Paper short abstract:

This paper explores my role as an educational anthropologist, fostering anthropological engagement through experiential learning and public outreach. It overviews a student-initiated project that promotes anthropological knowledge and participatory action, extending anthropology beyond academia.

Paper long abstract:

This study delineates my role as an educational anthropologist, promoting anthropological engagement through experiential learning and public outreach. It highlights the growing focus on experiential learning for students and academia’s social responsibility for public engagement. In this context, anthropology emerges as an optimal medium to achieve both goals while simultaneously bolstering the global initiative of anthropologists to broaden the discipline's influence beyond academic boundaries to engage broader audiences. This is particularly significant in regions like Hong Kong, where the discipline of anthropology is relatively underrepresented.

This manuscript outlines a project that introduces anthropological methodologies to non-anthropology undergraduates in Hong Kong. Simultaneously, it engages them in a combination of experiential learning and public outreach to address the educational challenges confronting ethnic minority students. The project is structured into five stages: 1) training in anthropological methodology; 2) field research to identify the needs of ethnic minority students; 3) formulating support measures; 4) implementing these measures; and 5) evaluating the process. In the concluding stage, participating undergraduates are specifically tasked with creating a sustainable collaboration plan, incorporating input from ethnic minority students, to facilitate mutual learning.

This student-initiated project, leveraging anthropological methods, aims to enhance the learning experience of all involved parties. Drawing insights from this project's experiences, this paper explores the prospects and challenges related to establishing anthropological engagement as a normative practice for non-anthropology students participating in experiential learning and public outreach. The emphasis lies on the dissemination of anthropological knowledge and the promotion of participatory action within the public sphere.