DegreeVenue Advance Your Career Today.

Anthropology brings global, comparative, and holistic views to the study of the human condition, exploring an enormous range of similarities and differences across time and space. It includes the study of how Homo sapiens evolved as well as the study of how language, culture, and society have shaped and continue to shape human experience. At Harvard, the Anthropology Department is divided into three wings, each concerned with one of the main branches of anthropology: Archaeology, Biological Anthropology, and Social Anthropology.

Biological Anthropology is a track within the Anthropology concentration that examines human biology, growth and development, and long-term physical evolution as revealed by the fossil record. It also studies the behavior of non-human primates, and modern humans and human behavioral evolution. The concentration differs from Human Evolutionary Biology in being more closely linked to the social sciences, and includes courses in the human fossil record, human anatomy and physiology, human and non-human primate behavior and ecology, as well as archaeology and social anthropology.

The structure of the concentration provides students with an introduction to anthropology as a whole, and a broad and solid knowledge of biological anthropology, including classes in evolution, genetics, and behavioral ecology. During the spring of the sophomore year, concentrators participate in a tutorial that explores the major sub-fields of the discipline. In the junior year, students participate in a research-intensive tutorial. Additional field and laboratory research is encouraged, although not necessarily required.