Get sought-after essential and transferable skills in an Honors program.

Especially if you’re considering grad school at all.

This is five-part series profiling the Faculty of Arts Honors students who are presenting at the inaugural Arts Honors Mini-Conference on November 17, 2020.

Tell us about yourself.

My name is Nial Gorman, I’m in my 5th year in the Anthropology Honors program, specializing in sociocultural anthropology.

How did you come to be in the Honors program?

I didn’t initially intend to go into the honors program, but after my third year when I started setting my sights on grad school I decided the extra experience in independent research would be useful.

What has your Honors experience been like?

My experience in the honors program has been very helpful as I’ve had a good opportunity to learn essential skills that are necessary for any aspiring academic. It has also given me the opportunity to pursue my own personal interests which I have not been able to do in my other courses very often throughout my degree.

What will you be presenting on at the Honors mini-conference?

I will be presenting my ethnographic study of a group of radical Marxist activists, it is a participant-observation based study with formal interviews also having been conducted. The analysis of the data was an interdisciplinary approach utilizing philosophy as a better to understand the worldview of the research subjects.

How did you find this topic or area of interest to focus on?

I chose to study this topic almost two years ago as I had been growing increasingly interested in the trend of political polarization that has been going throughout most of North America.

What would you tell someone that is considering applying to Honors?

I would encourage anyone considering applying to honors to reach out to an advisor to find out more, and I would advise applying regardless as it is a useful way to have a smaller scale introduction to the independent work one will have to perform in further university studies.

Learn more about the Honors program and all the undergraduate degree programs that the Faculty of Arts has to offer by:

• Visiting the Degree programs page on the Arts website,
• Watching our Program Overview Videos on the Faculty of Arts YouTube channel, and
• Discussing your options with an undergraduate advisor — email arts.undergrad@ualberta.ca or book a one-on-one advising appointment by clicking here