About 80 percent of the approximately 7,000 anthropologists in the United States are employed in colleges and universities. They teach undergraduate students the four branches of anthropology. Others head projects funded by foundations, grant agencies, nonprofit associations and the private sector. The federal government employs anthropologists in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Smithsonian Institution, the National Park Service, the National Institutes of Health and the Public Health Service. The U.S. Department of State, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency also employ anthropologists.
Some physical anthropologists work in medical schools.
Others work in community and regional development and planning, and a few work in forensics labs helping to solve crimes. The Sociology and Anthropology Department offers a course on Urban Sociology in London and a course on Native Americans taught in New Mexico and Arizona. Many of our students also take a Philadelphia semester and some take advantage of opportunities for a semester abroad. In the past year, we have had students study in Belize, Brazil, and several places in Europe.