cornell anthropology phd

Academic Department

Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of the human condition from the deep past to the emerging present. The field is unified by its commitment to engaged field research that seeks to enhance understanding across boundaries of culture, nation, language, tradition, history and identity. A holistic discipline, anthropology regards economy, politics, culture and society as inseparable elements of humanity’s complex long-term history. A bridge between the humanities, social, and natural sciences, anthropology documents the diversity of our communities and examines the consequences of our commonalities. Because it engages directly with communities around the world, anthropology has a unique capacity to bring the entire human experience to bear on vital questions of sustainability, equality, and mutual understanding that will shape the future of the planet.

Cornell’s Department of Anthropology is one of the most respected programs in the world with a long tradition of innovation and a legacy of leadership in the discipline. The work of its faculty traces the human career from the emergence of the species to the formation of 21st century post-colonialism. Our ethnographic, archaeological and biological research links empirical observations to critical theoretical approaches. Key themes in ongoing research projects and teaching profiles include: medicine and culture; politics, inequality and sovereignty; economy, finance, corporations and law; materiality and aesthetics; gender, personhood and identity; ethics and humanitarianism; humans and animals; colonialism and post-coloniality. Our students and faculty work around the globe from Ithaca, India and Indonesia to the Caribbean and Central America, from Japan, Africa and Nepal to China and the Caucasus, from the circumpolar North to the Global South. The Anthropology Collections, housed in McGraw Hall and used in a range of courses, include over 20,000 ethnographic and archaeological objects whose origins span the globe and represent over 500,000 years of human history.

Associated Faculty

• Chloe Ahmann
• Adam Clark Arcadi
• Caitie Barrett
• Daniel Bass
• Sherene Baugher
• Sarah Besky
• Jonathan Aaron Boyarin
• Magnus Fiskesjö
• Frederic Wright Gleach
• Seema Golestaneh
• John S. Henderson
• Saida Hodžić
• David Holmberg
• Kurt A. Jordan
• Hayden Kantor
• Lori Khatchadourian
• Paul Kohlbry
• Stacey A. Langwick
• Sturt Manning
• Kathryn March
• Hirokazu Miyazaki
• Viranjini P Munasinghe
• Paul Nadasdy
• Alex Nading
• Jess Marie Newman
• Juno Salazar Parreñas
• Rachel E. Prentice
• Natasha Raheja
• Lucinda E.G. Ramberg
• Nerissa Russell
• Samantha Sanft
• Paul Steven Sangren
• Vilma Santiago-Irizarry
• Meredith F. Small
• Adam T. Smith
• Noah Tamarkin
• Yohko Tsuji
• Matthew Velasco
• Sofia A. Villenas
• Thomas Peter Volman
• Marina Welker
• Andrew C. Willford

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The Anthropology Major

The Anthropology major is flexible, enriching, and transformative. You will work together with your advisor on designing a meaningful major course plan that addresses your interests, expands your worldviews, and prepares you for your desired professional career or graduate school. The major provides a general grounding in three subfields of anthropology (sociocultural anthropology, anthropological archaeology, and biological anthropology) and a detailed focus on your chosen area or areas of interest. Our rich course offerings will allow you to design a course plan that prepares you for US-based and globally oriented careers in law, medicine, education, nonprofit and social justice work, development and foreign service, business, and others.

Bianca Garcia '23 said the following about majoring in Anthropology:

I came to Anthropology, like many other bright-eyed freshmen who enroll in our courses, I think, not entirely knowing what I was signing up for. In searching for a major to list on my application, Anthropology seemed like a fair enough choice: I had had my hand at “ethnography” for a high school research project, and studying culture sounded apt as a Filipina-American born and raised in multicultural Hong Kong.  Four years down the road, I can say that there could not have been a better choice in curriculum for me. This degree has spoken to every part of myself that I’ve ever been proud of and uncovered parts that I’ve since grown to love. 

Read more about Bianca's experiences in this feature article and this extraordinary journey article .

Requirements

No prerequisites are required to declare the anthropology major. Majors and advisors collaboratively build a program of study that reflects the student’s individual interests and furthers their goals.

A minimum of ten courses are necessary to complete the major. To complete the major, students must take:

• One course of 3 or more credits in each of the three subfields (sociocultural, archaeological, biological) from the list below.

      Sociocultural - ANTHR 1400 , ANTHR 2400 , ANTHR 2421 , ANTHR 2468

      Archaeological - ANTHR 1200 , ANTHR 2201 , ANTHR 2245 , ANTHR 2430 , ANTHR 2729

      Biological - ANTHR 1300 , ANTHR 2310 , ANTHR 3235  

• ANTHR 3000 - Introduction to Anthropological Theory
• Two other courses of at least 3 credits at the 3000 level.
• Two 4000-level courses of at least 3 credits each, one of which must be a seminar course in your senior year with a research paper or project component ( ANTHR 4263  is not a seminar course and does not fill the requirement).
• An additional two elective courses of at least 3 credits each, which may be in cognate disciplines with the approval of your advisor.
• Transfer credits may apply to the major by application to the DUS.

Exceptions to these requirements may be granted if a written petition is approved by the Director of Undergraduate Studies.  (submit the petition to [email protected] )   

No S–U credits or First-Year Writing Seminars may count toward the major. A letter grade of C– or better is required in all courses counted toward the major.

How to Apply to the Anthropology Major

No prerequisites are required to enter the anthropology major.  To apply to the major, fill out and submit the Anthropology Major Application and Course Plan  and submit a  Major Proposal  write up to  [email protected]

We recommend that you take courses that appeal to your interests and that cut across anthropological subfields and the faculty’s areas of specialty. You may find our Pathways through the Anthropology major a useful resource. Pathways represent some common interests and trajectories that support student career interests. They are not rigid sets of requirements but simply road maps through the department’s diverse and rich course offerings.

After admittance to the major, we will put you in touch with your Anthropology advisor.  Majors and advisors collaboratively build a course plan that reflects the student’s individual interests and furthers their goals. Go to your advisor’s regularly scheduled office hours as soon as possible to discuss your course plan. In addition to advising you on the course plan, your advisor is also available to discuss other aspects of your study, such as study abroad, research in Anthropology, field schools, our honors program, and internships in Anthropology.

Cornell Anthropology offers a supportive honors program that helps students prepare for, design, conduct, and write up anthropological research. Our courses help you imagine your topic and design an appropriate methodology for conducting your honors research; we strongly recommend you take one or more methods courses before conducting your honors research. Your faculty advisor and honors thesis advisor help you design your research and apply for funding and human subjects approval . Our year-long honors workshop guides you through all stages of thesis writing.

Cornell Anthropology students have conducted honors research on topics such as:

• A Sister’s Hope: Finding Peace at the Intersection of Murals and Police Brutality.
• Issues in Contemporary Public Art: A Conversation
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Culture: Conflicts as CBT Converses with its New Publics.
• The Molo Story and Other Narratives About Healing With Food.

We encourage you to identify an appropriate topic for a thesis by discussing it with your faculty advisor and other professors with relevant expertise. A Cornell anthropologist (which may be a faculty member in the department or in the graduate field of Anthropology) must agree to supervise your research and serve as your thesis advisor.

Admission to the Honors Program requires an overall GPA of 3.3 or greater and a 3.5 GPA in the major. In addition, the student should have no outstanding Incompletes in courses for the Major (provisional admission with Incompletes is possible at the discretion of the DUS). Under special circumstances, a student with an overall GPA of 3.0 may petition for admittance to the Program.  

Apply in the second semester of junior year (requests for late admission may be considered, but in no case later than the second week of the first semester of the senior year).

Review the guidelines and procedures for undergraduate honors in anthropology

Complete and submit the Honors Program Application .  

Honors in Anthropology are awarded for excellence in the major, which includes overall GPA and the completion of an honors thesis.

Students write the honors thesis over two-semesters involving eight credits of coursework. During their first semester of Honors work, students register for (1) Anthropology 4983, Honors Thesis Research (3 credits) with their thesis advisor and (2) Anthropology 4991, Honors Workshop I (1 credit). During their second semester of Honors work, students typically register for (1) Anthropology 4984, Honors Thesis Write-up (2 credits) with their thesis advisor and (2) Anthropology 4992, Honors Workshop II (2 credits).

The thesis advisor is responsible for guiding the scholarly development of the thesis. We encourage students to meet weekly with their thesis advisor and discuss thesis progress.

The honors workshop provides additional support and structure for your writing goals. The honors workshop will help you develop a feasible timeline toward completion of the thesis and will provide a context for sharing ideas and feedback (both editorial and substantive) as your thesis progresses.

Study Abroad

The Department of Anthropology encourages students to consider a semester of study abroad or off-campus study. Anthropologically-relevant study abroad options, using existing Cornell Abroad and off-campus options, can enrich your major and teach you invaluable anthropological skills. After reviewing Cornell Abroad offerings and the Nilgiris Field Learning Center offerings, discuss your study abroad options with your major advisor.

The Global Health Program

The Cornell University Global Health Program offers a minor in global health.  This program is intended to compliment any academic major as the University and provide students with basic knowledge about global health, as well as the necessary skills and experience to build their own unique global health career.  For more information, visit the  Global Health website .

Nilgiris Field Learning Center

The  Nilgiris Field Learning Center (NFLC)  is a unique partnership that aligns Cornell faculty and students with experts and community members in the Nilgiris, the “blue hills” of southern India. The NFLC learning community explores nutrition and health, land use, cultural practices, and livelihoods in a region recognized for both its biological and cultural diversity. Students develop ethnographic research skills in a collaborative, field-based environment.  Cornell brings strengths in the ecological and social sciences in collaboration with the applied fields of regional planning and policy analysis. Our partner, the Keystone Foundation, works with indigenous communities in the Nilgiris Biosphere Reserve focusing on livelihoods, conservation, culture and identity, and market-based social enterprise. The vibrant Keystone campus is located in Kotagiri, a hill station in the Western Ghats. Cornell course credits for the NFLC can be used to satisfy requirements for the anthropology major and minor.  

• The NFLC learning community explores nutrition and health, land use and livelihoods in a region recognized for its biodiversity.
• Students develop research skills in an engaged, field-based environment.
• Projects address community-identified issues:
• Community wellness and changing approaches to healing
• Dietary diversity, eating habits and sourcing patterns in local food systems
• Contested forest lands as space for food, farming and trade
• Infant feeding practices in the context of maternal health and social networks
• Water and waste infrastructure in an urbanizing environment

Contact Professor  Andrew Willford  for more information about NFLC.

Independent Study

Specialized individual study programs are offered in Anthropology 4910, Independent Study Undergraduate, a course open to a limited number of juniors and seniors who have obtained consent and supervision of a faculty member. The credit hours for this course are variable. Students select a topic not covered in regularly scheduled courses in consultation with the faculty member who has agreed to supervise the course work.

For More Information

For more information on the Undergraduate Major in Anthropology, contact our Director of Undergraduate Studies:

Magnus Fiskesjö

[email protected] Office: McGraw 201

Graduate Program

The Ph.D. program in the Field of the History of Art, Archaeology, and Visual Studies at Cornell is renowned for its global scope and critical engagement with methodology. Small cohorts enable productive collaborations between students and faculty, while standardized funding packages promote a robustly democratic intellectual environment. In addition to conducting pathbreaking research, graduate students participate in organizing the Visual Culture Colloquium and gain valuable experience as teaching assistants; many also lead their own writing seminars. Our alumni draw on their experiences at Cornell to re-shape the art history as practiced both in universities and museums, and among still broader publics beyond institutional walls.

Ph.D. Program Guidelines and Requirements

Program of Study

Cornell’s graduate program is unique in two ways: the Field system and Committee system. The Graduate School at Cornell oversees all academic fields and determines basic requirements. The DGS (Director of Graduate Studies) is the interface between the field and students and works closely with the department.

At Cornell, students select a Special Committee of three members and work with them to reflect their own intellectual objectives. The Director of Graduate Studies will initially act as the student's principal advisor. In the first year, students select the committee chair, a member of the Department of  History of Art . By the end of the third semester, students choose the remaining two members, who may be drawn from the graduate faculty at large, although we recommend that one additional member be from the department. This flexible Special Committee system is tailored to each individual student's needs. Cornell faculty encourage interdisciplinary approaches to the student's selected major field.

Requirements in the Field of History of Art, Archaeology, and Visual Studies include the Graduate Methods Seminar, proficiency in two foreign languages, and a minimum number of courses. We encourage applicants to begin language study prior to admission to the program. There are no distribution requirements or a core curriculum, in order to  best suit the academic goals of each student.

Students take coursework in their first three years, and from the second year they also serve as a Teaching Assistants.  Before the start of their fourth year, or seventh semester, students must have successfully completed the A-exam (Admission to Candidacy). The format and questions of the A-examination are determined by the members of the Special Committee.  After passing the A-exam, students receive the MA degree.  (We do not offer a terminal Master's degree, however.)  Dissertation research and writing occupies the next two years, culminating in the B-exam (oral defense of the completed dissertation).

Field System

Fields rather than departments define graduate education at Cornell. Members of the Department of the History of Art may also serve in other fields as well as their own, such as Medieval Studies, Near Eastern Studies, or Classics.

