Our world is experiencing humanitarian and environmental challenges of disturbing dimensions. This new programme addresses these challenges from a human and ethical angle, exploring the social, political, economic and technological aspects of the crises that mark our contemporary world.
This unique programme of study focuses on contemporary planetary emergencies and conflicts that have a humanitarian or environmental impact. It will explore how to study such crises from an anthropological point of view using a variety of ethnographic research methods, such as interviewing, participant observation and localised surveys.
The programme provides the opportunity to analyse such pressing issues as migration and the refugee crisis, racism, xenophobia and populist politics, and the global climate emergency from an ethical and non-ethnocentric perspective. It is particularly suited to students who want to make a difference in today’s complex world by understanding the roots of global challenges and human suffering.
Taught in the School of Anthropology and Conservation, the first School at Kent to declare a climate and environmental emergency, this MA provides excellent preparation for people who aspire to enter fields in which anthropological training and cultural expertise is integral, such as non-governmental organisations aimed at humanitarian and/or environmental issues or state initiatives designed to provide aid as a response to conflict or planetary emergency.
Professor of Social Anthropology, João de Pina-Cabral, welcomes the new programme: “Here at Kent, we have had for a long time a sustained interest in environmental issues and a research focus on situations of conflict and economic oppression. The MA in Humanitarian and Environmental Crises responds to our sincere feeling that anthropology can contribute, in a hands-on manner, to some of the more poignant and provocative questions of our day.”
Full details on the programme, including eligibility criteria and how to apply, can be found here.