Welcome to the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences! This Department is one of the constitutive units of the Indian Institute of Technology Madras at Chennai. We are proud of our inter and intra disciplinary diversity. As an academic unit, we come from a diverse range of disciplinary training. We work on wide range of courses in our teaching. We supervise scholars and engage with colleagues from equally wide or wider range of disciplines. We work and focus on scientific temper in our work. We feel enriched to have a group of young and motivated students who believe that their understanding must help them build their capacity. We work on building scholastic achievements, developing cognitive flexibility, and practicing social tolerance.

The Department offers 2-year M.A. programs in Development Studies, Economics, and English Studies besides a robust PhD program and a huge basket of elective courses drawn from various domains of humanities and social sciences. Our elective courses are open to students from all Department of the Institute. These courses are open to our MA students as well. Our students have options to credit open electives courses from other Departments too.