Areas currently offered in the field of History of Art, Archaeology and Visual Studies include the following:

• 19th century art
• African; African American, and African Diaspora
• American art
• ancient art and archaeology
• Asian American art
• baroque art
• comparative modernities
• contemporary art
• digital art
• East Asian art
• history of photography
• Islamic art
• Latin American art
• medieval art
• Native American and Indigenous studies
• Renaissance art
• South Asian art
• Southeast Asian art
• theory and criticism
• visual studies

Concentration in Archaeology

Graduate students in the Field of History of Art, Archaeology, and Visual Studies may concentrate on archaeology with appropriate field members. Currently we emphasize archaeology in the following areas: Ancient, Near Eastern, Classical and Southeast Asian art. Students working in these areas are encouraged to organize their programs with faculty members in other related fields, such as Anthropology, Classics, and Medieval Studies, and the Southeast Asia Program.

Doctoral students admitted to the department of History of Art, may become members of the Cornell Institute of Archaeology and Material Studies (CIAMS) by completing two courses and requesting membership with CIAMS .

The History of Art, Archaeology and Visual Studies field is a partner in the Cornell-Harvard Sardis Excavations . Qualified graduate students are eligible to participate in annual excavations. 

All graduate students in the Field of History of Art, Archaeology, and Visual Studies are admitted with five years of guaranteed support, including tuition, health insurance, and an annual stipend, in addition to a summer stipend for the first four summers.

Two years of this support (ordinarily the first and the fifth) take the form of a fellowship provided by the Graduate School. Funding for the other three years is in the form of Teaching Assistantships.

Teaching Assistantships include assisting with an undergraduate course, in some cases teaching discussion sections.  Advanced students are offered the opportinity to teach a freshman seminar under the auspices of Cornell's  First-Year Writing Seminar Program . This is a course designed and taught by the student in their field of interest, with a focus on developing writing skills within the discipline of art history/ visual studies. This unique teaching opportunity at Cornell enables advanced Ph.D. students to design and teach as independent scholars -- essential experience for their future job searches.

Other sources of student funding include research travel and conference funding from the Graduate School, area studies programs, and the department. The department offers two grants for professional development, Goldring Grant (download accessible PDF application form) and Conference Travel Grant (download accessible PDF application form). The application deadlines are October 15 (Fall) and April 15 (Spring). Individual awards are usually no more than $1500. Preference is given to applicants who have not previously received a department grant

Funding for foreign language study can come from the Graduate School (for summer) and the Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowships (FLAS) from the Einaudi Center, which also supports dissertation research travel.  See https://einaudi.cornell.edu/student-funding . Other programs at Cornell may also assist with research and travel funds. Students’ committee members will advise on these possibilities.  Students in our program are required to apply for outside fellowships for dissertation research. In recent years our students have been extremely successful with their applications to Fulbright, Metropolitan Museum, Smithsonian Museum, and AAUW (American Association of University Women), among others.

Application Procedures

Complete the application online at apply.gradschool.cornell.edu no later than December 10 . Applications are evaluated January - March, and applicants are usually notified of their status no later than April 1 . We offer only a Ph.D., not a terminal Masters degree, except under exceptional circumstances.  A BA or MA in the History of Art, Archaeology, or Visual Studies is desirable but not required. We do not require GRE scores.

Additional Requirements:

In addition to all Graduate School requirements, including the TOEFL Exam for Non-Native English Applicants (institutional code # 2098), or IELTS , History of Art requires the following:

• Three letters of recommendation
• A writing sample (usually 20-25 pages in length)

Click here for standing exemptions from the English Language proficiency test (TOEFL iBT or IELTS)

Dissertations of Recent Graduates

Click here to access summaries of recent graduate dissertations.

Jobs Grants and Fellowships

Click here to view job placements for recent graduate students.

Click here to view department receipients of academic grants and fellowships.

In the College of Arts and Sciences   .

Course Offerings    

The Department of Anthropology at Cornell University is one of the leading institutions for the study of humanity and our surroundings from the remote past to the impending future. We offer courses of study at the undergraduate level that help train students in the arts of global citizenship by cultivating both an intellectual understanding of human social life and the practical skills vital to navigating a culturally complex world. Anthropology’s commitment to the marriage of theoretical reflection and empirical fieldwork make it an ideal discipline for students interested in engaged learning and research. 

The department is committed to exploring social and cultural life through methods and scholarly traditions that range from archaeology to ethnography to human biology. Pathways through the anthropology curriculum support student interests in health and medicine, business and economy, law and politics, environment, activism and social justice, and heritage. The Anthropology major and minor prepare students for a wide range of careers, including law, medicine, foreign service, environmental advocacy, human rights,  community service, education, international development, and business.

Anthropology welcomes nonmajors into its courses. Unless explicitly stated, 2000- and 3000-level courses do not have formal prerequisites and students without prior experience in anthropology are welcome. 

Website: anthropology.cornell.edu

A. Smith, chair; M. Welker, director of graduate studies; P. Nadasdy, director of undergraduate studies; A. Clark Arcadi, J. Boyarin, M. Fiskesjö, F. Gleach, J. Henderson, S. Hodžić, K. Jordan, S. Langwick, H. Miyazaki, V. Munasinghe, L. Ramberg, A. Riles, N. Russell, S. Sangren, V. Santiago-Irizarry, Y. Tsuji, M. Velasco, S. Villenas, T. Volman, A. Willford. Emeritus: J. Fajans, D. Greenwood, D. Holmberg, B. J. Isbell, K. March, J. Siegel, M. Small

The major is structured to provide both general grounding in three subfields of anthropology (sociocultural anthropology, anthropological archaeology, and biological anthropology) and detailed focus on a particular area of concentration. Areas of concentration include a wide variety of subjects within and between these three subfields including the pathways defined above. Additional topics ranging from identity politics and globalization to prehistory and human evolution can be pursued in classes focused on every major geographical region in the world. Upper-level courses span a range of topical and theoretical issues related to religion, gender, economics, colonialism, democratization, prehistoric cultures, race, behavioral evolution, and conservation, to name a few.

No prerequisites are required to enter the anthropology major. Students should see the Director of Undergraduate Studies to apply to the major and obtain an advisor. Majors prepare a short statement about their interests and goals for the major, and then meet with their advisor. Majors and advisors collaboratively build a program of study that reflects the student’s individual interests and the intellectual breadth of the field. Our goal is to provide a close and supportive advising relationship and a strong and coherent structure for the student’s major.

A minimum of 37 credits are necessary to complete the major. To complete the major, students must take:

• One course of 3 or more credits in each of the three subfields (sociocultural, archaeological, biological) from the list below .

Sociocultural - ANTHR 1400   , ANTHR 2400   ,  ANTHR 2421   , ANTHR 2468    

Archaeological - ANTHR 1200   ,  ANTHR 2015   ,  ANTHR 2200   , ANTHR 2201   ,  ANTHR 2430    

Biological - ANTHR 1300   , ANTHR 2310   , ANTHR 2750    

• ANTHR 3000 - Introduction to Anthropological Theory    
• Two other courses of at least 4 credits at the 3000-level.
• Two 4000-level courses, one of which must be a seminar course in your senior year ( ANTHR 4263    is not a seminar course and does not fill the requirement).
• An additional 8 credits in elective courses, which may be in cognate disciplines with the approval of your advisor.
• Transfer credits may apply to the major by application to the DUS.

Exceptions to these requirements may be granted if a written petition is approved by the director of undergraduate studies.

No S–U credits or First-Year Writing Seminars may count toward the major. A letter grade of C– or better is required in all courses counted toward the major.

Honors in anthropology are awarded for excellence in the major, which includes overall GPA and completion of an honors thesis. Undergraduate students interested in working for an honors degree should apply to the chair of the Honors Committee in the second semester of their junior year (requests for late admission may be considered, but not later than the second week of the first semester of the senior year). It is the student’s responsibility to identify an appropriate topic for a thesis and to find a faculty member willing to sponsor and supervise the research; the advisor and at least the general subject of the thesis must be identified at the time of application for admission to the Honors Program. Note that clearance from the University Committee on Human Subjects usually is required before research involving living people may begin; students contemplating such research should begin to work with their thesis advisors to design their investigations and obtain the clearance well in advance of the date when the involvement with research subjects is to begin.

Admission to the Honors Program requires an overall GPA of 3.3 or greater and a 3.5 GPA in the major. In addition, the student should have no outstanding incompletes in courses that will be used toward the major (provisional admission with incompletes is possible at the discretion of the chair of the Honors Committee on evidence that a good faith effort to finish them is under way). Under special circumstances, a student with an overall GPA of 3.0 may petition for admittance to the program.

Writing an honors thesis typically is a two-semester project involving 8 credits of course work; most students do this work during their senior year. During their first semester of honors work, students typically register for (1) ANTHR 4983 - Honors Thesis Research    (3 credits); and (2) ANTHR 4991 - Honors Workshop I    (1 credit). During their second semester of honors work, students typically register for (1) ANTHR 4984 - Honors Thesis Write-Up    (2 credits); and (2) ANTHR 4992 - Honors Workshop II    (2 credits). The two-course/term arrangement reflects the division of supervision over the thesis between the thesis advisor and the chair of the Honors Committee. The thesis advisor is ultimately responsible for guiding the scholarly development of the thesis; the chair of the Honors Committee is mainly responsible for assuring timely progress toward completion of the thesis, and providing a context for students in the Honors Program to share ideas (both editorial and substantive) as their theses progress.

The department is pleased to offer the Freedman Award for Undergraduate Research in Anthropology. The award is designed to support undergraduate majors wishing to undertake anthropological research either independently or in collaboration with an existing program of ethnographic or archaeological research. Our first priority is to support students who propose to collect original data in preparation for writing honors theses, but proposals for non-thesis oriented research are also welcome. Please contact the Director of Undergraduate Study for more information.

The Department offers a Minor in Anthropology to undergraduate students in any college at Cornell. The Minor is designed for students who want to engage with sociocultural anthropology, archaeological anthropology, or biological anthropology but cannot commit to a full academic major. No specific advisor is required; all departmental faculty are available to discuss students’ plans for completing the Minor. Students can apply for the Minor at any time before the March 31st prior to their graduation; to be certified for the Minor, a student must submit a completed Minor Form and transcript to the Director of Undergraduate Studies by this date. Specific criteria for the minor are:

• Completion of five Anthropology courses, worth 3 credits or more.
• One of the five courses must be taken at the 1000- or 2000- level. (FWS do not count)
• Of the four additional courses, one must be at the 3000 level, and one must be a seminar at the 4000 level.
• No S/U classes will be accepted; all classes must be taken for a letter grade.
• Students must achieve a C- or better in all five courses taken to fulfill the minor.
• One of the courses for the minor may be taken as transfer credit and one may be taken through study abroad. A minimum of three of the five required courses must be taken at Cornell.

Special Programs and Facilities

First-year Writing Seminars: The department offers first-year writing seminars on a wide range of anthropological topics. Consult the John S. Knight Institute for times, instructors, and descriptions.

Independent Study: Specialized individual study programs are offered in ANTHR 4910 - Independent Study: Undergrad I   , a course open to a limited number of juniors and seniors who have obtained permission and supervision of a faculty member. Undergraduates should note that many graduate level courses are open to them by permission of the instructor.

Global Engaged Learning Opportunities: The Department of Anthropology encourages students to consider a semester of study abroad or off-campus study as an integral part of the student’s major concentration. The Director of Undergraduate Studies serves as the anthropology study abroad advisor.

Nilgiris Field Learning Center:   The Nilgiris Field Learning Center is a partnership between Cornell University and the Keystone Foundation, India. The NFLC is based in Kotagiri, Tamil Nadu, which is located in the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve of the Western Ghats. The partnership is an interdisciplinary, collaborative effort that explores questions of sustainable environments and livelihoods. Three areas of focus are emerging:

• impacts of biodiversity on nutrition and traditional medicine systems
• effects of urbanization on biodiversity in the reserve
• systems of governance for effective implementation of conservation, sustainable environments, and livelihood generation

For more information, visit the Nilgiris website https://blogs.cornell.edu/nflc/

The Global Health Program: The Cornell University Global Health Program offers a minor in global health.  This program is intended to compliment any academic major at the University and provide students with basic knowledge about global health, as well as the necessary skills and experience to build their own unique global health career.  For more information, visit the Global Health website http://www.human.cornell.edu/dns/globalhealth/index.cfm

Drugs and Social Justice: ANTHR 2920   / FGSS 2220   / LGBT 2220   . This course works with local nonprofits, coalitions, and groups that are concerned with the social effects of drug consumption and regulation. Some of these groups try to remedy the effects of the war on drugs, including mass incarceration, while others work on providing access to pharmaceutical drugs or finding alternatives.

Other anthropologically-relevant study abroad options, using existing Cornell Abroad and off-campus options, can be worked out in consultation with the major advisorand Cornell Abroad.

Collections: The department has an extensive collection of archaeological and ethnological materials housed in the Anthropology Collections. A limited number of students can make arrangements to serve as interns in the Anthropology Collections. Olin Library houses some of the most extensive collections of materials on the ethnology of Southeast Asia, South Asia, East Asia, and Latin America to be found anywhere in the United States. The biological anthropology laboratory (B65 McGraw Hall) houses an extensive collection of materials for teaching purposes, including (1) human skeletal remains, (2) articulated skeletons and cranial casts of primates, and (3) casts of important fossils in the human lineage.

Colloquia: The Department of Anthropology holds colloquia almost every week of the semester on Friday at 3:00 p.m. in 215 McGraw Hall. Faculty members from Cornell and other universities participate in discussions of current research and problems in anthropology. Students are encouraged to attend.

For more complete information about the anthropology major, see the Director of Undergraduate Studies or visit the Department of Anthropology web page: anthropology.cornell.edu .

