[URBANTH-L]30th Ethnography in Education Research Forum

[Center for Urban Ethnography]

Penn’s Center for Urban Ethnography is pleased to announce:

30th Annual Ethnography in Education Research Forum:  Ethnography for Social Justice in Education.

February 27 & 28th 2009 at the Graduate School of Education, University of Pennsylvania

Friday Morning Keynote Address - Shirley Brice-Heath, Brown University
Friday Evening Plenary - Kris Gutiérrez, University of California at Los Angeles
Saturday Morning Plenary - Patricia Carini, Prospect Ctr. and Margaret Himley, Syracuse University 
Saturday Evening – “A Conversation About Ethnography and Education” with Shirley Brice-Heath, Kris Gutiérrez and Brian Street, King’s College.

Reinventing Anthropology "is for people for whom 'the way things are' is not reason enough for the way things are … who ask of anthropology what they ask of  themselves … responsiveness, critical awareness, ethical concern, human relevance, a clear connection between what is to be done and the interests of mankind" (Hymes 1969: 7).

On this 30th anniversary of the Ethnography in Education Research Forum, we reflect on Dell Hymes' vision of anthropology in the service of social justice.  In his prolific and powerful writings, and in his leadership of Penn's Graduate School of Education, Hymes proposed not only a vision but a set of ways of doing ethnography in education – from ethnographic monitoring and the ethnography of communication to the ethnopoetics of oral narratives and the ethnography of language policy-- that have inspired and informed researchers for a generation and more.  In this year's Forum, we hope to explore the myriad uses educational ethnographers are making of these and other ways of working to change schooling and education for the better, in  the ongoing project of reinventing anthropology.

Free admission to Philadelphia School Employees and UPenn Students, Faculty and Staff.

For registration information: www.upenn.edu/cue/forum