<p>I know that the quality of a department at any college can be very subjective, but, in general, what are the “best” departments at Brown? Which departments at Brown are not particularly great? Are there any departments that Brown is really KNOWN for being great in?</p>
<p>Neuroscience</p>
<p>some of the strongest:</p>
<p>neuroscience
applied math
computer science</p>
<p>international relations
commerce, organizations, and entrepreneurship</p>
<p>philosophy
classics
archeology and the ancient world (including egyptology)
comparitive literature</p>
<p>visual art
ethnomusicology & electronic music</p>
<p>definitely, int'l relations</p>
<p>i really like the art department. the professors are great and we have risd.</p>
<p>math history....yes, it does exist.</p>
<p>It's got a hardcore history department and yes, international relations is big. Government/poli-sci is strong too, or so I hear.</p>
<p>seems like a lot of biased answers aside from dcircle's, no offense to anyone</p>
<p>neuroscience was mentioned twice
interesting</p>
<p>Art was mentioned twice as was IR.</p>
<p>History was top 4 in the 80s, but has dropped a lot lately. According to that department, it's mostly because of increased teaching pressures lowering the number of publications they can put out. Many of the same professors are still there + some amazing, bright young additions.</p>
<p>And I'm a chem student...</p>
<p>FWIW, Applied Math is also excellent, as is CS and COE, from the more science perspective.</p>
<p>biased answers? </p>
<p>if you mean someone in the department saying it's good is a biased answer, who better to judge a department's quality than one directly involved with it?</p>
<p>that's a real answer</p>
<p>i think what you are looking for is a ranking, a college guide book answer. and tuh to those.</p>
<p>i'm not looking for a ranking
i'm looking for departments that Brown is known to be especially good at, not simply which departments you are involved with or departments that you personally think are really good, because I think being in a particular department instills a bias in a student that makes them more likely to say that that department is one of the best
i'm just looking for someone to tell me departments that Brown is known to be really good in, by both Brown students and students from other colleges. I don't mean to offend anyone by any means, but I do think that some of the responses I got were solely based on personal judgment, and I would like responses that take into account how Brown's departments are viewed on a national scale. Not rankings.
Maybe there really is no straightforward answer to this question, but I think some people have mentioned departments multiple times and perhaps those departments are the ones I am really looking for when I ask about the best departments at Brown.</p>
<p>Lets put it this way.....by asking current brown students what is the "best" department, they will pick what they are majoring in, or else they wouldnt major in it. (this is true lik 99% of the time...there are always exceptions)</p>
<p>I wouldn't say Chemistry is one of the best departments though that's what I'm studying, and for what it's worth Tony, I think that pretty much everything mentioned in this thread is a dept. considered to be strong.</p>