Research

     Opportunities for independent research are built into many of the courses in the Anthropology curriculum, and several courses are designed to develop specific research skills. For example, The Ethnographer's Craft (Anth 245) provides students with practical and methodological preparation for field research in cultural anthropology, and Archaeological Field Methods (Anth 231) provides students with experience excavating at local sites. The most recent site to be excavated by students in Archaeological Field Methods is Springside, the original home of Mathew Vassar. Opportunities for laboratory research, which is also critical to anthropological inquiry, are available in our archaeology, biological anthropology, sound analysis and digital media labs.
 
The Department also offers research opportunities with on-going faculty research projects, as research assistants and as URSI (Undergraduate Research Summer Institute) and Ford Scholars.
 
The Undergraduate Research Summer Institute (URSI) supports collaborative student-faculty research for ten weeks during the summer. URSI students working with Professor L. Lewis Johnson have worked at archaeological sites in Alaska and URSI students working Professor Anne Pike-Tay have worked analyzing materials from Paleolithic sites in France, Spain, and New Zealand.
 
The Ford Scholars Program at Vassar provides special opportunities for students in the humanities and social sciences to engage in collaborative scholarship with faculty. Ford Scholars working with Professor Colleen Ballerino Cohen have done ethnographic research in the Eastern Caribbean, and have worked production and post-production on ethnographic video; Ford Scholars working with Professor Tom Porcello have set up a digital audio lab and developed exercises for the lab; Ford scholars working with Professor Martha Kaplan and Professor Yu Zhou (Geography) helped to design two new courses "Imagining Asia" and "Asian Diasporas".
 
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     The field experience is essential to the discipline of anthropology. Therefore, majors are urged to take at least one fieldwork course, to engage in field research during the summer and/or to undertake independent field research under a study away program. Students considering the possibility of doing fieldwork should be aware that several options are available to suit individual needs. It may help to know what alternatives exist. Fieldwork opportunities vary greatly in terms of location, duration and amount of supervision.
 
Fieldwork through the Fieldwork Course Option
     The Fieldwork Office maintains a list of placements which provide opportunities for observation and participation which are not ordinarily available in classwork. Every fieldwork student is supervised by a faculty member who evaluates the intellectual merit of the proposed fieldwork, determines the amount of credit to be given, and decides upon the academic requirements for the awarding of credit. Fieldwork may be done during the academic year or in the summer.
 
Summer and Independent Fieldwork Opportunities
     The Fieldwork Office keeps a listing of placements for fieldwork during the summer. If one of these is relevant to Anthropology, students may work under the supervision of a member of the department and receive anthropology credit. Credit may also be received for internships or fieldwork placements that students arrange elsewhere, and that have been approved in advance by the Department and the Fieldwork Office.
 
A number of anthropology summer fieldwork programs exist under varying institutional sponsorships. Some examples are The Ethnographic Field School of New Mexico, The Archaeological Program of the University of Jerusalem, The College of William and Mary Summer Field School in Historical Archaeology on St. Eustabius, Caribbean. Field schools and field placements for six months are also available through programs such as Semester in Athens, The Experiment in International Living, and World College. The American Anthropological Association and the Archaeological Institute of America maintain listings of numerous fieldwork programs.
 
Finally, anthropology majors may propose to do independent field research under the auspices of and with support from the Catherine Montgomery and Julia F. Gehan Fieldwork Funds. These funds require formal research proposals.
 
Study Away Opportunities
     Vassar's Junior Year Abroad (JYA) Program offers numerous opportunities for students to combine course work with home stays and independent field projects. Historically, many anthropology students take advantage of various School for International Training (SIT) programs because of their well-organized and extensive fieldwork components. Vassar's Study Away Office keeps an extensive list of JYA programs similarly suited to undergraduate work in Anthropology. Anthropology majors have studied in Ghana, Madagascar, Nepal, India, South Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Germany, France, Russia, Jamaica, on projects including performance and dance, folklore, language revitalization, social movements, ethnic relations, tourism, primate studies, museumology, and gender studies. Anthropology majors returning from JYA often use the experience as the basis for their Senior Seminar paper or Senior thesis.
 
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