Anthropology concerns the unity and diversity of humans and their primate relatives as well as human culture and society from a comparative and global perspective. For more than 150 years, University of Toronto faculty have taught aspects of Anthropology and its Department of Anthropology, formally established in 1936, has included many of the most prominent figures in Canadian Anthropology. The department awarded its first MA degree in 1949, and its first PhD in 1956.
The University of Toronto has three campuses — the University of Toronto St. George (UTSG) in downtown Toronto, the University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM) to the west, and the University of Toronto Scarborough (UTSC) to the east — and Anthropology faculty and programs are present on all three. The campuses offer separate undergraduate programs but the University of Toronto’s Graduate Department of Anthropology is spread over all three, while Anthropologists across the campuses are linked through common research interests and tri-campus committees, colloquia and other events. Anthropology faculty are also active in several interdisciplinary programs, centres and institutes, including the Archaeology Centre, the Centre for Indigenous Studies, the Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies, the School of the Environment, the Material Culture and Semiotics program, and others. Some faculty also have strong links to the Jackman Humanities Institute, the Faculty of Medicine, the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, or the Royal Ontario Museum.
Members of the department conduct research on present and past human societies, cultural knowledge and practice, evolutionary antecedents, and non-human primate species. We offer graduate training in socio-cultural, medical, evolutionary/biological, linguistic, and archaeological branches of the field. Anthropology students at the University of Toronto can study human biology and evolution; human behaviour from its first appearance in the archaeological record to the historical and modern periods; language and society; anthropology of health; and the diversity of human culture in today’s world. Anthropology faculty and graduate students have broad Canadian and international research coverage and exhibit considerable diversity in methods and theoretical frameworks. You can find some indications of this research diversity by clicking on the “Research” tab above.
Further Links:
Covid-19 Information and Resources
Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in the Department of Anthropology
Permanent Exhibit – Uncovering Our Early Past: First Nations in Toronto