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fundamental moral questions which life poses
for us. We seek to give students practice in
thinking for themselves and good company in
which to do so. Our small class size and student
to faculty ratio guarantee one-on-one attention,
mentoring and guidance to all majors
and minors. We know our students well. The
anthropology and history programs at Butler
do not seek to train students for any particular
profession but seek instead to equip our
students with the skills to become who they
wish to be. Because students come to our programs
with widely varying interests and goals,
we offer them no uniform regimen of study or
of practical experience. Each student, grounded
in several fundamental courses of method and
theory, builds a suitable course of study geared
to their specific interests. The department offers
more advanced students various opportunities
for student research often culminating in
honors theses. We seek to deepen book learning
with various kinds of hands-on experience, and
our courses, when appropriate, regularly incorporate
experiential components. Anthropology
students helped Exodus International settle
Burmese refugees in Indianapolis and turn
what they shared into ethnographies for class.
Students in a course on working class history
shadowed the Butler grounds crew, cleaners
and cafeteria workers. The department also
offers practical experience to test the waters for
later life. During the past few years students in
the department have undertaken internships in
circumstances as varied as the Indiana State
House, the Indiana State Archives, the US
Attorney General’s Office, the Center for American
Progress, archeological fieldsites in Kenya, the
Legal Aid Society of Indianapolis, the Kinsey
Institute, a Tibetan refugee camp in India,
Father and Families Inc. of Indianapolis, the
Monroe County Historical Society, a women’s
domestic violence organization in Buenos Aires,
Earth House in Indianapolis, and humanitarian
organizations in Palestine. The graduates of our
programs quickly scatter in all directions. Many
first give their energies to help other people
through programs like Teach For America and
the Peace Corps. Many seek graduate study,
law school, and medical school; others enter
government, the military, or civil service, and
still other various forms of business. We also
number amongst our graduates a fireman, a
missionary, a carpenter, and research chemists,
each of whom is happy to explain how studying
history
Butler University
and anthropology helped get them where they
wished to go. Indianapolis offers much that
we use in teaching and learning: Indiana’s seat
of government and hard hit neighborhoods, a
Rembrandt self-portrait, Chinese scroll paintings
and immigrant communities fresh off the
boat, museums and archives, sports teams and
political rallies, music, theater, homeless people,
domestic violence shelters, ethnic and religious
communities of every description. Our courses
draw on them all.
Anthropology Program Student
Learning Objectives
The anthropology program seeks to teach
students to think for themselves independently
and critically; appreciate human and cultural
differences and master the basic tools necessary
for understanding those differences; employ the
ethnographic method; appreciate academic and
civil discourse; ready themselves for responsible
citizenship; more specifically we seek to teach
students the characteristic methods of anthropology
and the basic range of anthropological
theories, to analyze evidence and develop
arguments, conduct anthropological research
alone and with other people, incorporate the
views of other people into their projects, look
at problems from a variety of perspectives, share
their ideas and research in proper form.
History Program Student Learning
Objectives
The history program seeks to teach students
to think for themselves independently and
critically; master the history of one part of the
world; apply the past to understand the present;
appreciate those who are different from themselves;
appreciate academic and civil discourse;
ready themselves for responsible citizenship;
more specifically we seek to teach students the
characteristic methods of history and the basic
range of historical theories, to analyze evidence
and develop arguments, conduct historical
research, incorporate the views of other people
into their projects, look at problems from a
variety of perspectives, share their ideas and
research in proper form.
Degrees
• Major in Anthropology
• Minor in Anthropology
• Minor in Geography
• Major in History