What kind of research makes a great anthropology project?

Question

for University work

Answer 1

Do a study of a sub-culture of American socieity, such as "gamers" involved in Dungeons and Dragons or another role-playing game.  These die-hard gamers have stereotypes attributed to them.  If you study this sub-culture you will find they have rituals and taboos surrounding their dice, etc.

Answer 2

Ethnographic field work comprised of first-hand observation and data gathering.

Answer 3

How about Star Trek conventions or Renaissance Faires?

Anthropology doesn't have to always be about ancient or primitive peoples.

Answer 4

Studying the documented fossil evidence available, in order to advance evolutionary biological theories, and human migration patterns, which can be supported by factual DNA and cultural data...

Answer 5

Did you have a particular field of Anthropology in mind?

Whatever research you do, it needs to be something you are ultimately interested in. Lack of interest leads to bad research, bad results and bad final reports. But as someone above said, it doesn't necessarily need to be ancient or prehistoric. For an ethnography project I studied non-traditional students at my almost completely traditional university. Prof loved it because she didn't even know we were there and no one had ever done it. Would I spend my life studying that? No. But it worked for a semester long project, and it was local and meant something to me.

Answer 6

Food or Funerals.

Each of those topics are unique to a culture, regardless of how you define a culture, large focus, such nationality, or a smaller focus such as religious sect.

Food plays a part in every "lifemark" humans use to mark significant events... birth, marriage, death, birthdays, anniversaries, and so on.

Funeral customs are as diverse as all cultures are.

For information on funeral customs, contact a local mortuary where you live. In the U.S. and U.K., funeral directors have guidelines for dealing with the numerous different cultures and their traditions.. it is fascinating.

For information of culinary history, contact me personally by e-mail and I can give you a reading list and web sites for further study. I am a culinary historian.