College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences

Teaching and learning

We offer one of the broadest ranges of academic choice in the UK, attracting students at undergraduate and postgraduate level from over 160 countries. Twenty of our subjects were ranked within the top 10 of the UK’s Complete University Guide 2022.

From the Access, International Foundation and English Language programmes available in the Centre for Open Learning, to the innovative research, industry and public engagement work in the Edinburgh Futures Institute and Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, our College is diverse, inclusive and accessible to all.

Our undergraduate portfolio includes around 300 individual and joint programmes, with over 1,800 course choices across a diverse range of subjects. We also host the biggest ERASMUS programme in the UK and the largest Study Abroad programme in the UK, with around 1700 students per year. 

Our dynamic, multidisciplinary postgraduate taught portfolio includes over 1,300 course choice options and a variety of exciting Executive Education and professional development opportunities.

With a diverse, supportive and creative community of world-leading academic researchers that work across subject boundaries, our postgraduate research students are in the best place to thrive.

Our distinctive curriculum goes beyond classroom-based learning, harnessing our research-led, disciplinary excellence. We prioritise student experience and wellbeing to ensure our students flourish during their learning journeys. All students, graduates and alumni are empowered to make a difference in whatever they do, wherever they do it.

Twenty of our subjects were ranked within the top 10 of the UK’s Complete University Guide 2022:

  • Nursing 1st in the UK
  • Education 2nd in the UK
  • Theology & Religious Studies 4th in the UK
  • Asian Studies 4th in the UK
  • Social Policy 5th in the UK
  • Music 5th in the UK
  • Linguistics 5th in the UK
  • Archaeology 7th in in the UK
  • Iberian Languages, 8th  in the UK
  • Classics 8th in the UK
  • History 9th in the UK
  • Russian & East European Languages 10th in the UK