Prospective Students

• To apply for the MA in Archaeology, visit Cornell’s  Graduate School Admissions .
• For a description of the field, see the Graduate School’s  Archaeology Field Description .
• Questions about the MA program in Archaeology should be sent to the  Director of Graduate Studies  (DGS). 
• Students considering applying to graduate school in archaeology are encouraged to read Professor Adam T. Smith’s informative  blog post  on the subject.
• For full details on the MA Program, download the Graduate Student Handbook .

The MA Program in Archaeology at Cornell is designed to provide students with an intensive orientation to the field, appropriate to both students with BA degrees in the liberal arts who have considerable experience in archaeology and those seeking to build a solid foundation for future work or study. The goal of the program is to offer students the intellectual resources and institutional support necessary to prepare them for successful admissions to top tier PhD programs and for careers beyond academia.

Cornell Archaeology supports a diverse array of interests, ranging from material culture studies to public archaeology, museum studies, archaeological science, and archaeological method and theory. Archaeology at Cornell is deeply committed to multidisciplinary studies. Faculty in Archaeology belong to the fields of Anthropology, Classics, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, History of Art, Landscape Architecture, Near Eastern Studies, and City and Regional Planning.

The ideal trajectory toward the MA should result in the completion of all requirements within 12-18 months, although extensions to 24 months are allowed when warranted by a student’s research program.

Requirements

Students in the MA program in Archaeology design their course of study with the guidance and approval of the Graduate Affairs Committee and in consultation with their advisors. During their first year in the program, students are expected to take four courses each semester, as well as the 1-credit Craft of Archaeology. The following courses are required:

• ARKEO 7000: CIAMS Core Seminar in Archaeological Theory and Method (typically offered in the Fall semester);
• 1 course at the 6000+ level devoted to Archaeological Method;
• 2 additional archaeology courses at the 6000+ level;
• A course in Research Design in the Spring semester. This can be either ARKEO 6250: Archaeological Research Design or ARKEO 8901: Master’s Thesis.
• ARKEO 6100: The Craft of Archaeology (this 1-credit course is typically offered in the Spring semester)

Only one of the courses may be taken S/U. All the rest must be taken for a letter grade.

If a course is not available in a given area of interest, students may speak to relevant faculty to discuss the possibility of an independent study. Students are advised to take no more than one independent study, but exceptions can be made in consultation with the Graduate Affairs Committee or the Special Committee.

Conferral of the MA in Archaeology also entails the satisfactory completion of a thesis, the MA exam, and 2 semesters in residence (i.e., taking courses on the Ithaca campus).

Model Course of Study

Each student’s course of study is guided by the Graduate Advisory Committee. There is thus no single model for a program of study. One possible model for a 2-semester curriculum would be:

* See section on language below

Each student’s tailored course of study is developed in close consultation with faculty advisors. Entering students receive guidance initially from the temporary advisor assigned to them upon admissions and from the Graduate Advisory Committee (GAC). Composed of the DGS, CIAMS director, and one additional faculty member, the role of the GAC is to provide advice until such time as the Special Committee is constituted and to provide any assistance that might fall outside of the academic purview of the special committee (e.g., issues pertaining to the Graduate School, TAships, etc.).

Please note  that the Graduate School requires all students to have registered an adviser online via Student Center by the  3 rd  week of the fall semester . If you have not selected a Special Committee chair by this time, you should select the DGS or the adviser who was assigned to you in your letter of admissions. Once a Special Committee has been formed, you can remove the temporary member or alter their status as needed.

You should establish a Special Committee, including Chair and Minor Member(s) by the end of Fall semester. The Special Committee is ultimately responsible for all decisions regarding a student’s academic trajectory. Each student should officially constitute a Special Committee no later than the end of the first semester in residence. The committee chair must be a member of the Field of Archaeology; the second member can be chosen from the Graduate Faculty at large, in consultation with the Chair. Students may change the composition of their committees at any time if needed.

There is no language requirement for the Archaeology MA. However, the Special Committee can advise language study as appropriate. In particular, for some MA research papers – where relevant primary sources or key scholarly literature are not available in English – it will be necessary for students to demonstrate suitable minimum language ability (as advised by the Special Committee) at least by the time of their MA defense.

The final thesis for the MA in Archaeology should present a piece of original research on a topic of empirical, theoretical, or methodological importance. It must not exceed 30 pages including tables, figures, bibliography and notes (using standard formatting in accordance with graduate school requirements). It should aim to be similar in quality and scale to those published in professional archaeological journals.

No later than the second week of spring semester, students must submit to their Special Committee a short (maximum 4 pages) proposal detailing the focus of their thesis.

After submission of the MA research paper an oral examination is convened with the Special Committee and any other Archaeology Field members who choose to attend.  

As you move toward completion of your MA thesis, it is important to be aware of Graduate School requirements that impact scheduling. The Graduate School stipulates a filing deadline for MA candidates who wish to graduate during a given semester. The final possible date for the MA exam is about 2 weeks before the filing deadline. The Graduate School’s A3 form scheduling the MA exam must be filed with the GFA for Archaeology (Laura Sabatini) at least one week prior to the exam. And the defense draft of the MA thesis must be circulated to your committee no later than 3 weeks prior to the exam. As you plan for the completion of your degree, please consult the Graduate School’s timeline:  https://gradschool.cornell.edu/academics/thesis-dissertation/understanding-deadlines-and-requirements .

Tuition & Stipend

We make every effort to help our students manage the costs of the MA in Archaeology by maintaining competitive tuition rates and offering various funding opportunities. Our MA students pay the  graduate research tuition rate  of the Cornell’s contract colleges, currently $10,400 per semester. To further defray these costs, each year two teaching assistantship packages are awarded on the basis of merit to incoming MA students at the point of admission. These packages are “half-TAships”, which cover half the cost of tuition and health benefits, and include a half-stipend. 

Occasionally, other opportunities arise for MA students to work as teaching assistants for other departments, and we make every effort to identify and secure such positions for our students.

Fellowships

For those who do not receive TAships, in the first year of the program we provide fellowships of $2,500 in the fall semester, and an additional $2,500 in the spring semester, provided students remain in good academic standing. 

Research Assistantships

Students are sometimes able to work as assistants to faculty, supporting research in labs and on individual projects. If you are interested in a research assistantship position, inquire with your Special Committee if any such opportunity is available.

Research Grants

CIAMS is also pleased to sponsor various  grant programs , including the Hirsch Graduate Travel Scholarship and the CIAMS Research Grants. 

Conference Grants

The Graduate School provides conference grants to all graduate students who are invited to present papers or posters at professional conferences. Award amounts are based on geographic location, not actual expenses. The Graduate School tries to fund most requests from students who meet the criteria for eligibility. Only one award will be considered during a single academic year, which is from July 1 through June 30. For information and deadlines, please refer to the  Conference Grant Application  found on the Graduate School website. Students can  apply to CIAMS  to supplement a Conference Travel grant from the Graduate School.

Diversity Fellowships

A  core value  of Cornell University is to provide a community of inclusion, belonging, and respect where scholars representing diverse backgrounds, perspectives, abilities, and experiences can learn and work productively and positively together. The CIAMS Diversity Fellowship is designed to advance the field’s commitment to diversity, inclusion, equity, and especially access. It is available on a competitive basis to applicants from all backgrounds. The Field awards one CIAMS Diversity Fellowship per year, consisting of $5,000 in the fall semester and an additional $5,000 in the spring semester, provided students remain in good academic standing.

Within the personal statement, applicants interested in being considered for the fellowship should provide details on any significant barriers they have navigated to make graduate education accessible to them, as well as lessons learned from any of their lived experiences, including but not limited to

• being a first-generation college student or graduate (no parent/guardian completed a baccalaureate degree)
• racial, ethnic, and/or cultural background(s)
• managing a disability or chronic health condition
• experiencing housing, food, economic, and/or other forms of significant insecurity
• being a solo parent
• gender identity and/or sexual orientation
• having served in the military
• holding DACA, refugee, TPS, or asylee status

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What paths do graduates pursue after completing the MA in Archaeology?

CIAMS alumni follow a range of career paths. Approximately half of the students in our MA program (49 per cent) go on to pursue a PhD in Anthropology, Classics, or Near Eastern Studies. A number of our alumni (23 percent) choose to work in the heritage sector, from cultural and national resource management, to laboratories and libraries. For others still, CIAMS is a stepping stone to careers in education, information technology, or other fields (23 percent). Some of our students (6 percent) choose to pursue additional master’s degrees in such diverse fields as Conservation, Roman History, and Education.

2. How does the MA program support students who wish to go on for a PhD?

We have a very high success rate of PhD placement. From 2007-2018, 85 percent of all students who applied to at least one PhD program were admitted. A full 100 percent of all students who applied to multiple PhD programs were admitted. Our students have gone on to pursue a PhD at such institutions as Brown University, Cornell University, Johns Hopkins University, McGill University, University of Oregon, Southern Methodist University, SUNY Buffalo, University of Kentucky, University of Michigan, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Yale University. CIAMS provides students with the training, guidance, and support necessary to be competitive for PhD admissions.

3. How long does it take to complete the MA degree?

The average time to degree for the MA in Archaeology is four semesters, but many students finish in three semesters or even one calendar year. The duration of the degree depends in large measure on the time needed to develop and complete the MA thesis. Students spend the first two semesters fulfilling coursework requirements. The summer after the first year is dedicated to fieldwork or other thesis-related research. In the fall of Year 2, most students turn their full attention to writing the thesis, and typically go on in absentia status to conduct research away from Ithaca. Those who wish to take additional coursework in the second year to deepen their training in a given area are permitted to do so. Upon completion of the thesis, students take the MA exam. This is the final requirement of the degree, and is usually held in the fall or spring semester of the second year. In some cases, as when students are able to begin thesis research prior to entering the program, or otherwise make swift progress on the thesis during the first year, it is possible to complete the requirements of the degree in the summer after the first year.

4. Is there funding available to support MA students?

We make every effort to help our students manage the costs of the MA in Archaeology by maintaining competitive tuition rates and offering various funding opportunities. Our MA students pay the graduate research tuition rate of the Cornell’s contract colleges, currently $10,400 per semester. To further defray these costs, each year two teaching assistantship packages are awarded on the basis of merit to incoming MA students at the point of admission. These packages are “half-TAships”, which cover half the cost of tuition and health benefits, and include a half-stipend. For those who do not receive half-TAships, in the first year of the program we provide fellowships of $2,500 in the fall semester, and an additional $2,500 in the spring semester, provided students remain in good academic standing. Occasionally, other opportunities arise for MA students to work as teaching assistants for other departments, and we make every effort to identify and secure such positions for our students. Likewise, students are sometimes able to work as assistants to faculty, supporting research in labs and on individual projects. CIAMS is also pleased to sponsor various grant programs , including the Hirsch Graduate Travel Scholarship and the CIAMS Research Grants. In addition, we welcome opportunities to diversify our student body, and make every effort to support diversity students by nominating them for competitive fellowships offered by the Graduate School. When possible, we also offer one CIAMS Diversity Fellowship per year, consisting of $5,000 in the fall semester and an additional $5,000 in the spring semester, provided students remain in good academic standing.

Our students are also encouraged to apply for external funding in support of graduate training. Nationally, although funding opportunities for MA students are limited, in the past our students have received fellowships from the American Association of University Women (AAUW) and various scholarships for postgraduate scholar-athletes. Finally, we understand that students may need to maintain part-time employment while in our program, and are supportive of such arrangements to the extent that they comply with Graduate School regulations. 

Graduate Program

Introduction.

Established in 1991, Cornell’s Department and Graduate Field of Science & Technology Studies were formed from two previously independent Programs: “Science, Technology and Society” (STS) and “History and Philosophy of Science and Technology” (HPST). The department and graduate field brought together a group of scholars with convergent interests committed to the rigorous academic advancement of this new and exciting field.

Our aim is to bring together faculty and students with diverse backgrounds and interests in a shared effort to study science and technology with special tools for exploring distinctive questions. At the same time, these tools and questions are designed to facilitate conversations with colleagues in traditional disciplines. Our approach throughout is both descriptive (aimed at understanding how science and technology are done) and normative (for example, showing where actual practices and professed norms are in conflict).

Possible topics of investigation range from transformations in early-modern natural philosophy to the dynamics of contemporary environmental, biological, and technological change. The field transcends the boundaries of pre-existing disciplinary specialties. Such categories as “historian” or “sociologist,” are still relevant for guiding research design, but they fail increasingly to capture the transdisciplinary character of S&TS investigations.

Ph.D. Requirements

Special committees .

The Cornell graduate system requires students to assemble individually-tailored “special committees” to direct their programs of study. Graduate students must select at least two members of their three- (exceptionally four-) member committee from the S&TS field. The Chairperson must be a faculty member of the S&TS graduate field. The remaining members are chosen from Cornell’s graduate faculty as a whole. This system allows students to include faculty members from outside the field of S&TS on their committees, and thus introduces a degree of flexibility in the design of each student’s specific training and research program.

In addition, faculty members in the S&TS graduate field provide ties to other departments and programs through their own wider affiliations. Cemented through joint appointments and graduate field memberships, these include History, Communication, Philosophy, Government, Sociology, Anthropology, Information Science, Environmental Engineering, Peace Studies, Women’s Studies, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Human Development and Family Studies, and other areas of the social and natural sciences. Members of the field thus provide students with a considerable range of disciplinary expertise and perspectives.  

The core faculty members of the graduate field are particularly noted for their work in the following areas: history and historiography of science and technology; technology and society; social study of contemporary science and technology; engineering, environmental, and biomedical ethics; women in science; gender and technology; philosophy of science; politics of science and technology; and communication and popularization of science. Much of this work necessarily is historical, sociological, and political in the broadest sense, and it draws on the well-established traditions of expertise in such studies possessed by individual faculty members. 

