Economic/ Archaeology

Economics and archaeology are disciplines that might seem to inhabit different worlds, but they are connected by a shared interest in how human beings organise their material lives. Economics asks how scarce resources are allocated, how markets function, and how the interactions between producers and consumers produce the patterns of wealth and distribution we observe in contemporary societies. Archaeology examines similar questions for the deep past, using the material evidence left by earlier societies to reconstruct how people produced, exchanged, consumed, and valued the objects and resources available to them.

Studying the two together creates an unusual breadth of perspective on the economic dimensions of human society across both historical time and the present.

At the University of Glasgow, this four-year, full-time degree allows you to develop rigorous training in both disciplines. In economics, you will study microeconomic theory, macroeconomics, quantitative methods, and a range of applied and specialist topics. In archaeology, you will engage with the material culture and landscapes of past societies, developing skills in site analysis, artefact interpretation, and the theoretical frameworks that archaeologists use to reconstruct social and economic life.

A year abroad is embedded in the programme, giving you the opportunity to study in a different academic and cultural environment. The typical entry tariff of 232 points reflects the high academic expectations of a challenging interdisciplinary programme at a leading research university.

Graduates of this combination bring a distinctive profile to the job market. The economic rigour and quantitative skills are valued in finance, consultancy, the civil service, and policy roles, while the archaeological dimension opens doors in heritage, museums, cultural resource management, and research. Academic careers in either economics or archaeology require postgraduate study, and this combination provides a genuinely unusual and intellectually rich foundation for doctoral research.

Many graduates also find that the ability to think about human behaviour across very different contexts is a competitive advantage in a range of professional fields.