Educational anthropology

Educational anthropology, or the Anthropology of Education, is a sub-field of anthropology and is widely associated with the pioneering work of Margaret Mead and later, George Spindler, Solon Kimball, and Dell Hymes. It gained traction as a field of study during the 1970s, particularly due to professors at Teachers College, Columbia University. As the name would suggest, the focus of educational anthropology is on education, although an anthropological approach to education tends to focus on the cultural aspects of education, including informal as well as formal education. As education involves understandings of who we are, it is not surprising that the single most recognized dictum of educational anthropology is that the field is centrally concerned with cultural transmission. Cultural transmission involves the transfer of a sense of identity between generations, sometimes known as enculturation and also transfer of identity between cultures, sometimes known as acculturation. Accordingly, it is also not surprising that educational anthropology has become increasingly focused on ethnic identity and ethnic change.