In consultation with their faculty advisers, graduate students in S&TS take active responsibility for the development of their own academic programs within the overall disciplinary context of S&TS. Students are assigned a temporary chairperson, which is chosen by the Director of Graduate Studies (DGS) when they enter the S&TS graduate program. Before the end of the Fall semester of his or her first year, the student must form a temporary committee, consisting of a temporary advisor and two other members of the S&TS Field. The student will meet with this preliminary committee at the end of their first year, in an end-of-year progress meeting. After that meeting the student may reconstitute their committee, but must do so by the end of their third semester.

Course Requirements

Course requirements provide a foundation for students in S&TS, covering key questions and relevant research methods: 

Each student must successfully complete, prior to their A-exams, a one semester seminar, S&TS 7111, intended as an introduction to the field as a whole. Each student also must complete a one-semester seminar on methods, and at least four additional S&TS courses that broadly cover the field. A total of at least four of the courses taken during a student's first year should be designated as S&TS. 

All students will be expected to achieve a level of competence in one foreign language sufficient for reading the literature in the student's research area. It will be up to the special committee to decide how this competence should be demonstrated. Additional languages may be required at the discretion of the special committee.

Second Year Project

A central goal of the S&TS graduate curriculum is to prepare students for independent research. To achieve this goal, each student selects a topic related to some field of specialization within S&TS and explores it under the guidance of a faculty committee. This “Second Year Project” creates a context for students to increase their familiarity with research techniques and strategies such as ethnographic fieldwork, or primary source and archival work. Students are expected to present the results of their research in a departmental seminar and/or professional journal or meeting.

Admission to Ph.D. candidacy occurs after the student has 1) passed the A-exam (written and oral examinations in specific subject areas), 2) received committee approval of a dissertation proposal, and 3) completed any additional work required by the committee. The A-exam should be taken, at the latest, by the beginning of the seventh semester of study. Scheduling of A-exams also requires that no incomplete or failed courses appear on the student’s graduate transcript.

Admissions and Financial Aid

Applications for admission to the Graduate Field of Science & Technology Studies should be submitted on-line through the  Graduate School .

The following supporting documentation is required:

• Three letters of recommendation
• Transcripts from all institutions of higher education attended (admitted students are required to submit official transcripts prior to matriculation)
• Statement of purpose (for guidelines, see: https://gradschool.cornell.edu/admissions/prepare/statements-of-purpose/ )
• Writing sample (term paper or similar scope)

All international applicants must demonstrate proficiency in the English language. International students demonstrate proficiency by submitting official IELTS (International English Language Testing System) Academic or TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) exam scores. Scores must be sent electronically (e-delivery) to the Cornell University Graduate Admissions, Caldwell Hall e-download account. E-delivery may also be referred to as an e-TRF by your test center. A list of English language exemptions can be found on the Graduate School website .

The deadline for applications and materials is December 15. All supporting documentation can be attached to the online application. All applicants will be informed of admission decisions by early April, at the latest.

Applications to the field have a variety of backgrounds, including the basic sciences, engineering, anthropology, history, philosophy, sociology, and politics. Familiarity with science and technology studies is desirable. Prospective students are welcome to visit Cornell.

Extensive financial resources are available to help defray the cost of graduate study at Cornell. The majority of our graduate students receive financial assistance, either from Cornell or from outside sources each year. Support in the field of Science & Technology Studies usually comes from a combination of fellowships and teaching assistantships. Among potential funding sources are: the Sage Graduate Fellowship; external fellowships from the National Science Foundation and the Javits Foundation; fellowships for minority students; and S&TS teaching assistantships.

Resources and Activities

The most important resource available to graduate students in S&TS is Cornell University itself. Home to dozens of laboratories and research institutes, Cornell is both a public and a private institution grappling with the turbulent politics of science and technology in a rapidly changing world. At the same time, the university is home to a world-class library system that encourages and fosters historical inquiry.

In addition to superb collections in the humanities and in the natural and social sciences, the system boasts a number of specialist libraries of interest to S&TS.  Mann Library  is at the forefront of efforts to improve information management and retrieval, especially in agriculture and the life sciences.  Kroch Library’s  holdings in the history of science and technology are among the most important collections of primary-source materials on science and medicine in the United States, with claims to History of Science being the largest in number of volumes. These range from the Renaissance through the nineteenth century, and are augmented by collections of more recent scientific literature in the dedicated subject libraries, which include engineering, law, industrial and labor relations, veterinary science, physical sciences and biological sciences. Archival resources cover the full range of sciences and engineering, and are explicitly oriented toward S&TS research. Of special interest are the unique archival collections on  science writing , the  cold fusion controversy ,  DNA testing in the law  (informally known as the “O.J. archive”),  public perceptions of the Y2K episode , and the  Voting Technology Archive  (a special archival collection on the technological issues raised by the year 2000 US presidential election).  

Additional activities hosted or oriented specifically towards S&TS include Professor Suman Seth's co-editorship of the History of Science Society's journal Osiris . There is an invited lecture series; the Nordlander Lecture on Science and Public Policy (given by such notable scholars as Yaron Ezrahi, David Hollinger, David Holloway, Albert Teich, Shirley Malcom, Thomas Hughes, Khotso Mokhele, Caldwell Esselstyn, Freeman Dyson, Kathy Hudson, David Healy , and Allison Macfarlane ); lectures by postdoctoral fellows in S&TS; and weekly informal lunchtime seminars for faculty and graduate students at which local scholars, including the S&TS graduate students, may present their work.  The S&TS Department is part of a  vibrant international community  of STS programs.

STS Graduate Field Handbook

The first point of reference for students to understand the requirements for successfully completing a doctoral degree in Science and Technology Studies at Cornell is the Graduate Field Handbook. The Graduate Field Handbook is a regularly updated document designed to help graduate students in Science and Technology Studies:

• Find essential information about core requirements for their degree completion,
• Differentiate among and understand requirements of the Graduate School, the field, and the Special Committee chair and committee,
• Understand the normative timeline for completing field and Graduate School milestones
• Identify academic and professional development opportunities to support students at different stages in the program

Click here to access the STS Graduate Field Handbook

Contacts and Field Faculty

Director of Graduate Studies: Stephen Hilgartner , Frederic J. Whiton Professor of Science & Technology Studies,  [email protected]

Graduate Field Faculty Click here to browse profiles of members of our graduate field.

Graduate Program

Introduction and application requirements.

Our faculty expertise in the global study of race and Blackness in the traditional disciplines of English, anthropology, literature, history, politics, philosophy, sociology and art history makes Africana studies at Cornell a significant resource for graduate students who want to engage in the interdisciplinary study of Black people in Africa, the African diaspora and around the globe.  There are few departments or programs that match our strengths in:

• Black political, cultural, philosophical and artistic thought and practice in global perspective
• Global studies in black popular and mass culture 
• Race in relation to the study of gender and sexuality

While we have particular expertise in the study of Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and the United States, we support and encourage the study of black people everywhere in the world. 

Africana Studies offers a Ph.D. program with full funding, which includes paid tuition, health insurance and a stipend.

Application Requirements Summary:

• All graduate school requirements, including the TOEFL Exam or the IELTS Exam for Non-Native English Applicants (Scores must be sent electronically (e-delivery) to the Cornell University Graduate Admissions, Caldwell Hall e-download account. E-delivery may also be referred to as an e-TRF by your test center.)
• Statement of purpose    
• Writing sample
• Personal Statement
• Three signed letters of recommendation on letterhead   
• GRE general test not required
• Minimum of a 3.0 cumulative GPA 
• The deadline to apply for the Fall 2024 term is January 15, 2024
• Cost to apply is $105.  For more information, please see the Graduate School website.

To apply now, visit the Graduate School website.

Graduate education at Cornell is designed to accommodate the specific interests, objectives and development of individual students who work out a program of study in consultation with a special committee selected by the student from the membership of the graduate faculty. This procedure, commonly referred to as "the committee system," takes the place of uniform course requirements and uniform departmental examinations and is intended to encourage freedom and flexibility in the design of individual students' degree programs. Such a system requires adaptability on the part of both faculty and students, and requires of each student a high degree of initiative and responsibility.

Required Courses

There are four required courses and a dissertation proposal workshop that introduce students to the field of Africana studies:

I.   Seminar in Africana Studies I: Historical, Political and Social Analysis

II.  Seminar in Africana Studies II: Cultural, Literary and Visual Analysis

III.  Topics class in Africana History or Theory (Chosen in consultation with the DGS)

I.   A supporting methods course: Students are required to take a supporting methods course. This course is chosen in consultation with the student’s advisor and may be taken in Africana Studies and Research Center (ASRC) or in a related field.

Workshop on Dissertation Proposal Development  

8 additional courses:

Students must also complete, by the end of their second year, a minimum of eight additional courses, chosen in their field of research emphasis and selected in consultation with their advisor. Of these eight additional courses, one course per semester must be taken with a core faculty member in the ASRC. Students will develop a program of study within major and minor areas of concentration by their second year. Within each track, students will select a geographic area of concentration, e.g. Africa, the United States, the Caribbean and Latin America, or emerging studies of the global African diaspora. In regards to course load, in order to remain in good academic standing, students are expected to complete at least three courses per semester. Students are strongly encouraged to enhance their learning and training by striving to complete more than the minimum courses. The ASRC Ph.D. Program will only accept the transfer of graduate courses from other institutions under extremely rare circumstances and after the submission of a petition to the Director of Graduate Studies (DGS).

Required Courses for students who matriculated before Fall 2019

There are two required courses that introduce students to the field of Africana studies: 

• Seminar in Africana Studies I: Historical, Political and Social Analysis
• Seminar in Africana Studies II: Cultural, Literary and Visual Analysis 

Students complete the required seminars during the first year and, in consultation with their special committee, develop a program of study within major and minor areas of concentration over the following year. Within each track, students will select a geographic area of concentration, e.g. Africa, the United States, the Caribbean and Latin America, or emerging studies of the global African diaspora. Students take a minimum of ten additional courses in Africana studies and related fields before taking the qualifying exam (Q exam) by the end of the second year of graduate study. Students are strongly encouraged to enhance their learning and training by striving to complete more than the minimum courses. The ASRC Ph.D. Program will only accept the transfer of graduate courses from other institutions under extremely rare circumstances and after the submission of a petition to the DGS.

Special Committee

The DGS serves as the student's main academic adviser and provisional chair during the first semester of residence and during that period will assist the student in beginning the process of forming a special committee. Because the special committee is charged with guiding and supervising all of a student's academic work, it is important to establish this committee as soon as possible. The expectation is that a student will select at least one member of their committee no later than the end of the first year of graduate study. The entire special committee should be chosen and assigned in "Student Center" by the end of the fall semester of the second year of graduate study and the chair of the committee will become the candidate's dissertation advisor. The two other members of the committee represent fields of study (the "minor fields") in which the student also has a strong interest and will become competent to teach. The DGS will serve as a temporary member of the student's special committee until there is a full complement of functioning members. Minor members may be chosen from related fields outside the department, but the chair must be in the graduate field of Africana studies. Any changes or additions to the special committee before the A Exam can be assigned through Student Center. A student's special committee chair is charged with certain formal responsibilities: 

• Approving the student's choice of courses for each semester
• Recommending at the end of each semester that the student be awarded appropriate residence credit. One "unit of  residence" is awarded for a semester's satisfactory full-time study. Fractions of a unit may be awarded for part time or not wholly satisfactory study.
• With the other special committee members, conducting the Qualifying Exam (Q Exam)
• Conducting the Admission to Candidacy Examination (A Exam) with the whole special committee
• Approving the dissertation with the committee after conducting a formally scheduled final examination (B Exam)
• Recommending the conferral of the degree. This recommendation must be unanimous. The committee is expected to meet with the student at least once a year.

The goal of a Q exam is to test whether the student has the necessary qualifications for continuation in the program. 

The content of the exam is decided in consultation with the student’s committee chair. Passing the Q Exam is required to remain in good academic standing. 

The process and content for the Q exam should be discussed with second-year Ph.D. students early in the fall semester, and the exam must take place no later than the fourth semester of graduate study. 

The Q Exam is comprised of both a written and an oral portion. Each student, in consultation with his or her committee chair, will choose one of the 20-25 page research papers written during a previous semester at Cornell and work with his or her chair to enhance and revise it in preparation for submitting it to the full committee. This paper will form a significant part of the student's oral qualifying exam that must be taken by the end of the fourth semester of study. The Q Exam itself consists of a presentation by the student and questions from the committee. 

At the conclusion of the exam, the committee offers the student its written assessment of progress in developing the knowledge and skills necessary for a Ph.D. in Africana studies and makes recommendations for further study. At this time, the committee should also take the opportunity to propose how the language requirement is to be satisfied, or whether it has been satisfied already. Committee chairs must report the results of Q-exams to the DGS, along with information about the language requirement. 

This exam will determine whether the student will remain in good academic standing.  Students with incompletes are not eligible to take the exam.

No later than the end of the third year, each student will take an “A” Exam (Admission to Candidacy Examination), demonstrating proficiency in one major and two minor fields. Successful completion formally admits the student to candidacy for the doctoral degree.

After two years of coursework, Ph.D. students will take the A exam in the spring semester of the third year.

The examination is taken after a student has earned at least two registration units of credit. Unless special permission is obtained from the Dean, all doctoral students must attempt the Examination for Admission to Candidacy before beginning their seventh semester of registration in the Ph.D. program.

