpinnings of human behaviour. This course also examines some of the ways anthropologists have tried to understand what it means to be ‘human’. On this course, you will learn to think like an anthropologist and investigate the social, cultural and evolutionary aspects of our behavioural modernity.

This course is aimed at adult learners who are seeking to develop a better understanding of human social and cultural difference either for personal intellectual development or in order to increase their career opportunities. The course will introduce you to some of the important theoretical and methodological underpinnings of social and cultural anthropology, and to the political and ideological implications of the kinds of theories and knowledge that anthropologists produce.

This is an introductory course and no previous experience of having studied in this area is required.

The course will run every Wednesday from 6.30-8.30pm for ten weeks (with one week’s break for reading week).= 20 hours in total.