ANT 226T - Education and Culture

Course Units: 1

(Fall; Brison) This course examines the relationship between educational systems, on the one hand, and their cultural and social environment, on the other hand. The course will consider such as issues as: 1) the relationship between schools and ethnic and national identity; how do educational systems attempt to construct national identities? Do they succeed? How are ethnic divisions reinforced or mediated by educational systems? 2) the relationship between imported international educational models and local cultures: how do the assumptions embedded in imported educational models conflict with local understandings about authority, knowledge, and society? 3) the ways that cultural assumptions are implicit in classroom routines; how can we analyze classroom routines to reveal the “hidden curriculum” of assumptions about knowledge, authority, and the qualities needed to be a good and successful person. Students will conduct participant observation in a local school, will read and discuss works on education and society and will analyze local schools in papers. CC: LCC