Advancing to the A Exam

In order to advance to scheduling the A exam, the student should first clear their dissertation topic with their special committee and submit a draft of their dissertation proposal to their special committee members.

Outline of the A Exam

The A exam will cover one major and two minor concentrations, and is partly oral and partly written.

This exam consists of written responses to questions from each of the committee members, followed by an oral examination based on the responses to the questions. The content and timing of the A exam is negotiated between the student and their special committee. Although there is variability in each A exam experience – the questions and timing are tailored to the interests and goals of each individual student – the exam is typically a “take-home” exam comprised of a minimum of three separate questions (one from each committee member; if a student has more than three committee members, additional members may choose to collaboratively write an exam question for the student, may write a fourth question, or may substitute the dissertation proposal for a question. The student should consult with their committee chair and the other committee members, who will be charged with outlining how the question from the fourth committee member will be incorporated). The student may have anywhere from two days to one week to respond to each of their committee members’ questions. The response time should be agreed upon at least one month before the exam is scheduled. Students may also be required to submit reading lists, syllabi, and/or a dissertation proposal as part of the A exam.

Protocols for Scheduling, Etc.

Students and faculty must adhere to Graduate School protocols for completing the A exam, including scheduling the exam and submitting exam results. These protocols include policies for Faculty Participation (including expectations for faculty and student attendance and regulations regarding remote participation), Location of Examinations, Scheduling Examinations, and Examination Results. Once a student has received the exam questions and the exam has been scheduled, the student is expected to complete all exam questions during the semester in which the exam is initially scheduled. Any rescheduling that delays the exam beyond the semester in which it was initially scheduled will only be approved under extremely rare circumstances, and the student will have to petition the DGS for permission to do so.

Upon passing the A exam, the student advances to Ph.D. Candidacy status. By the time of the A exam, the student should have identified and explored a doctoral dissertation topic. If the student plans to do fieldwork, a great deal of planning and preparation is necessary. Almost all foreign countries require graduate students to be attached to an institute or agency, so all such arrangements must be completed in advance. Students must also ensure that human subjects protocols are approved if this kind of research is germane to their dissertation research and writing. See the Institutional Review Board for Human Participants regulations at https://www.irb.cornell.edu/

Similarly, applications for travel and research funds are typically made eight to twelve months prior to the initiation of fieldwork.

A Note on Failing the Exam

ASRC adheres to the Graduate School policy outlined in the following link:  https://gradschool.cornell.edu/policies/code-of-legislation/

https://gradschool.cornell.edu/academic-progress/requirements-milestones/exams/exams-required-for-ph-d-degree/

Language Requirement and Registration Units

Language proficiency.

All students must demonstrate proficiency in one language other than English. This requirement can be satisfied by taking a proficiency exam or by taking the relevant language course. 

Registration Units

Ph.D. candidates at Cornell must complete at least six registration units. One registration unit is equivalent to one semester of fulltime study. Students entering the Ph.D. program may be granted a maximum of two registration units for a master's degree earned at another institution if that degree is relevant to the doctoral program. However, no commitment regarding transfer of registration units may be made until the special committee has had an opportunity to judge the student's accomplishments.

Teaching Requirement

Teaching assistant.

Candidates for the Ph.D. degree in Africana studies must complete at least three semesters of carefully supervised teaching as a teaching assistant during their third and fourth years. Following admission to candidacy, students will have the option of teaching in the undergraduate writing seminar program.

Center for Teaching Innovation (CTI) 

First cti requirement:    .

In the second year of Africana Ph.D. program, candidates are expected to complete the  Cornell Teaching Assistant Online Orientation

The TA Online Orientation includes essential information to accelerate new TAs on the path to success in their teaching roles, as well as details about campus teaching support resources. It should take approximately 4-5 hours to complete all 5 modules in the orientation. 

The Orientation is comprised of the following modules:

• Module 1: Welcome to Cornell 

An overview of teaching at Cornell and the roles of teaching assistants at the university. 

• Module 2: Getting Ready to Teach

Preparing for the first day of class, warming up the learning environment, and tips for working with a teaching team.

• Module 3: Teaching Essentials 

Strategies for engaging students, leading discussions, implementing group work, assessing student learning, and grading. 

• Module 4: Cornell Policies and Resources

Introduction to Cornell University policies and resources related to teaching. 

• Module 5: Next Steps

Opportunities for developing your teaching skills and preparing for your future career. 

Second CTI Requirement: 

Candidates must also complete either 

• The University-Wide GET SET Teaching Conference in the Fall Semester
• One of the Institutes on Special Topics offered in the Spring Semester

Other Requirements

Colloquium/presentation.

Doctoral candidates will be required to give a departmental colloquium/presentation in the early stages of dissertation research and writing and a public colloquium/presentation at a later stage. Students must also defend the final dissertation in an oral exam

Graduate School Requirements

Plus, all graduate school requirements https://gradschool.cornell.edu/polices/degree-requirements.

• Annual Student Progress Review

In the spring semester of each academic year, Ph.D. students in the Africana studies program will complete a Student Progress Review (SPR) https://gradschool.cornell.edu/academic-progress/requirements-milestones/student-progress-review/ .  Using the SPR form, students are asked to reflect on their recent accomplishments, identify challenges, and set goals. Committee chairs then review their students’ SPR forms and enter constructive feedback. Chairs indicate whether progress has been excellent, satisfactory, needs improvement, or is unsatisfactory. Feedback that is documented on the SPR will be made available to the student, all members of the student’s special committee, and the DGS/GFA of the student’s field. Students in years one to two should also include an updated description of research interests. 

Advanced students will update the DGS on progress towards formulating a dissertation question/problem or, if they are far enough along, progress on writing/defending a dissertation proposal or the completed dissertation. If a student has incompletes, the evaluation must include the names of the courses, dates of enrollment and plans for resolving the incompletes. In addition, the self‐evaluation should include a description of published work, conference presentations and/or grant/fellowship awards for the academic year. 

The review will be based on the students' grades, papers, presentations, Q and A exams, publications and teaching in order to determine if they are making satisfactory progress toward the completion of the program. 

Visit the Grad School website for more details on policies.

Africana Studies Ph.D. Assessment

Faculty assess student performance through a variety of direct and indirect measures; these include:

• Assignment of registration units, which record student progress semiannually
• Official milestones such as qualifying exams (Q exam), administered early in an academic program, admission to candidacy exams (A exam) which assess breadth and depth in the discipline, the defense of the thesis (B exams)
• Public presentations of scholarly work
• Fellowships and special acknowledgements such as student awards for their work and travel grants
• Evaluation of student skills by TA supervisors or field experience supervisors, undertaken in a systematic way and with notes recorded consistently
• Annual faculty supervisor ratings from chairs and TA supervisors of knowledge, skills, and progress
• Student satisfaction with their learning and career preparation, collected through surveys, focus groups, or exit interviews

To learn more about Africana Studies Assessment Plan, go to Learning Outcomes and Associated Assessments

https://gradschool.cornell.edu/academics/fields-of-study/subject/africana-studies/africana-studies-phd-ithaca/#section-7

Graduate Student Profiles

Current Graduate Student Profiles

Ph.D. Alumni

Anthropology

Peace Pedagogies in a Divided Society

Information Session: Global PhD Research Awards

Information session: southeast asia program undergraduate opportunities.

Revenge of the Nation-State: Borders, Sovereignty, and Cyberspace

Information Session: Latin American and Caribbean Studies Graduate Summer Research Funding

Information Session: Global Internships in Africa

Information Session: Laidlaw Scholars Program

Information session: fulbright u.s. student program for undergraduates.

Information Session: Fulbright Opportunities for Graduate Students

Anthropology

As an anthropology major, you’ll study the complex social and cultural relationships that define human communities and learn how to conduct engaged, collaborative, field-based research. You’ll be able to investigate topics ranging from identity politics and globalization to the origins of agriculture and the rise of empires. The settings you’ll explore can take you from the lowland rain forest of ancient Mesoamerica to the mountains of the Himalayas, from prisons in Latin America to a synagogue on New York City’s Lower East Side, from medical research centers in Tanzania to the colonial era Finger Lakes. 

Sample classes

• Medicine, Culture and Society
• The Rise and Fall of "Civilization"
• Cultural Diversity and Contemporary Issues
• Myth, Ritual and Symbol

All information below is based on the 2022 First-Destination Post-Graduate Survey. Lists are not exhaustive; rather, they are a sampling of the data.  If you would like more information, please email [email protected]

What can you do with a degree in Anthropology? 

Graduate school: .

Anthropology students pursued various advanced degrees like their MA and PhD. Their graduate field interest ranges from anthropology to comparative literature and international relations.

These ambitious individuals have chosen to continue their education at prestigious institutions like Harvard University, Columbia University, and the University of Oxford.

Employment: 

The majority of anthropology graduates entered sectors in human healthcare services, education, and nonprofit organizations.

Where 2022 Anthropology Graduates Work

• Department website
• Anthropology major
• Anthropology minor
• Anthropology graduate program
• Courses of study

Associated interests

• Ancient History
• Environment and Sustainability
• Exploring the natural world
• Gender and sexuality
• Language and culture
• Plants, animals and evolution

Related disciplines

• Social Sciences

Full list of majors and minors

Graduate Program

The Anthropology graduate program provides students with excellent training in theory and methods, enabling them to pursue an advanced graduate degree in many subfields of Anthropology, including archaeology, ecology, environmental anthropology, evolution, linguistic, medical anthropology, political economy, science and technology, and sociocultural anthropology.

The doctoral program prepares students to conduct independent research and analysis in Anthropology.  Through completion of advanced course work and rigorous skills training, the doctoral program prepares students to make original contributions to the knowledge of anthropology and to interpret and present the results of such research.  Eligible PhD students from other disciplines at Stanford University may also pursue a PhD Minor in Anthropology. See PhD Program Flyer for more information.

The department offers a Coterminal MA degree in Anthropology for current Stanford undergraduates seeking to obtain a MA degree while completing their BA degree in the same or different department. The department also offers a Terminal MA degree in Anthropology for Stanford graduate students, either in anthropology or in other disciplines, who have fulfilled the MA degree requirements for the MA 'on the way to the PhD'.

Over 1,500  doctoral dissertations  have been completed in the department since 1895.  Anthropology alumni pursue successful careers in teaching, research, or non-academic careers in the United States and worldwide.

Beyond the Classroom

In close collaboration with Stanford  faculty members  and  department leadership , our graduate students organize number of event series that contribute to the department's intellectual life and community.  The Graduate Student Organization (GSO) representatives act as a liaison between the department leadership and the graduate student body, actively participating in department issues, and providing a supportive community for the first-year PhD student cohort as well as other for other PhD and M. graduate students. Graduate students also engage with unique research, curricular, and professionalization activities. 

Fields of Study

Our graduate s tudents may choose from the following Department tracks: 1) Archaeology; 2) Culture and Society.  Students work closely with faculty members who are engaged in research informed by a wide array of theoretical perspectives from political to spiritual. Subfields in Archeology include: cities, gender and sexuality, and materiality. Students interested in Culture and Society can focus on a wide range of issues such as: linguistic anthropology, culture and mind, medical anthropology, and global political economy.   Explore each Research Area and its faculty .

The Anthropology Department offers 5 years of financial support to PhD students.  No funding is offered for student enrolled in the co-terminal and terminal MA programs.

Join dozens of  Stanford School of Humanities and Sciences students  who gain valuable leadership skills in a multidisciplinary, multicultural community as  Knight-Hennessy Scholars  (KHS). As a scholar, students join a distinguished cohort, participate in up to three years of leadership programming, and receive full funding for up to three years of Doctoral studies at Stanford. The KHS application deadline is October 11, 2023. Learn more about  KHS admission .

How to Apply

Please review admissions for policies and requirements for each degree program by visiting the specific degree program page listed above. Please also consider reviewing the Stanford School of Humanities & Sciences'  Guide on Getting into Grad School  to explore which graduate program may best suit your interest, what graduate committees look for, and the benefits and challenges for pursuing a graduate degree.

Program Contacts

Angela Garcia

Lochlann Jain

/images/cornell/logo35pt_cornell_white.svg" alt="cornell anthropology phd"> Cornell University --> Graduate School

Anthropology ph.d. (ithaca), field of study.

Anthropology

Program Description

Graduate training in the Field of Anthropology emphasizes sociocultural anthropology, with an additional concentration in archaeological anthropology. Biological anthropology is primarily an undergraduate program. Substantively, the Field of Anthropology combines humanistic and social scientific approaches in innovative ethnographic research, emphasizing culture as a productive process and anthropologists as engaged in understanding and defending cultural diversity. Geographically, our greatest depth is in Asia (East, South, and Southeast), but the Americas, Europe, and Africa all also figure importantly. The Field of Anthropology has strong ties with all the geographic area programs, as well as faculty active in many other interdisciplinary programs, including joint appointments with Asian American Studies, Latina/o Studies, American Indian and Indigenous Studies, and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.

The graduate program in anthropology is highly individualized and interdisciplinary. Only four courses and a field research proposal are required; thus, the bulk of students' work in language, area studies, or other training is individually designed in consultation with the Special Committee. Individually-tailored examinations occur after approximately the first year of course work (the Qualifying Exam), the second or third year (the Admission to Candidacy, or A Exam), and after completion of the thesis (the Defense or B Exam). Most graduate students in the Field of Anthropology complete one to two years of intensive field research. All doctoral candidates are also expected to teach at some point: most students first get experience as assistants in both introductory and mid-level courses; later, many design and teach courses of their own in the Knight Writing Program. A vigorous colloquium series enriches the intellectual environment for both students and faculty.

