Anthropology at Oxford Brookes University

The Anthropology department at Oxford Brookes offers two single honours undergraduate degrees. The BSc/BA (hons) in Anthropology combines Biological and Social Anthropology, and we also offer a BA (hons) in Social Anthropology. Anthropology can also be taken as part of a joint honours degree in combination with the following subjects: Communication, Media and Culture; Criminology; English Literature; Geography; History; History of Art; International Relations; Philosophy; Sociology.

At graduate level, Oxford Brookes offers a one year full time (or two years part time) diploma in anthropology. The study of non-human primates is a particular strength of the department at graduate level; the MSc in Primate Conservation has a worldwide reputation; that and the associated MRes are very popular courses.

We have a particular specialism in contemporary Japanese studies (2 members of staff); other staff work on a variety of topics including lifestyle migration in Western Europe; craft production in India and labour migration to the Middle East; masculinities, and precarious livelihoods in West Africa. We span the biosocial divide with staff who work on animal-human relations, human evolutionary patterns, the shift from hunter-gathering to sedentary agriculture, and the illegal wildlife trade.

We supervise research students on topics ranging from crop-raiding chimpanzees in Guinea-Bissau to British followers of the Japanese house stylist Mari Kondo; from human-boar interactions in the Forest of Dean to post-tsunami reconstruction in disaster-struck Japan; from the Basque sculptor Jorge Oteiza to the reintroduction of red kites in Oxfordshire. Many of us jointly supervise with colleagues in the biological sciences, the humanities, and other social sciences.

Research centres and networks involving anthropologists at Oxford Brookes include the Centre for Environment and Society (with a research cluster on the theme of space and temporality), the Europe-Japan Research Centre, and the research networks in Migrants & Refugees and Healthy Ageing.