Università Roma Tre

Educational goals of the course
The course is intended as an introduction to anthropology as cultural critique, specifically aimed at forming a figure of anthropologist regarded as “intellectual” capable of analysing, interpreting and comparing different cultural cases and systems.
The objectives of the course are:
– to develop in the student an awareness of “otherness”;
– to critically examines ideas about cultural differences and images of “otherness”;
– to develop in the student a capacity to recognize preconceptions and assumptions of their own social and cultural environments.
This kind of knowledge is today particularly important, even necessary in order to understand the changes we’re all experiencing, and educate the future generations to live together the Others and recognize that they are an essential resource, but also to offer the means useful to the practice of everyday life and to every kind of job, especially for the teachers of any level of the educational system.

Knowledge and skills in the field of anthropology and cultural anthropology are extremely useful for the practice of teaching at any level of the education system, because they enhance the awareness of students’ personal stories and identities, of their peculiarities, and family backgrounds; at the same time, they help the teacher to abstain form any kind of social and cultural labelling.
Social and cultural anthropology also offer a body of knowledge about migratory processes and globalization, allowing the teacher to deal with multicultural groups of students and make them experience cultural diversity, starting the communication among them and letting the differences among them to interact without reductionisms, promoting integration and an intercultural dialogue. Moreover, they help better understanding phenomena connected to dropping out of college.