We spend time learning from people around the world. Our program offers insight to better understand inequalities, cultural differences, linguistic diversity, and the wealth of human life for educational purposes. Our students become productive scholars, practitioners, and activists.
On June 2, 2023, the Comitas Institute and Programs in Anthropology will hold an event in honor of Prof. Lambros Comitas at Teachers College. To RSVP, please email comitas.celebration@cifas.us. For further event details, please click here. We hope you will join us for this special day.
We are excited to announce our fourth conference on Anthropology and Education, Anthropology for Education. Presentations will explore the value of anthropology and ethnography for educators and policy makers. Click here for further details and registration!
Bunster graduated with a Ph.D. in Anthropology from TC in 1968. She became the youngest university professor in Chile at age 23, and was the first Latin American woman to win a Fulbright scholarship. Read more about Bunster's legacy and the recent discovery of her personal library here.
Anthropology is positioned to answer some of the toughest questions of education and policy-making because of its emphasis on spending time with and learning from people. Our program highlights participatory ethnography: engaging in and observing human activities and conversing with people as a means of improving education and collaborating with local groups and organizations. We offer one of the only master's programs in Anthropology and Education in the world and we offer a unique outlook on how to understand and support diverse approaches to education in and outside the classroom.
Our two doctoral programs help student develop the complex theoretical and methodological issues involved in the application of anthropological knowledge and approaches to matters of policy concern in medicine, psychiatry, psychoanalysis, economic and community development, education, businesses and corporations, institutional programs, and ecological and environmental change.
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Late 20th century high school in the American Midwest: The sites where a community displays itself to itself, in all its divisions and
affirmations: ceremonially (football and basketball, cheerleading), politically (taxing all to ensure the future through education) and structurally (class and race). (H. Varenne)
A circle of Iranian seminarian (howzevi) women in Qom doing Mobaheseh, a daily practice of disputing Islamic edicts or Islamic text. The women use Manteq, an approach to disputation grounded in Aristotelian logic. (A. Tawasil)
Children playing on the ruins of their bombed school in 1945 London in what became known as an Adventure playground—a different form of emancipatory pedagogy through unsupervised play during times of crises.
Rural people from Sumapaz (Colombian Eastern Andes) who write without the direct guidance of any instructor and for decades have used to press their case about land property and political participation. (D. Rudas-Burgos and E. Guerrero)
Re-imagining Germany and migration: a wall in Kreuzberg, a neighborhood in Berlin known for its nightlife, activists and artists, many from Turkey and from other Muslim countries. (B. Burnside)
The anthropologist with other young adults at play on an 'ultimate frisbee' field as they make their lives in Beijing, China (M. Zhang)
Use the tabs below to discover our degree programs.
The masters program in Anthropology and Education is concerned with the cultural, social and linguistic dimensions of education. Our program offers insight to better understand inequalities, cultural differences, linguistic diversity, and the wealth of human life for educational purposes. We examine educational processes in schools and classrooms, in families, on street corners, in community centers, in churches, and in all other non-conventional education settings.
The Doctoral Programs are research degrees designed to help students develop the complex theoretical and methodological issues involved in the application of anthropological knowledge and approaches to matters of policy concern in medicine, psychiatry, psychoanalysis, economic and community development, education, businesses and corporations, institutional programs, ecological and environmental change, etc. The programs lead to a Columbia degree and capitalize on the strength of the university's faculty.
Two doctoral programs are offered and differ slightly in their focus and the career paths for which they prepare.
The program in Anthropology and Education emphasizes theories of education and their uses in the analysis and planning of educational efforts in and out of schools. An Ed.D. in Anthropology and Education is also available under special circumstances.
The Anthropology Programs at Teachers College, Columbia University
Proposals are due Friday, May 19th at 11:59 PM EST After a hiatus, the Programs in Anthropology at Teachers College, Columbia University are excited to host the 4th Conference on Anthropology & Education with the theme, Anthropology For Education. The conference will highlight ethnography and its value for educators and policy makers. We are pleased […]
By Lottie Boumeester, MA in Anthropology and Education ’22 It’s another Sunday evening before school – a time that some teachers (and many others so gainfully employed) have often marked out for the Monday Blues. Yet I do not feel a sense of dread for the week ahead and I haven’t for many years. Since […]
Teaching is often a quintessential part of the graduate student experience. At TC, finding a teaching assistant position can be intimidating and challenging because we usually have to go ‘across the street’ to find opportunities in departments that sometimes seem opaque and mysterious. Nevertheless, every semester, TC students in the TC anthro program take on […]
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* Deadline for the 2023 application extended to May 1.
* Deadline for the 2023 application extended to May 1.
Program Director: Professor Grey Gundaker
Box: 10
Contact Person: Caitlin Quinn
Phone: 212-678-3309
Email: anthropology@tc.edu