This seminar taps into the current discussion that calls for a renewed anthropology, and questions the desirability of the discipline because of its affiliation with colonial violence. This discussion creates a window of opportunity for students of anthropology to get involved in rethinking the future of anthropology, and their participation is strongly encouraged. This seminar’s call to action goes alongside an attempt to empower students in using their anthropological skills to think and act independently from academic spheres and their modes of instruction.

This seminar, additionally, provides an open space to safely discuss any concerns that students might have or obstacles that they encounter that intensify feelings of failure or exclusion. This sense of unbelonging amongst young academia is subsequently related to anthropology’s objectification and marginalization of issues like race or gender, drawing on insights from decolonial and feminist theory. This awareness stresses the need to foster a developed sense of autonomy and intellectual independency amongst students and to enable them to make the most out of their anthropological training. This concern about the level of confidence of anthropology students, and especially those that are underprivileged, raises questions about the nature of student care in universities that this seminar tries to unravel.

Convenor: Avery Delany

Part of the Goldsmiths Anthropology Autumn Seminar Series - Anthropology and Double Consciousness: Moving Between Worlds?