Comments on: ASU Turns a Department into a School

By: An ASU Grad student

An ASU Grad student — Wed, 23 Nov 2005 06:37:48 +0000

A point of clarification: as an ASU graduate student in the new School of Human Evolution and Social Change (SHESC), my degree will technically be a PhD in “Anthropology”, not in “Human Evolution and Social Change.” The degree remains the same, although eventually there may be more than one degree offered through the school. Other departments at ASU, such as Biology (now the School of Life Sciences), have gone through similar transformations and seem to be doing quite well. Most of us here at ASU are pretty positive about the change. ASU seems to be supportive of anthropology and there have been a number of good faculty hires that will ultimately benefit grad students by providing for committees that can handle overseeing projects that span across disciplinary or methodological boundaries. I for one am not worried about the name change making us less hirable.

By: PostdocBioAnth

PostdocBioAnth — Tue, 22 Nov 2005 15:49:35 +0000

I don’t think it going to hurt anyone getting a job as long as the graduate student can stay focused. If they are interested in a research position related to bioanth, for example, then getting a job in an anthropology department is going to boil down to three critical questions: One, is your research anthropological (whatever that means now)? Two, are you published in competitive journals in your field? Three, can you secure outside funding? If you cover these three bases, then I doesn’t matter if your degree is from the school of maps, monkeys and savages.

By: John Hawks Anthropology Weblog : 2005 11

John Hawks Anthropology Weblog : 2005 11 — Tue, 22 Nov 2005 05:31:52 +0000

[…] I got the story via this Savage Minds post by Kerim, who adds some comments as well. […]

By: Anthro Grad Student Guy

Anthro Grad Student Guy — Sat, 12 Nov 2005 05:47:13 +0000

Hey thanks for posting the article I suggested. I wanted this article posted somewhere because it seem to be something that many anthropologists might not know about if they don’t have direct contact with people at ASU or (as in my case) happened to come across the article in Inside Higher Education. (I don’t think many people outside of ASU know what happened. I haven’t heard anything about this from other generally aware people in my department) I am ambivelent towards the idea of a new school which is interdisciplinary and not called “anthropology”. On the one hand, it could allow for richer scholarly discourse and a focus on topics that other departments might not focus. On the other hand, I,like Kerim, have a feeling it could be problematic from the standpoint of graduate students. First, the “school” is going to have problems promoting its program. While I did receive advice from professors about applying to graduate schools, not all of the graduate schools to which I applied were recommended by professors. Anthropology is big enough that professor are not necessarily aware of the current locations of specific anthropologists and/or anthropologists specializing in areas not represented in their own departments. I actually found out about my current school through the web since my advisor was unaware of some the professors who were here. I think this is becoming the norm for many disciplines. ASU could see a large drop in the number of graduate students entering because either they don’t know about the number of anthropologists in the “school” or because new graduate students want to go to a “real” anthropology (or sociology other social science) department).

Second, graduate students getting degrees within the program will most likely have difficulty getting jobs. I have a feeling that professors at some universities might not want to hire people who don’t have a degree in anthropology. It will also limit job oportunities for the ASU PhD. holder to within the US since I doubt that many in Europe will be aware of what the new “school” represents.

Third, what will happen to undergraduates at ASU who are interested in anthropology. If they want to go on to graduate school what discipline’s department will they go to?

Finally, how the heck are we supposed to expose more people to the strengths of anthropology if we are not calling it anthropology anymore. Many people are exposed to anthropology through introductary classes. By creating a new school, hundreds of students who might have been exposed to anthropology in the past will probably think that anthro is either about dinosaurs (you’d be suprised how many college educated people think this) or have a view of anthropology that would be more true for the 1930’s. In this sense I think that the “school” is potentially dangerous in that it erodes anthropology’s ability to accurately represent itself to the general public.

By: Sing Anyway

Sing Anyway — Mon, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

didn’t think it was a big deal, although I liked the idea of an inter-disciplinary school making lots of new hires enough to come here. Turns out, we’re getting some press! Here’s an article from Inside Higher Ed about the school. John Hawks and Savage Minds both have comments. It’s really interesting to hear the dire predictions others have for the future of the program here (and my chances of getting a job!). What effect will removing the word “anthropology” have on the world? Not much of one, I hope!