Paper
Uniting Voices to Challenge the Monolith: Multivocal, Multilingual, Mutual approaches to Teaching Anthropology
presenters
Heather OLeary
Nationality: United States
Residence: Florida
University of South Florida
Presence:Face to Face/ On Site
Keywords:
Multilingualism, Theory,
Abstract:
What is anthropological knowledge and theory, where is it produced, and by whom? For many years, anthropologists have been struggling, on many fronts, to tackle the multiple inequalities that exist within our discipline and the wider academic landscape in which it is embedded. Slowly but surely, marginal voices in and around the anthropological powerhouses of the world, mostly located in the so-called ‘Global North’, are getting more recognition. Because of the ways in which global academia is currently structured, however, it is much more difficult to spotlight anthropological insights produced by anthropologists outside the hegemonic centers. Changing this would require a radical makeover of the systems of knowledge production and circulation.
This paper will describe the process by which the Antro Radikoj team imagined and executed the project. It will examine the ways we sought to destabilize traditional approaches in the discipline and the ways--gentle or radical--we as anthropologists are experimenting with new ways of knowing and teaching our discipline to the next generations. Together we discuss the ways our project answers questions at the core of anthropology about perspectives, practices and power.
Attendees will be introduced to the tool and then join us in re-imagining the approaches and next steps in the process such as: What can we learn by reflexively re-examining the ways we teach, conduct research, collaborate, or disseminate? How can we better amplify voices of and across multi-lingual platforms, spotlighting those in the so-called ‘periphery’? How does this contribute to the sustainability of the discipline and the people, lifeways, processes, and materials we study?