Honours in Anthropology

Prerequisites for Honours
The Honours Program
Supervision
Goals of the Honours Program
Honours Handbook
Past Honours Theses
Contact

Prerequisites for Honours

To gain admission to the Honours program, a student must obtain an average of 75% or above in second and third year subjects to a combined value of 20 points. Eight of the units must be at second year level, 12 at third year level. At least one of these units must have been completed at Distinction level. The Discipline recommends that students include in their degree program either Culture and Society: Inspirations for Anthropology or Culture and Society: Contemporary Debates.

A student who does not meet the essential conditions for entry to the Honours Program may make a special application to the Discipline's Committee. The details of such an application must be presented in writing to the Honours Coordinator in the first instance.

The Discipline welcomes applications from students who wish to embark on Joint Honours with another discipline from within the Faculty.  Any such program must meet all the requirements stipulated by the Faculty, and all arrangements relating to course work and the dissertation must be clearly laid down at the beginning of the year.

The Honours Program in Anthropology must normally be completed within one academic year. It is possible, however to do the program part-time over two successive years, in which case all course work has to be completed in the first year, and the dissertation is to be written in the second. Where students are involved in continuous wage employment in excess of about 16 hours each week, the Discipline advises considering the part-time option.

Each year, a preliminary meeting is held in late October or early November of all students who are considering entry into the Honours year. At this meeting, details of the forthcoming program will be spelled out, and students are asked to complete an application form which has to be returned to the Discipline office by 30 November. Once the final grades for the academic year are available, all students who have qualified for Honours will automatically receive an invitation to join the program.

If a student is qualified for entry but intends to defer for a year or more, the Anthropology Office should be informed of this. Any student who proposes to enter the program at a later date will be considered according to the criteria which are in force at the year of entry.

The Honours Program

There are four components to the Honours program:

1. The structured seminar Anthropology and the Postmodern Experience
2. The structured seminar Anthropology and the Ethnographic Experience
3. The Fieldwork Project
4. The Dissertation

The two structured seminars run concurrently in the first half of the first semester: the Fieldwork Project occupies the second half of the first semester; the second semester is entirely devoted to production of the Dissertation.

Students are assessed on the basis of an essay of about 3500 to 4000 words arising from Anthropology and the Postmodern Experience (20% of the final grade), an essay of the same length based on the Fieldwork Project (30% of the final grade), and the Dissertation of approximately 15000 words (50%).

All four parts of this program must be successfully completed in the above order. It is not possible to fail a part of the course and proceed to the next.

Supervision

It will be evident that a high level of organization and a good measure of efficiency is essential if this year-long program is to go smoothly. One of the major tasks of the supervisor is to help students use their time, and other scarce resources, as effectively as possible. Each student is entitled to a one-to-one, half hour supervisory session each week, and it is essential that appropriate arrangements are agreed upon early, and then adhered to. All supervisors are expected to be involved in on-going discussion about a student's essay topics, the fieldwork project and the dissertation. All students are entitled to receive informed feedback at each stage, including draft essays and draft dissertation chapters.

It is unlikely that all students will be able to have their first choice of supervisor. The Discipline has a firm policy of involving all staff equally in the supervision of Honours students, and where possible no member of staff supervises more than four students. It is however emphasized that students have informal access to all members of staff and, indeed, are encouraged to seek advice as widely as seems appropriate.

Goals of the Honours Program

All staff members are strongly committed to the Honours Program. It is our hope that all students will emerge with an excellent degree, and that a substantial proportion will proceed to postgraduate work either at Adelaide or further afield. But there are other goals besides these:

• All students are expected to read widely, to learn to think independently, and to develop new research skills throughout the year
• It is expected that students will acquire advanced conceptual skills and, in particular, develop the ability to make original connections between theoretical ideas and ethnographic data.
• It is hoped that all students will develop the capacity to articulate sustained arguments, and to defend them from informed critique.
• All students should be able to explain clearly to a wider audience what, in the new millennium, the central concerns of anthropology as a discipline are.
• Finally, they should be able to bring an informed anthropological perspective to some of the central issues and problems facing Australian society today.

Honours Handbook

The 2009 Honours Handbook in Anthropology is now available online.

The 2009 Development Studies Honours Handbook can also be downloaded here.

Past Honours Theses

A full list of Honours thesis is available online.

Copies of Honours theses are kept in the Discipline area. For further information please call the Anthropology Discipline Office 830 35730

Contact

For further information about Honours in Anthropology, please contact the people below.

Dr Andrew Skuse, Tel: 830 34285
Dr Susan Hemer, Tel: 830 35764