In the United States and Europe the recognition of the need to integrate archaeology with the natural and social sciences has resulted in the creation of interdisciplinary programs in archaeology at the graduate level. These include the Archaeology Graduate Program at the University of California at Los Angeles, the M.A. Program in Archaeological Studies at Yale University, the Graduate Program in Archaeological Sciences and Prehistory at the University of Sheffield, and the Graduate Program in Archaeological Sciences at the University of Bradford. Some, such as the University of Pennsylvania Graduate Group and the Archaeology Program at Belgium’s Leuven University, are specifically specialized in the Settlement Archaeology of the Near East and the Mediterranean regions.

Unfortunately, settlement and environmental archaeology, as a recently developed modern interdisciplinary domain, remain undeveloped in Turkey. There are no settlement archaeology programs in Turkey, or, indeed, interdisciplinary archaeology programs at all. This is especially regrettable given the fact that, as noted above, Turkey is the site of what are arguably the most significant archaeological remains of early agricultural settlements and early civilizations in the world. There is an urgent need for Turkish archaeologists who are comfortable with and competent in interdisciplinary archaeological approaches. Graduates of the interdisciplinary master’s program may expect to find employment at the numerous domestic and international archaeological projects in Turkey, including the rapidly growing area of salvage archaeology, or at the growing number of museums. Graduates will also, naturally, be capable of pursuing further graduate studies leading to the Ph.D. in archaeology or related fields, either in Turkey or at foreign universities.