Sociocultural anthropology at UNLV is characterized by a diversity of theoretical and methodological perspectives, both in research opportunities and in undergraduate and graduate courses offered. Some of our faculty and graduate students focus on biocultural approaches to nutrition and health (particularly childhood development, global health disparities, and complementary and alternative medicine); others adopt sociocultural approaches for the study of gender, romance, marriage, migration, identity, colonialism, and the history of science and anthropology. The Department of Anthropology at UNLV emphasizes both cross-cultural comparative research, as well as in-depth ethnographic research within a single community. Sociocultural faculty employ -- and train students in -- both quantitative and qualitative methods and analyses.

Labs

Faculty

Sociocultural Anthropology faculty at UNLV includes Nicholas Barron, Daniel C. Benyshek, Alyssa Crittenden, Liam Frink, William Jankowiak, and Iván Sandoval-Cervantes

Research and Teaching

The sociocultural faculty are committed to integrating methodological and theoretical approaches to simultaneously explore the diversity and universality of human cultures. Our course offerings include an array of undergraduate and graduate courses in cultural anthropology, including those concerned with culture and culture change, food systems, social stratification, sex and gender, romance, marriage and kinship, religion and magic, and health and illness. Our course offerings reflect our wide-ranging research interests which investigate the history of anthropological theory and practice, romance and love, migration, indigeneity, gender, multi-species ethnography, and complementary, alternative, and integrative medicine.

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Fieldwork

Sociocultural Anthropology faculty and graduate students conduct ethnographically grounded and experimental research in the US, Mexico, China (Inner Mongolia), and Tanzania. The Department fosters interdisciplinary research and has an active connection with Midwives Alliance of North America (MANA), the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine at UNLV, and with the Department of Interdisciplinary, Gender, and Ethnic Studies.