Mar 15, 2026  
USC Catalogue 2025-2026 
    
USC Catalogue 2025-2026

Archaeology and Heritage Studies Minor


The minor in Archaeology and Heritage Studies broadens the experience of students preparing for a wide range of professional careers and graduate study. This five-course minor is structured around four required courses: a foundation course, ANTH 202g Archaeology: Our Human Past ; a heritage ethics course to support principled, considered decision-making; an experiential applied methods course; and a capstone course in which students encounter the exciting diversity of heritage applications from folklore and historic preservation, to archaeological discovery and emerging fields such as traces of human habitation in space.

Discovery and investigations of heritage occur in diverse ways, sometimes with trowel in hand, with remote sensing from satellites or drones, through virtual means, by listening to stories and folklore, through laboratory analysis and artifact material studies, or through policy, planning, advocacy, and preservation investments.

Through archaeology and heritage studies we deepen our understanding of peoples and societies worldwide across space and time, equipping us for debates in the past and present about the shape of our shared human future. 

 The minor in Archaeology and Heritage Studies is available to students in all schools and departments. 

Lower-Division Requirement (4 units)


Required Course (4 units)


Upper-Division Requirement (16 units)


  • Select one course from the Theories and Methods list of the Archaeology and Heritage Studies Major (4 units).
  • Select any one upper-division course from those listed under Archaeology and Heritage Studies Major (4 units).
  • Take one course from the Ethics and Heritage list of the Archaeology and Heritage Studies Major (4 units).
  • Take Capstone Course (4 units):

 

Total Requirement: Five courses (20 units)