Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the study abroad context as a place of anthropological learning, focusing on US undergraduates studying in France. It describes teaching methods that use the urban space of the study abroad context as a rich source of ethnographic data through which theory can be apprehended.

Paper long abstract:

Studying abroad has long been viewed as an essential part of the US American undergraduate education, a means to broaden horizons, be immersed in new languages and cultures and foster cross-cultural understanding and communication. In some ways, this experience is similar to what the aspiring anthropologist undergoes when she conducts fieldwork, often in unfamiliar spaces, where new understandings emerge from interactions that take place in a foreign language and in new and different cultural contexts. This paper focuses on the context of teaching anthropology courses to US undergraduates at two American institutions in Paris, France. I reflect on how place and space can be used as pedagogical tools to engage students—many of whom have little background in anthropology or social science—in developing ethnographic methods of observation and analysis, using their placement as study abroad students in a European urban space as a foundation for developing critical and comparative awareness of important social issues. I describe experimental methods I have been using in a linguistic anthropology course on language in France and in a course on migration and Europe, considering how theoretical anthropological concepts can be conveyed using hands-on or practical approaches. The paper invites discussion on how to further develop creative teaching methods that encourage students to take an anthropological perspective into novel spaces they encounter at home or abroad, and in turn to bring those spaces into the classroom for critical reflection and review.