Call for Contributions on Teaching Anthropology in China
It has long been suggested that sociocultural anthropology needs to adapt its research methodologies (e.g., Marcus 1998) and adjust its analytical concepts to the current sociopolitical conditions of an altered global situation (e.g., Collier and Ong 2005, Pink and Salazar 2017). Teaching is one of the critical areas where anthropology reproduces itself and where any changes in the discipline should register. We contend, however, that educational practices have not received the scholarly attention they deserve. Despite the fact that most university positions require a considerable amount of teaching, we are evaluated primarily through our publication record, and our teaching achievements become secondary. In teaching, anthropology shifts from a disciplinary practice to the substantive content of pedagogic practice. The depth and engagement with pedagogic issues have not been up to pace with reflections on our methodological and theoretical practice. The recent pandemic has intensified the urgency of these discussions and brought new challenges, dilemmas, and opportunities in teaching and learning anthropology. This global challenge has been met locally in various ways, but primarily by turning to online solutions.
We stress the need to rethink our educational strategies. How do we as educators respond to the challenges and changes? How do we engage our students in the society that surrounds them? How do we cherish ‘the view from afar’ in our teaching when most of our students do fieldwork ‘at home’? How do we incorporate online platforms and remote pedagogic practices in a discipline that is so grounded in direct interpersonal contact? What is being lost in the shift from personal to e-teaching, e-supervision, and e-evaluation?
This edited volume on teaching and learning anthropology wishes to explore, compare, and discuss different forms of anthropological engagement and reflect on how anthropological education has been changing over the past 30 years and particularly by the challenges posed by the recent pandemic. We wish to take stock of the current situation, promote a space for sharing, and reflect on how this situation affects the teaching and learning of anthropology in different contexts and levels. We invite papers investigating how anthropology teachers across Europe (and beyond) have tried to engage their students and make anthropology relevant to the contemporary world. We call for contributions that are based on experiences, theoretically embedded, and analytical.
Please send an abstract of 500 words (+ 10 references), framing your argument and specifying your ideas and related literature.
Provide, also, the following information:
- Author full name(s),
- Institutional affiliation(s),
- E-mail address(es),
- Short biographical note (100-150 words) for each author
Lorenzo Cañás Bottos: canas.bottos@ntnu.no
Jakob Krause-Jensen: jakj@edu.au.dk
Ioannis Manos: imanos@uom.edu.gr
Note: For whom might be interested to contribute, it would be great to have a quick note of interest asap (please email Shuhua shuhua.chen@ntnu.no) before submitting the abstract by the end of this month, 30 April 2022. And also please feel free to contact shuhua.chen@ntnu.no for further details.
managing editor: Tong Meng
Network for Research into Chinese Education Mobilities (NRCEM) 