The Field of Anthropology primarily admits candidates seeking a Ph.D. because of the lack of funding for, and employment with, only an M.A. With very rare exceptions, every student admitted to the Ph.D. program receives funding to support five years of on-campus study. Graduate students apply for additional funding from Cornell or from major external sources such as NSF, Fulbright, SSRC, and Wenner-Gren to conduct both preliminary and dissertation field research. Most students complete the Ph.D. within seven years and most have gone on to find academic employment at major colleges and universities in the U.S. or abroad.

Contact Information

266 McGraw Hall Cornell University Ithaca, NY  14853

Concentrations by Subject

• archaeological anthropology
• socio-cultural anthropology

Visit the Graduate School's Tuition Rates page.

Application Requirements and Deadlines

Fall, Dec. 15; no spring admission

Requirements Summary:

A committee, chaired by the director of graduate studies and consisting of three additional faculty members, evaluates all applications for admission and financial support. Applications should also include a writing sample such as a term paper, an honors thesis, or a research report. The deadline for receipt of completed applications is December 15.

• all  Graduate School Requirements , including  English Language Proficiency Requirement  for all applicants
• Academic Statement of Purpose limited to 2 pages or approximately 1,000 words
• Personal Statement
• three recommendations
• writing sample limited to 35 pages double-spaced (including all notes, images, bibliography)

Learning Outcomes

Make an original, substantial, and publishable contribution to Anthropology

• Identify and pursue new research opportunities within one's field
• Think originally and independently to develop concepts and methods

Demonstrate advanced Anthropological research skills

• Create new knowledge through the generation, analysis, and synthesis of primary and secondary source materials
• Identify and access appropriate sources of relevant information
• Critically analyze and evaluate one's own findings and those of others
• Master application of relevant research methods, technical skills, and languages

Demonstrate commitment to advancing Anthropological scholarship

• Show understanding of the history of Anthropology and the development of current theoretical debates
• Keep abreast of current advances within one's field and related areas
• Show commitment to professional development through engagement in professional societies, publication, applied, and/or outreach activities
• Teach effectively by presenting and disseminating knowledge in the field to students, professionals, and members of the public

Demonstrate professional skills

• Adhere to ethical standards of the discipline for using sources, artifacts, and remains; interacting with human subjects; and working with colleagues
• Write and speak effectively to professional and lay audiences about issues in the field
• Actively compete for major intramural and extramural research grants

Narrow Your Search

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Jessica Marie Falcone, PhD

News & Events

Save the date.

The EMI Annual Conference 2024  will be held on Nov 1, at Cornell Tech, NYC . Please stay connected and register to our newsletter to keep updated about speakers, program, and registration.

EMI Upcoming Events

Emi fellows meeting, emerging markets institute - phd research day, webinar series: ai as a transformative tool - development and inclusive growth in emerging markets, webinar series: capstone projects 2024, emi fellows graduation 2024, 2024 cornell emi mark mobius pitch competition final, 2024 cornell emi corning case competition final, emi conference 2024, emerging markets institute businessfeed.

Regulation Comes to AI

AI regulations are emerging globally with the EU leading the way. Are businesses prepared for this new regulatory landscape?

The Lackluster Past and Promising Future of China’s Central Bank Digital Currency

China’s slow adoption of its central bank digital currency, e-CNY, suggests existing electronic payments systems can be a deterrent.

India and Vietnam Attract Global Capital, Emerge as Strong Investment Hubs in Asia

With growing venture capital investments and private equity deals, India and Vietnam are positioned to become prime choices for international capital.

EMI on Social Media

Mario einaudi center for international studies events, may 6, 2024: why don’t indian voters hold politicians accountable for air pollution at uris hall.

Talk by Tariq Thachil (Political Science, University of Pennsylvania)

Urban citizens in low-income democracies rarely hold elected officials accountable for toxic air. To understand why, we fielded a large citizen survey in Delhi, India, a highly polluted megacity where voters rarely prioritize air pollution at the polls. We find no evidence of conventional explanations for accountability failures: residents are aware of pollution’s adverse impacts, do not privilege development over curbing emissions, and are not fractured along class or ethnic lines on this issue. Instead, we find partisanship and sensitivity to the potential private costs of mitigation policies reduce accountability pressures. On the other hand, a simple randomized intervention (sharing indoor air quality information) that personalizes the costs of air pollution increases its electoral salience. We reveal key opportunities and constraints for mobilizing public opinion to reduce air pollution in developing democracies.

Tariq Thachi is Professor of Political Science, Director of the Center for Advanced Study of India (CASI), and Madan Lal Sobti Professor for the Study of Contemporary India at the University of Pennsylvania. His recent book (coauthored with Adam Auerbach), Migrants and Machine Politics, focuses on the political lives of poor migrants in Indian cities. His first book, Elite Parties, Poor Voters examines how elite parties can use social services to win mass support, through a study of Hindu nationalism in India. He received his PhD in Government from Cornell University in 2009.

View on site | Email this event

May 4, 2024: Pandemic Archives: Media, Geopolitics, and Temporalities of Crisis at Physical Sciences Building

Day 2: Pandemic Archives: Media, Geopolitics, and Temporalities of Crisis

About this workshop:

As the world enters its fourth year living with COVID-19, this workshop critically examines our conceptual tools for capturing this chronic crisis and its seismic impact on global geopolitics and humanistic inquiry. Departing from existing discussions, we focus on how the diverse media practices that flourished during the pandemic are now transforming into historical and aesthetic archives enabling re-readings of overshadowed affects, stories, and relationalities within a larger picture. With a special interest in transregional, diasporic, global, and/or other innovative frameworks of analysis, we seek to address the controversial yet indispensable role of China and Chineseness in constituting the global political ecology of this crisis period. Discussion topics include but are not limited to (post-)pandemic global politics and sociality, crisis temporalities, media forms and platforms, ordinary agency, archive, transregional world-making, soundscapes, ecocriticism, and ongoing changes in Chinese/Sinophone/Asian/Asian American studies.

We invite all interested to join us for this get-together for creative and convivial thinking.

10:00-10:10 Welcome Remarks

10:10-11:50 Panel 1: ARCHIVE

Fanyi Faye Ma (Duke University): Can Digital Wailing Crumble the Zero-COVID Great Wall?: The Political Lives of Mediated Female VoiceNick Admussen (Cornell University): The Postpandemic, the Postsocialist, and Jile Disike (Disco Elysium)Lilian Kong (University of Chicago): Calibrating the Self: Approaching East Asian Healing Vlogs as Digital Pandemic ArchiveShana Ye (University of Toronto): The Pandemic Steel(Still): Materiality, Memory and the Many Lives of Chinese Cargo Containers1:30-3:10 Panel 2: REWORLDING

Yanting-Leah Li (Cornell University): From Immunity to Superabundance: Radical Possibilities of Communitarian EcologyShiqi Lin (Cornell University) and Hans Yi Su (Pennsylvania State University): Pandemic Clubbing: Fugitive Cohabitation in a Shifting Global OrderChristopher T. Fan (University of California, Irvine): Park My Car: Ambiguity and the Auteur in the Films of Chung Mong-hongLily Wong (American University): Transpacific Alliance: Asian/American Coalitional World-Making in and beyond the Pandemic3:20-4:50 Hybrid Roundtable: RECALIBRATION

A special discussion bringing back scholars who have written about COVID-19 since 2020

Michael Berry (UCLA), Jenny Chio (University of Southern California), Belinda Kong (Bowdoin College), Carlos Rojas (Duke University), Kaiyang Xu (University of Southern California)Moderators: Nick Admussen and Shiqi Lin5:00-5:30 Concluding Discussion

Cosponsors include the East Asia Program Graduate Student Steering Committee, EastAsia+ Initiative, Society for the Humanities, Department of Asian Studies, Asian American Studies Program, Department of Comparative Literature, and the Klarman Fellowship Program.

Read about Day 1's book talk here.

May 4, 2024: IAD Spring Symposium: Imagining Just Environmental and Climate Futures in Africa at Mann Library

On Friday, May 3 and Saturday, May 4, 2024, the Institute for African Development, in collaboration with the Polson Institute for Global Development and the Einaudi Center for International Studies, Cornell University, will host a symposium on Imagining Just Environmental and Climate Futures in Africa. Please see our website for the schedule on Friday and Saturday! The event is fully hybrid, so join us in Mann in person or remotely via zoom (registration below).

Keynote talks include:

Edmond Totin, Universite Nationale d'Agriculture (Benin): "Path dependencies shaping environmental and climate futures in African food systems”Nadège Compaoré, University of Toronto, Mississauga: "African Climate Solidarities: Beyond Boundaries" Timothy Raeymaekers, University of Bologna: "Rural Work: What Future for Social and Ecological Reproduction"Siri Eriksen, Norwegian University of Life Sciences: "Between a rock and a hard place: Exploring the lived experience of climate change and social injustice"Hanson Nyantakyi-Frimpong, University of Denver: "Nature-Based Solutions to Climate Change and the Reproduction of Maladaptation in Africa" Youjin Chung, University of California, Berkeley: "Limits of 'Green Sacrifice Zones': Towards a Decolonial Environmental and Climate Justice in AfricaPaper discussion sessions:

“Environmental governance and transformative policy in Africa” (Chuan Liao & Edmond Totin, discussants)"Scales and time: extractive economies and agrarian change" (Nadège Compaoré and Timothy Raeymaekers, discussants)"Lived experiences of precarity and calls for climate justice" (Siri Eriksen and Wendy Wolford, discussants)"(Mal)adaptation in socioecological systems and institutions (Hanson Nyantakyi-Frimpong and Youjin Chung, discussants)Organized by the Institute for African Development, Polson Institute for Global Development, and the Einaudi Center for International Studies.

MA & PhD in Architecture

Ucla architecture and urban design offers two academic graduate degrees: the master of arts in architecture (ma) and doctor of philosophy in architecture (phd)..

The programs produce students whose scholarship aims to provoke and operate within architecture’s public, professional, and scholarly constituencies. Both programs are supported by the Standing Committee, made up of five faculty members: Michael Osman (interim program director), Cristóbal Amunátegui , Dana Cuff , Samaa Elimam , and Ayala Levin . A number of visiting faculty teach courses to expand the range of offerings.

Applications for the MA/PhD program (Fall 2024 matriculation) are completed via the UCLA Application for Graduate Admission , and are due January 6, 2024. Candidates will be notified of decisions in March 2024; admitted candidates who wish to accept the offer of matriculation must submit their Statement of Intent to Register (SIR) by April 15, 2024.

All MA and PhD students are required to enroll in a two-year colloquium focused on methods for writing, teaching, and researching in the field of architecture. The six courses that constitute the colloquium train students in the apparatus of academic scholarship. Over the two-year sequence, students produce original research projects and develop skills in long-format writing.

Research Opportunities

The intellectual life of the students in the MA and PhD programs are reinforced by the increasing number of opportunities afforded to students through specialized faculty-led research projects. These include cityLAB-UCLA and the Urban Humanities Institute .

MA in Architecture

This program prepares students to work in a variety of intellectual and programmatic milieus including historical research, cultural studies, and interdisciplinary studies with particular emphasis on connections with geography, design, art history, history of science and literary studies, as well as studio and design based research.

Beyond the core colloquium, MA students take a series of approved courses both at UCLA AUD and across campus. The MA program is a two-year degree, culminating in a thesis. The thesis is developed from a paper written by the student in their coursework and developed in consultation with the primary advisor and the standing committee. In addition to courses and individual research, students often participate in collective, project-based activities, including publications, symposia and exhibitions.

The program is distinguished by its engagement with contemporary design and historical techniques as well by the unusual balance it offers: fostering great independence and freedom in the students’ courses of study while providing fundamental training in architectural scholarship.

Recent MA Theses

• Jacqueline Meyer, “Crafting Utopia: Paolo Soleri and the Building of Arcosanti.”
• Joseph Maguid, “The Architecture of the Videogame: Architecture as the Link Between Representational and Participatory Immersion.”
• Meltem Al, “The Agency of Words and Images in the Transformation of Istanbul: The Case of Ayazma.”
• Courtney Coffman, “Addressing Architecture and Fashion: On Simulacrum, Time and Poché.”
• Joseph Ebert, “Prolegomena to a Poiesis of Architectural Phenomenology.”
• Jamie Aron, “Women Images: From the Bauhaus Weaving Workshop to the Knoll Textile Division.”
• Gustave Heully, “Moldy Assumptions.”
• Brigid McManama, “Interventions on Pacoima Wash: Repurposing Linear Infrastructure into Park Spaces.”

MA Typical Study Program

Phd in architecture.

This program prepares students to enter the academic professions, either in architectural history, architectural design, or other allied fields. PhD students are trained to teach courses in the history and theory of architecture while also engaging in studio pedagogy and curatorial work. In addition to the colloquium, PhD students take a series of approved courses both at UCLA Architecture and Urban Design and across campus. They select these courses in relation to their own research interests and in consultation with their primary advisor. The priorities for selection are breadth of knowledge and interdisciplinary experience that retains a focused area of expertise. To this end, the students identify Major and Minor Fields of study. The Minor Field is generally fulfilled by satisfactorily completing three courses given by another department and the Major Field by five courses offered by UCLA Architecture and Urban Design.

