Paper short abstract:

A paper that examines reasons why pre-university education has a special role to play, both in building an ethic of multi-cultural engagement and in promoting the value of the discipline of anthropology.

Paper long abstract:

This paper aims to show how the school - as an institution of a multi-cultural society - is an important space for the discipline of anthropology far beyond its academic and intellectual potential. I would like to argue that including anthropology at a pre-university level facilitates the development of an interest in, openness toward, and skills for a multi-cultural dialogue built on an understanding of and respect for cultural difference. In schools, students share a relatively equal cultural situation, whatever their backgrounds, and they can investigate each other's family heritage theoretically with less in the way of hierarchical advantage or disadvantage than they may find in the wider society to which they will emerge. Thus, learning anthropology at a pre-university level may not only play an important role in cultivating an ethic of multi-cultural engagement, but also elicit an awareness of the value of anthropology as a discipline geared towards that end.