Anthropology News • November 2007

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A C A D E M I C A F F A I R S

AGUSTÍN FUENTES

U NOTRE DAME

DEBORAH ROTMAN

U NOTRE DAME

Groundbreaking, pioneering, inventive, original, new, novel … these have all become synonyms for innovative. But what do we as anthropolo-gists expect in innovative research and how does such research benefi t the discipline?

A large part of the answer lies in who is ask-ing the research questions. Last November, we argued in AN that undergraduate research was increasingly important in the production and dissemination of anthropological knowledge. This year, we would like to extend that perspec-tive and suggest that innovation in our disci-pline is facilitated by a rich and diverse pool of undergraduate scholars.

An ApprenticeshipUndergraduate research in anthropology, in its best form, can be seen as an apprenticeship, wherein the novitiate is granted a partnership and some degree of agency in pushing the boundaries of our shared knowledge. Although most undergraduate research projects do not change the way we see the world, in part be-cause of undergraduate’s stage of theoretical and methodological training, the constructive collaborations among faculty, graduate stu-dents and undergraduates necessary for good undergraduate scholarship positively impact the research dynamism in anthropology.

Designing and facilitating research projects in which undergraduates can have a signifi-cant role is a challenge although not impos-sible in our experience. Engaged teaching ped-agogies allow students to begin formulating research questions and initiate data collection in semester projects, which many students then continue as directed research, senior the-ses or projects to be presented via posters at professional conferences. Undergraduates who assist with faculty research are often inspired to expand a project in a direction of particular interest to them.

In both cases, students are invested in the process and the product of their research from the outset and create opportunities from which dynamic apprenticeships begin. These undertak-ings can help keep the field growing, and they keep current professionals reassessing what we do and why we do it.

The Importance of the Novitiate in Anthropology

Growth Rather Than ReplicationImportantly, these projects can kick start stu-dents’ professional careers and anthropological experiences with investigative and refl ective proj-ects that predispose them to challenging extant perspectives rather than replicating them. When the students are not just participants, they are invested in the work and want it to mean some-thing. They have not yet entered into the full fray of publication and the blinders of the self-imposed (by our academic systems), Hobbesian-driven world of limited professional “goods.”

We, as practitioners of anthropology, must not reproduce endless batches of technicians maintaining Kuhnian normative paradigms. We want to facilitate innovation. Collaboration with undergraduate students in research is one of the important ways we can accomplish this. Equally important, the experience of an appren-ticeship as an undergraduate allows students to experience all of the steps and missteps of anthropological research before entering the

graduate arena. Consequently, by the time stu-dents embark on a thesis or dissertation, they have gained valuable skills and experience that allow them to navigate the world of anthropo-logical research and, by extension, the quality of graduate-level research is enhanced.

Undergraduate research breaks down the classroom/research boundaries, focuses on the importance of experiential learning and exploits the naïveté and vigor of students not yet indoctrinated into paradigmatic com-placency. By not being constrained by the history of their subdiscipline, they can assist our attempts to move beyond the fissures generated during the past few decades. These crevices in the anthropological landscape now remain through sheer tenacity of inertia in the face of a growing body of anthropologists devoted to a sincerely and generously integra-tive approach. Undergraduate students can be agents and partners in reshaping the landscape of anthropology.

Agustín Fuentes and Deborah Rotman organized the poster sessions “First Rites: Innovative Undergraduate Re-search in Anthropology I and II” to be held concurrently on Thursday, November 29, (1:30–3:30 pm) at the 2007 AAA Annual Meeting. Poster topics include: the importance of social relationships on the treatment of HIV/AIDS; cultural ramifi cations of female sterilization campaigns, women’s autonomy and control over the birthing process; societal roles in the treatment of autism; unintended stigmatizing effects of some government health campaigns; contempo-rary Irish immigration into San Francisco; and the factors that contribute to the effi cacy of healthcare outreach programs; among many others.

A C A D E M I C A F F A I R S

The Political Economy of AcademiaIn collaboration with the Society for the Anthropology of Work, Anthropology News is soliciting contributions for a special theme issue on the Political Economy of Academia.

Where are current economic and cultural trends in higher learning taking us? With a changing economy, the number of students attending post-secondary institutions has doubled in the US since the 1970s. Despite the stagnation of real wages, however, tuition rates at post-secondary institutions have steadily climbed, and US students are taking on ever-greater debt burdens to earn their degrees. In contrast, post-secondary education in many countries is much more affordable, or even free. And with the increasing emphasis upon institutional ranking, which has accompanied enrollment growth, degrees from “non-elite” institutions are being marketed more as a ticket toward higher earnings, than as a pathway toward intellectual development. Emphasizing the marketability of degrees is a strategy that runs parallel to the steady decline in government fund-ing, and also to an increase in administrative hires. Younger scholars feel the blunt force of these shifts, as visiting PhDs and underpaid adjuncts replace the tenured faculty who once did most of the teaching.

How successfully have we been responding to what is often referred to as the “corporatization” of higher education? And why have anthropologists—in a field known for its introspection—not paid more attention to the dramatic political-eco-nomic transformations taking place in the universities in which we work? How will these trends affect future scholarship, fieldwork, teaching and advocacy?

Please send your 1,000 word submissions, by November 15, 2007, to Stacy Lathrop at slathrop@aaanet.org.