Once coursework is completed, PhD students move to the Comprehensive Exam, Qualifying Exam, and the writing of a dissertation, and final defense, if deemed appropriate by the doctoral committee. In the transition from coursework to exams, PhD students work on one paper beyond its original submission as coursework. The paper begins in the context of a departmental seminar, but often continues either in the context of an independent study, summer mentorship, or a second seminar with faculty consent. Upon the research paper’s acceptance, students begin preparing for their comprehensive exam. Before their third year, students must also satisfactorily complete three quarters of language study or its equivalent according to University standards. The particular language will be determined in consultation with the Standing Committee. The Comprehensive Exam is administered by at least two members of the Standing Committee and at most one faculty member from another Department at UCLA, also a member of the Academic Senate.

The Comprehensive Exam tests two fields: the first covers a breadth of historical knowledge—300 years at minimum—and the second focuses on in-depth knowledge of a specialization that is historically and thematically circumscribed. Students submit an abstract on each of these fields, provide a substantial bibliography, and prepare additional documentation requested by their primary advisor. These materials are submitted to the committee no less than two weeks before the exam, which occurs as early as the end of the second year. Students are encouraged to complete the Comprehensive Exam no later than the end of their third year of study.

The Comprehensive Exam itself consists of two parts: an oral component that takes place first, and then a written component. The oral component is comprised of questions posed by the committee based on the student’s submitted materials. The goal of the exam is for students to demonstrate their comprehensive knowledge of their chosen field. The written component of the exam (which may or may not be waived by the committee) consists of a written response to a choice of questions posed by the committee. The goal of this portion of the exam is for students to demonstrate their research skills, their ability to develop and substantiate an argument, and to show promise of original contribution to the field. Students have two weeks to write the exam. After the committee has read the exam, the advisor notifies the student of the committee’s decision. Upon the student’s successful completion of the Comprehensive Exam, they continue to the Qualifying Exam.

Students are expected to take the Qualifying Exam before the beginning of the fourth year. The exam focuses on a dissertation prospectus that a student develops with their primary advisor and in consultation with their PhD committee. Each student’s PhD committee consists of at least two members of the Standing Committee and one outside member from another department at the University (and a member of the Faculty Senate). Committees can also include faculty from another institution. All committees are comprised of at least three members of UCLA Academic Senate. The prospectus includes an argument with broad implications, demonstrates that the dissertation will make a contribution of knowledge and ideas to the field, demonstrates mastery of existing literature and discourses, and includes a plan and schedule for completion.

The PhD dissertation is written after the student passes the qualifying exam, at which point the student has entered PhD candidacy. The dissertation is defended around the sixth year of study. Students graduating from the program have taken posts in a wide range of universities, both in the United States and internationally.

Recent PhD Dissertations

• Marko Icev, "Building Solidarity: Architecture After Disaster and The Skopje 1963 Post-Earthquake Reconstruction." ( Read )
• Anas Alomaim, "Nation Building in Kuwait, 1961-1991."
• Tulay Atak, “Byzantine Modern: Displacements of Modernism in Istanbul.”
• Ewan Branda, “Virtual Machines: Culture, telematique, and the architecture of information at Centre Beaubourg, 1968–1977.”
• Aaron Cayer, "Design and Profit: Architectural Practice in the Age of Accumulation"
• Per-Johan Dahl, “Code Manipulation, Architecture In-Between Universal and Specific Urban Spaces.”
• Penelope Dean, “Delivery without Discipline: Architecture in the Age of Design.”
• Miriam Engler, “Gordon Cullen and the ‘Cut-and-Paste’ Urban Landscape.”
• Dora Epstein-Jones, “Architecture on the Move: Modernism and Mobility in the Postwar.”
• Sergio Figueiredo, “The Nai Effect: Museological Institutions and the Construction of Architectural Discourse.”
• Jose Gamez, “Contested Terrains: Space, Place, and Identity in Postcolonial Los Angeles.”
• Todd Gannon, “Dissipations, Accumulations, and Intermediations: Architecture, Media and the Archigrams, 1961–1974.”
• Whitney Moon, "The Architectural Happening: Diller and Scofidio, 1979-89"
• Eran Neuman, “Oblique Discourses: Claude Parent and Paul Virilio’s Oblique Function Theory and Postwar Architectural Modernity.”
• Alexander Ortenberg, “Drawing Practices: The Art and Craft of Architectural Representation.”
• Brian Sahotsky, "The Roman Construction Process: Building the Basilica of Maxentius"
• Marie Saldana, “A Procedural Reconstruction of the Urban Topography of Magnesia on The Maeander.”
• David Salomon, “One Thing or Another: The World Trade Center and the Implosion of Modernism.”
• Ari Seligmann, “Architectural Publicity in the Age of Globalization.”
• Zheng Tan, “Conditions of The Hong Kong Section: Spatial History and Regulatory Environment of Vertically Integrated Developments.”
• Jon Yoder, “Sight Design: The Immersive Visuality of John Lautner.”

A Sampling of PhD Alumni and Their Pedagogy

Iman Ansari , Assistant Professor of Architecture, the Knowlton School, Ohio State University

Tulay Atak , Adjunct Associate Professor, Pratt School of Architecture

Shannon Starkey , Associate Professor of Architecture, University of San Diego

Ece Okay , Affiliate Research, Université De Pau Et Des Pays De L'adour

Zheng Tan , Department of Architecture, Tongji University

Pelin Yoncaci , Assistant Professor, Department Of Architecture, Middle East Technical University

José L.S. Gámez , Interim Dean, College of Arts + Architecture, UNC Charlotte

Eran Neuman , Professor, School of Architecture, Tel Aviv University

Marie Saldana , Assistant Professor, School of Interior Architecture, University of Tennessee - Knoxville

Sergio M. Figueiredo , Assistant Professor, Eindhoven University of Technology

Rebecca Choi , Assistant Professor of Architecture History, School of Architecture, Tulane University

Will Davis , Lecturer in History, Theory and Criticism, Department of Architecture, National University of Singapore

Maura Lucking , Faculty, School of Architecture & Urban Planning, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee

Kyle Stover , Assistant Professor, School of Architecture, Montana State University

Alex Maymind , Assistant Professor of Architecture and Director of Undergraduate Studies in Architecture, University of Minnesota

Gary Riichirō Fox , visiting faculty member at Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) and lecturer at USC School of Architecture

Randy Nakamura , Adjunct Professor, College of Arts and Sciences, University of San Francisco

Aaron Cayer , Assistant Professor of Architecture History, School of Architecture + Planning, University of New Mexico

Whitney Moon , Associate Professor of Architecture, School of Architecture & Urban Planning, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee

Todd Gannon , Professor of Architecture, the Knowlton School, Ohio State University

Dora Epstein Jones , Professor of Practice, School of Architecture, the University of Texas at Austin

Sarah Hearne , Assistant Professor, College of Architecture and Planning, University of Colorado Denver

PhD Typical Study Program

*The choice of language to fulfill this requirement must be discussed with the Ph.D. Standing Committee

Our Current PhD Cohort

AUD's cohort of PhD candidates are leaders in their fields of study, deepening their scholarship at AUD and at UCLA while sharing their knowledge with the community.

Adam Boggs is a sixth year Ph.D candidate and interdisciplinary artist, scholar, educator and Urban Humanist. His research and teaching interests include the tension between creativity and automation, craft-based epistemologies, and the social and material history of architecture at the U.S.-Mexico border. He holds a BFA in Sculpture Cum Laude from the Ohio State University, and an MFA in Visual Art from the State University of New York at Purchase College. Prior to joining the doctoral program at UCLA he participated in courses in Architecture (studio and history) at Princeton University and Cornell University. His dissertation analyzes the history of indigenous labor during the Mexican baroque period to form a comparative analysis with the 20th century Spanish revival architecture movement in Southern California and how the implementation of the style along the U.S.-Mexico border might function as a Lefebvrian “thirdspace” that disrupts binary thinking. In Spring 2024 he will teach an undergraduate seminar course at AUD on the history of architecture at the U.S.-Mexico border as part of the CUTF program.

Hanyu Chen is a second-year doctoral student at UCLA AUD. Her research focuses on the intersection between (sub)urban studies, heritage conservation, and the genders of the space. Specifically, it concerns the dynamics of genders in (sub)urban areas and how these dynamics are conserved as heritage. Born and raised in China for her first 18 years, Hanyu chose the conservation of comfort stations in China as her master's thesis at the University of Southern California, where she earned her master’s degree in Heritage Conservation and officially started her journey in architecture. Her thesis discusses the fluidity and genders of comfort stations and how they survive in contemporary China’s heritage conservation policies.

Hanyu also holds a Bachelor of Science degree in AMS (Applied Mathematics and Statistics) and Art History from Stony Brook University.

Yixuan Chen

Yixuan Chen is an architectural designer and a first-year doctoral student in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design at UCLA. Driven by an impulse to demystify both the grand promises and trivial familiarities of architecture, her research embarks on the notion of everydayness to elucidate the power dynamics it reveals. She investigates the conflicts between these two ends and focuses on modernization across different times and places.

Prior to joining UCLA AUD, she was trained as an architect and graduated from the University of Nottingham's China Campus with a first-class honors degree. Her graduation project “Local Culture Preservation Centre,” which questioned the validity of monumental architecture in the climate crisis, was nominated for the RIBA President's Medal in 2016.

She also holds a Master of Arts degree with distinction in Architectural History from the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London. Her dissertation, “Shijing, on the Debris of Shijing,” explores the vanishing shijing places, or urban villages, where rural migrant workers negotiate their urban identity in Chinese cities, revealing shifting power relations. Additionally, she authored an article in Prospectives Journal titled "Architectural Authorship in ‘the Last Mile,’" advocating for a change to relational architectural authorship in response to the digital revolution in architecture.

Pritam Dey is an urban designer and second-year doctoral student at UCLA AUD. His research interest lies at the intersection of colonial urbanism, sensorial history, and somatic inquiries. His architecture thesis investigated the crematorium and temple as sensorial infrastructure, and was presented at World Architecture Congress at Seoul in 2017. Previously Dey worked in the domain of urban design, specifically informal markets, as a shaper of urbanism in Indian cities. Prior to joining the AUD doctoral program, his past research focused on investigating the role of informal and wholesale markets in shaping up urbanity in the Indian city cores and co-mentored workshops on Urbanity of Chitpur Road, Kolkata with ENSAPLV, Paris which was both exhibited at Kolkata and Paris. He also co-mentored the documentation of the retrospective landscape of Hampi with the support of ENSAPLV and French Embassy. His investigations on the slums of Dharavi title ‘The tabooed city’ was published in the McGill University GLSA Research series 2021 under the theme: the city an object or subject of law?

An urban designer and architect, Pritam Dey pursued his post graduation from School of planning and Architecture, Delhi. During his academic tenure at SPA, he was the recipient of 2018 Design Innovation Center Fellowship for Habitat design allowing him to work on the social infrastructure for less catered communities in the Sub Himalayan Villages. In 2022 He mentored a series of exhibitions on the theme of Water, Mountains and Bodies at Ahmadabad.

He was the 2022-23 Urban Humanities Initiatives Fellow at UCLA and recipient of 2023 UCLA Center for India and South Asia fellowship for his summer research.

Carrie Gammell

Carrie Gammell is a doctoral candidate working at the intersection of architectural history, property law, and political economy. Her research focuses on claims, investments, and intermediary organizations in the United States, from the Homestead Act of 1862 to the Housing Act of 1934.

Carrie is also a Senior Research Associate at cityLAB UCLA, where she studies state appropriations for California community college student housing. In the past, she contributed to Education Workforce Housing in California: Developing the 21st Century Campus, a report and companion handbook that provides a comprehensive overview of the potential for land owned by school districts to be designed and developed for teachers and other employees.

Prior to joining AUD, Carrie worked as an architectural designer in Colombia and the United States, where she built a portfolio of affordable housing, multi-family residential, and single-family residential projects as well as civic and cultural renovations and additions. She holds a Bachelor of Architecture from Rice University and a Master in Design Studies (Critical Conservation) from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Anirudh Gurumoorthy

Anirudh Gurumoorthy is a PhD candidate at UCLA AUD. His dissertation, tentatively titled (Un)Certain Tropics and the Architecture of Certain Commodities, 1803-1926, focuses on the spatial and environmental histories of natural history/sciences in the long-nineteenth century as it related to the political economy of empire within South Asia. He is interested in the ways the materiality of commodity extraction and production contends with how, where, and why certain ‘tropical’ animals, vegetables, and minerals are attributed with a metropolitan sense of ‘value’. Moving from the United States to Britain (and back) through various parts of the Indian Ocean world as markets for singular forms of ice, rubber, and cattle form, peak, and collapse, the dissertation ultimately aims to reveal interconnected spatial settings of knowledge, control, regulation, display, and labor where knowledge systems, technical limits, human and nonhuman action/inaction, differentiated senses of environments and value continually contend with each other to uphold the fetishes of the world market. Gurumoorthy holds a B.Arch. from R.V. College of Architecture, Bangalore, and an M.Des in the History and Philosophy of Design and Media from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Chi-Chia Hou

Chi-Chia Hou is a doctoral candidate in his sixth year at UCLA AUD. His working dissertation, “New Frontier: Architecture and Service 1893-1960,” explores his interest in architecture and wealth, changing ideas of profit and management, and social scientific discourses for measuring work and worker, self and others, and values of landed property.

His research locates moments of theorizing methodologies to manage income-generating properties in schools of agriculture, home economics, and hotel studies. The schools taught their students theories, while instilling the imminence of faithful direction of oneself, of self-as-property. The pedagogies, existing beyond the purview of Architecture, were of immense architectural consideration.

