Mode of Attendance: Full-time or Part-time
Food is a fundamental human necessity, essential to the sustenance of the human body. At the same time, food may be associated with pleasure, passion, even luxury. Food is also essential to the social body. Who eats what, who eats with whom, and whose appetites are satisfied and whose denied, are all profoundly social dynamics through which identities, relationships, and hierarchies are created and reproduced.
The SOAS MA programme in the Anthropology of Food offers students the opportunity to explore historically and culturally variable foodways, from foraging to industrial agriculture, from Europe and North America to Africa, Asia and South America. The programme asks students to trace the passage of food from plant to palate, and to examine who benefits, and who suffers, from contemporary modes of food production, exchange, preparation, and consumption. Students examine food policy at national and international levels, as well as the role played in its formation by the food industry.
Focus is given to the study of famine and the controversial role of food aid in securing food supplies. Debates over the impact of agricultural biotechnology on agrarian livelihoods and knowledge systems, as well as on the natural environment, are assessed. Movements toward organic agriculture, fair trade, and slow food are also analysed.
An anthropological approach to the study of food draws upon and challenges the perspectives of other disciplines, whether agronomy or nutritional science, economics or law, history or literature. Dependent upon individual interests and experiences, graduates of the programme may pursue research degrees in any number of academic disciplines, or find employment in food-related government ministries, international organizations, development agencies, or non-governmental associations, as well as in the fields of public health, education, and media, or in the catering industry.
Learn about the modules (courses) for this programme
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Course teachers Johan Pottier, Harry G. West, and Jakob Klein were awarded the 2009 Excellence in Instruction Award by the Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society. West was named joint runner-up for the SOAS Director’s Teaching Prize in 2011-2012. The SOAS MA in the Anthropology of Food was named a Finalist in the Best Food Initiative category in the BBC Food & Farming Awards in 2015.
Scholarships
Applicants for the MA Anthropology of Food may be eligible to apply for Scholarships and Bursaries.
Degree programmes at SOAS - including this one - can include language courses in more than forty African and Asian languages. It is SOAS students’ command of an African or Asian language which sets SOAS apart from other universities.
Programme Overview
The programme consists of 180 credits in total: 120 credits of modules and a dissertation of 10,000 words at 60 credits.
All students are expected to take the core and compulsory modules listed below, except for students with a previous Anthropology degree, who are not required to take the Theoretical Approaches to Social Anthropology module but may wish to select this as part of their 120 credits from the options lists.
All students must audit the compulsory module, Ethnographic Research Methods during term 1. This will not count towards the 180 credits. Students will be expected to attend only lectures and do not attend seminars or submit any assessments. Students may choose to take this module (worth 15 credits) as part of their 120 credits from the option lists.
Students with a previous Anthropology degree will be required to take 30 credits from the Anthropology and Sociology options list.
The remaining credits can be selected from the Department of Anthropology and Sociology or relevant options from other departments or a language module. See below for a detailed programme structure.
Language Entitlement Programme:
Many students choose to pursue a language through the SOAS Language Entitlement Programme (LEP). Languages normally available include Arabic, Chinese, French, Hebrew, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swahili, Turkish and Urdu. Others may also be offered.
Programme Detail
COMPULSORY MODULES
Students without a previous Anthropology degree are required to take all the compulsory modules, totalled at 90 credits. Students with a previous Anthropology degree are not required to take the Theoretical Approaches to Social Anthropology module, totalled at 60 credits. All students are required to audit the Ethnographic Research Methods module. This will not count towards your 180 credits.
CORE MODULE
All students must take the core module worth 30 credits.
OPTIONAL MODULES
Students without a previous Anthropology degree: the remaining 60 credits can be selected from Anthropology and Sociology or other departments or a language module. Students with a previous Anthropology degree: 30 credits of your programme must be selected from the Anthropology and Sociology list; the remaining 60 credits can be selected from Anthropology and Sociology or other departments or a language module.
Anthropology and Sociology
OTHER DEPARTMENTS
Centre for Gender Studies
Development Studies
Religions and Philosophies
LANGUAGE MODULES
For a list of language modules, please go to the Faculty of Languages and Cultures webpages - https://www.soas.ac.uk/languagecultures/courses/ - and view the options under the postgraduate modules section for each department.
This is the structure for 2018/19 applicants
If you are a current student you can find structure information on Moodle or through your Department.
Programme Specification
Disclaimer
Teaching & Learning
Contact Hours
All Masters programmes consist of 180 credits, made up of taught modules of 30 or 15 credits, taught over 10 or 20 weeks, and a dissertation of 60 credits. The programme structure shows which modules are compulsory and which optional.
As a rough guide, 1 credit equals approximately 10 hours of work. Most of this will be independent study, including reading and research, preparing coursework, revising for examinations and so on. It will also include class time, which may include lectures, seminars and other classes. Some subjects, such as learning a language, have more class time than others. At SOAS, most postgraduate modules have a one hour lecture and a one hour seminar every week, but this does vary.
More information is on the page for each module.
Tuition Fees
Full details of postgraduate tuition fees can be found on the Registry's Postgraduate Tuition Fees page.
This is a Band 1 tuition fee.
Fees for 2018/19 entrants. The fees below are per academic year. Please note that fees go up each year.
| Full-time |
Part-time 2 Years |
Part-time 3 Years |
UK/EU
Students |
Overseas
Students |
UK/EU
Students |
Overseas
Students |
UK/EU
Students |
Overseas
Students |
| £9,225 |
£18,980 |
£4,613 |
£9,490 |
£3,075 |
£6,327 |
Scholarships
Application Deadline: 2018-01-29 00:00
Application Deadline: 2018-01-29 00:00
Application Deadline: 2018-02-20 17:00
Application Deadline: 2018-02-20 17:00
Application Deadline: 2018-02-20 17:00
Application Deadline: 2018-06-05 00:00
For further details and information on external scholarships visit the Scholarships section
Please see our Alumni Profiles.
For more information about Graduate Destinations from this department, please visit the Careers Service website.
A Student's Perspective
When I first came here I was very surprised on how kind, polite and caring everyone was. From the staff to the students, everyone was very welcoming and enthusiastic. Coming from a corporate world and living in a big city like London, SOAS has been like an oasis in the desert; a very colourful, blissful environment which makes you feel at home.
Nafsika Papacharalampous