Chi-Chia Hou took a break from school in the previous academic year to learn from his daughter and has now returned to school to learn from his brilliant cohorts.

Adam Lubitz

Adam Lubitz is an urban planner, heritage conservationist, and doctoral student. His research engages the intersection of critical heritage studies and migration studies, with an emphasis on how archival information can inform reparations. His community-based research has been most recently supported by the Columbia GSAPP Incubator Prize as well as the Ziman Center for Real Estate and Leve Center for Jewish Studies at UCLA.

Prior to joining AUD, Adam worked at World Monuments Fund within their Jewish Heritage Program, and taught GIS coursework at Barnard College. His master's thesis applied field research with experimental mapping techniques in the old town of a municipality in Palestine. Adam holds MS degrees in Historic Preservation and Urban Planning from Columbia University and a BA in Urban Studies from New College of Florida.

José Monge is a PhD candidate in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design. His dissertation, titled Maritime Labor, Candles, and the Architecture of the Enlightenment (1750-1872) , focuses on the role that whale-originated illuminants, specifically spermaceti candles and oil, played in the American Enlightenment as an intellectual project and the U.S. as a country. By unravelling the tension between binaries such as intellectual and manual labor–the consumers that bought these commodities and the producers that were not able to afford them–the project understands architecture as a history of activities that moved from sea to land and land to sea, challenging assumptions about the static “nature” of architecture.

Kurt Pelzer

Kurt Pelzer is a fourth-year PhD candidate at UCLA AUD. Their research explores the relational histories, material flows, and politics of land in and beyond California in the long nineteenth century during the United States parks, public lands, and conservation movements.

Their current scholarship traces the settler possession and exhibitionary display of a Giant Sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum) in the 1850s; an act that contested the ways Miwok peoples ancestral to California's Sierra Nevada knew and related to life and land. Their broader interests include histories of colonialism and capitalism in the Americas, environmental history, and Blackness and Indigeneity as a methodological analytic for political solidarities and possibilities.

Prior to arriving at UCLA, Pelzer worked at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in the Architecture and Design Curatorial Department participating in exhibitions, programming, and collections work. Pelzer completed a Master of Advanced Architectural Design in the History, Theory, and Experiments program from California College of the Arts in San Francisco, and earned their Bachelor's degree in Landscape Architecture from the College of Design at Iowa State University.

Shota Vashakmadze

Email Shota Vashakmadze

Shota Vashakmadze is a sixth-year PhD candidate at UCLA AUD. His dissertation traces the conjoined histories of architectural computing, environmental design, and professional practice in the late 20th century, adopting critical approaches to architecture’s technical substrates—the algorithms, softwares, and user protocols of computation—to examine their social and political dispositions. In his scholarship and pedagogy, he aims to situate forms of architectural labor within the profession’s ongoing acculturation to environmental crisis. Most recently, he has been leading the development of the interdisciplinary “Building Climates” cluster, a year-long course sequence at UCLA, and co-organizing an initiative dedicated to fostering discourse on climate change and architecture, including a two-day conference entitled “Architecture After a Green New Deal.”

His research has been supported by the Canadian Centre for Architecture and appeared in journals including Architectural Theory Review , The Avery Review, and Pidgin Magazine. He is currently completing a contribution to a collection on landscape representation and a chapter for an edited volume on architecture, labor, and political economy.

Shota holds an MArch from Princeton University and has a professional background in architecture, landscape, and software development. Before coming to UCLA, he researched methods for designing with point cloud data and wrote Bison, a software plugin for landscape modeling.

Alexa Vaughn

Alexa Vaughn (ASLA, FAAR) is a first year PhD student in Architecture + Urban Design and a Eugene V. Cota-Robles Fellow , from Long Beach, California. She is a Deaf landscape designer, accessibility specialist, consultant, and recent Fellow of the American Academy in Rome (2022-23). She is a visionary speaker, thought leader, prolific writer and researcher, and the author of “ DeafScape : Applying DeafSpace to Landscape,” which has been featured in numerous publications.

Her professional work is centered upon designing public landscapes with and for the Deaf and disabled communities, applying legal standards and Universal Design principles alongside lived experience and direct participation in the design process. She is an expert in designing landscapes for the Deaf community (DeafScape) and in facilitation of disabled community engagement. Prior to joining the A+UD program, Alexa worked for several landscape architecture firms over the course of six years, including OLIN and MIG, Inc.

Through a disability justice lens, her dissertation will seek to formally explore the historical exclusionary and inaccessible design of American urban landscapes and public spaces, as well as the response (activism, policy, and design) to this history through the present and speculative future. She will also actively take part in activist- and practice-based research with cityLAB and the Urban Humanities Institute .

Alexa holds both a BA in Landscape Architecture (with a minor in Conservation and Resource Studies) and a Master’s degree in Landscape Architecture (MLA) from the University of California, Berkeley, with specialization in accessible and inclusive design. Much of her work can be found at www.designwithdisabledpeoplenow.com and on Instagram: @DeafScape.

Yashada Wagle

Yashada Wagle is a third year PhD student in Critical Studies at UCLA AUD, and a recipient of the department's Moss Scholarship. Her research focuses on imperial environmental-legislative regimes in British colonial India in the late nineteenth century. She is interested in exploring questions around the histories of spaces of extraction and production as they network between the metropole and the colony, and their relationship with the conceptions of laboring bodies therein. Her master's thesis focused on the Indian Forest Act of 1865, and elucidated the conceptualization of the space of the ‘forest’ through the lenses of its literary, legislative, and biopolitical trajectories, highlighting how these have informed its contemporary lived materiality.

Wagle holds a Bachelor in Architecture (BArch) from the Savitribai Phule Pune University in India, and a Master in Design Studies (History and Philosophy of Design and Media) from the Harvard Graduate School of Design. She was previously a Research Fellow at the Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture and Environmental Studies (KRVIA) in Mumbai, India.

In her spare time, Wagle enjoys illustrating and writing poetry, some of which can be found here .

Dexter Walcott

Dexter Walcott is a registered architect currently in his fifth year with the Critical Studies of Architecture program at UCLA. His research focuses on the Latrobe family and early nineteenth century builders in the Mississippi and Ohio river valleys. He is interested in the role of the built environment in histories of labor, capitalism, steam-power, and industry.

Born and raised in Hong Kong, Joy is a fifth-year PhD student in architecture history. Her research explores geology as antiquity from early 19th – 20th century British colonial Hong Kong and China. She holds a B.A. in Comparative Literature with a focus in German from Middlebury College in 2017, and is a graduate of The New Normal program at Strelka Institute, Moscow in 2018. Previously, she has taught in the Department of Architecture at University of Hong Kong, as well as the Department of Design at Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

After working as a curatorial assistant at Tai Kwun Contemporary in 2019, she has continued the practice of art writing and translation, collaborating with many local Hong Kong artists as well as international curators such as Raimundas Malašauskas. In her spare time, she practices long-distance open water swimming. In 2022, she completed a 30km course at the South of Lantau Island, Hong Kong.

The MA and PhD programs welcome and accept applications from students with a diverse range of backgrounds. These programs are designed to help those interested in academic work in architecture develop those skills, so we strongly encourage that you become familiar with fundamental, celebrated works in the history and theory of architecture before entering the program.

Applicants to the academic graduate programs must hold a Bachelor’s degree, or the foreign equivalent. All new students must enter in the fall quarter. The program is full-time and does not accept part-time students.

Applications for the MA and PhD programs (Fall 2024 matriculation) will be available in Fall 2023, with application deadline of January 6, 2024; please revisit this page for updates. Accepted candidates who wish to enroll must file an online Statement of Intent to Register (SIR) by April 15, 2024.

How to Apply

Applying to the MA and PhD programs is an online process via the UCLA Application for Graduate Admission (AGA).

Completing the requirements will take some time, so we strongly recommend logging in to the AGA in advance to familiarize yourself with the site and downloading the documents and forms you will need to complete your application.

You can also download this checklist to make sure you have prepared and submitted all the relevant documents to complete your application.

Your Statement of Purpose is a critical part of your application to the MA and PhD programs. It is your opportunity to introduce yourself and tell us about your specific academic background, interests, achievements, and goals. Our selection committee use it to evaluate your aptitude for study, as well as consideration for merit-based financial support.

Your statement can be up to 1500 words in length. Below are some questions you might want to consider. You don’t need to answer every question; just focus on the elements that are most relevant to you.

• What is your purpose in applying to the MA or PhD program? Describe your area(s) of research interest, including any areas of concentration and specialization.
• What experiences have prepared you for this program? What relevant skills have you gained from these experiences? Have your experiences led to specific or tangible outcomes that would support your potential to contribute to this field (e.g. performances, publications, presentations, awards or recognitions)?
• What other information about your past experience might help the selection committee in evaluating your suitability for this program? E.g. research, employment, teaching, service, artistic or international experiences through which you have developed skills in leadership, communication, project management, teamwork, or other areas.
• Why is UCLA Architecture and Urban Design the best place for you to pursue your academic goals?
• What are your plans for your career after earning this degree?

Your Personal Statement is your opportunity to provide additional information to help the selection committee evaluate your aptitude for study. It will also be used to consider candidates for UCLA Graduate Division fellowships related to diversity. You can read more about the University of California Diversity Statement here .

Your statement can be up to 500 words in length. Below are some questions you might want to consider. You don’t need to answer every question; just focus on the elements that are most relevant to you.

• Are there educational, personal, cultural, economic, or social experiences, not described in your Statement of Purpose, that have shaped your academic journey? If so, how? Have any of these experiences provided unique perspective(s) that you would contribute to your program, field or profession?
• Describe challenge(s) or barriers that you have faced in your pursuit of higher education. What motivated you to persist, and how did you overcome them? What is the evidence of your persistence, progress or success?
• How have your life experiences and educational background informed your understanding of the barriers facing groups that are underrepresented in higher education?
• How have you been actively engaged (e.g., through participation, employment, service, teaching or other activities) in programs or activities focused on increasing participation by groups that have been historically underrepresented in higher education?
• How do you intend to engage in scholarly discourse, research, teaching, creative efforts, and/or community engagement during your graduate program that have the potential to advance diversity and equal opportunity in higher education?
• How do you see yourself contributing to diversity in your profession after you complete your academic degree at UCLA Architecture and Urban Design?

A Curriculum Vitae (résumé of your academic and professional experience) is recommended but not required.

Applicants must upload a scanned copy of the official transcripts from each college or university you have attended both in the U.S. and abroad. If you are accepted into the program you will be required to submit hard copies. These can either be sent directly from each institution or hand-delivered as long as they remain in the official, signed, sealed envelopes from your college or university. As a general rule, UCLA Graduate Division sets a minimum required overall grade-point average of 3.0 (B), or the foreign equivalent.

As of this Fall 2023 cycle, the GRE is NOT required as part of your application to UCLA AUD. No preference will be given to those who choose to submit GRE scores as part of their application.

However, if you do take the GRE exam and wish to include it as part of your application: More information on this standardized exam can be found at www.ets.org/gre . In addition to uploading your GRE scores, please direct ETS to send us your official score sheets. Our ETS codes for the GRE are below:

UCLA Architecture and Urban Design Institution Code: 4837 Department Code: 4401

We recommend you take the exam at least three weeks before the application deadline as it usually takes 2-3 weeks for ETS to send us the test scores.

If you have received a Bachelor’s degree in a country where the official language of instruction and primary spoken language of daily life is not English, you must submit either a Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or an International English Language Testing System (IELTS). Exempt countries include Australia, Barbados, Canada, Ireland, Jamaica, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. This is a requirement that is regardless of your visa or citizenship status in the United States.

To be considered for admission to the M.Arch. program, international students must score at least a 92 on the TOEFL or a 7 on the IELTS exam. Because processing, sending, and receiving TOEFL and IELTS scores can take several weeks, international students must schedule their exam no later than October 31 in order to meet UCLA deadlines. TOEFL scores must be sent to us directly and uploaded as part of the online submission. Our ETS codes for the TOEFL are below:

UCLA Architecture and Urban Design Institution Code: 4837 Department Code: 12

If your score is less than 100 on the TOEFL or 7.5 on the IELTS, you are also required to take the English as a Second Language Placement Examination (ESLPE) on arrival at UCLA. The results of this test will determine any English as a Second Language (ESL) courses you need to take in your first term of residence. These courses cannot be applied towards your minimum course requirements. As such, you should expect to have a higher course load than students not required to take ESL courses.

If you have earned a degree or completed two years of full-time college-level coursework in the following countries, your TOEFL / IELTS and ESLPE requirements will be waived: U.S., U.K., Canada (other than Quebec), Australia, and New Zealand. Please provide official transcripts to demonstrate course completion. Unfortunately, we cannot accept any other documentation to demonstrate language proficiency.

Three (3) letters of recommendation are required. These letters should be from individuals who are familiar with your academic and professional experiences and can evaluate your capacity to successfully undertake graduate studies at UCLA. If you do not have an architecture background please note that we are looking for letters that evaluate your potential as a graduate student, not necessarily your architecture experience.

Letters of recommendation must be sent electronically directly to UCLA by the recommender. When logged in, you can enter the name and email address of each of your recommenders. They will be contacted by email with a request to submit a letter on your behalf. You can track which letters have and have not been received. You can also send reminders to your recommenders to send their letters.

Writing samples should illustrate an applicant’s capacities for research, analytical writing and scholarly citation. Texts may include seminar papers, theses, and/or professional writing.

Please complete and submit the Department Supplement Form to confirm your intention to apply to the MA or PhD program.