Anthropology & Education Quarterly ( IF 1.550 ) Pub Date : 2023-08-24 , DOI: 10.1111/aeq.12475 Bryan McKinley Jones Brayboy
I appreciate the opportunity to engage in a written scholarly dialogue with an article based on the remarks that were part of Bradley Levinson's presidential address in November 2016. My engagement here is not only with the submitted article; it also includes a few other data points. These include my in-person attendance at the address in 2016 as well as additional correspondence between the years 2017 and 2018 with the author. That correspondence was mediated by the editorial team at Anthropology & Education Quarterly (AEQ). Below, I will do my best to note where I had correspondence that was—to the best of my knowledge—shared with Professor Levinson.
I attended Professor Levison's original talk; I was there for its commencement, and I stayed through its conclusion. Later, at the request of AEQ's editors (Sally Galman and Laura Valdiviezo), I read a version of the original talk, and I gave explicit and direct feedback on the original manuscript where I suggested revisions. Out of respect for Professor Levinson and the enormity of publishing presidential remarks, I signed my review. A few years later (in 2021), I read an early version of the article that appears in this issue of AEQ. As is his prerogative, Professor Levinson did not significantly revise his original talk (despite my recommendations to do so). I read another iteration of this talk with the opening vignette and its concomitant commentary—the version now published in this issue. To his credit, Professor Levison recommended me to the previous AEQ editors (Lesley Bartlett and Stacey Lee) as a potential respondent. He also references my early engagement with his talk.
I have been the president of the Council on Anthropology and Education (CAE), and I have given a presidential talk. It is not easy; it carries its own set of anxieties. I can imagine giving such an address in the shadows of former President Donald Trump's controversial and contested election, which shook many people, added a layer of difficulty. I have a real sense of empathy for anyone having to offer a scholarly address to the council.
In exploring Professor Levinson's presidential address, I will draw on multiple reviews of it as well as my curiosity about its implications. Except where necessary, I will not engage in a point-by-point analysis. Instead, I will comment on points of agreement, while raising questions for us, as a council, to consider.
Professor Levinson outlines three questions emerging from the mission that are, for me, important and meaningful questions. In fact, in my original 2018 review of the address, I wrote that Professor Levinson was exploring a significant inquiry that had the potential to advance a meaningful conversation. I suggested at the time that there was power in his penultimate paragraph (which he has now edited to include the final two sentences) where he wrote:But over the last several years—especially the three years of my presidential service—I have become more intimately familiar with [the mission]. And the more familiar I become, the more it chafes against some of the sensibilities that are inseparable from my identity as an anthropologist. (Levinson, 2023, 211)
I suggested to Professor Levinson at the time, “This paragraph is compelling and thought-provoking. Indeed, it might inspire dialogue and reflection across the membership. It's where I would have recommended starting.” He chose to lead with what you see in his article, keeping his address largely the same in its organization, with the addition of his reflections.In the end, the message of my talk could be boiled down to the following: The notion of “advancing solutions to educational problems” doesn't capture what many of us do, in many moments of our work, so it seems inadequate as the opening clause of a mission statement. Yet beyond the statement's syntax, I am trying to question the deeper archaeology of our field's imaginary.* We all produce ethnographically-informed knowledge about education (knowledge that is contextualized, reflexive, etc.), and we all communicate that knowledge in varied forms to varied audiences. We should maintain our strong commitment to social justice in all we do, but continually expand our work and identities as educational anthropologists in ecumenical fashion. That is the “Big Tent” I was hoping to facilitate in the original address. And it is the organizational learning and growth I am hoping to inspire through this meta-reflection.
*My thanks to Rodney Hopson for some of this phrasing.
We should, as a council, hold up, turn over, examine, and interrogate the mission statement and its role in the CAE. There are—in my mind—significant possibilities for deep engagement about the role of the mission. The mission should not, in my opinion, serve as a litmus test for membership in the council. Nor do I believe that the mission should solely be used to assess the quality or meaningfulness of anyone's scholarship. I believe that the mission is aspirational, like many other mission statements or charter documents. It is in these different understandings that I think there must be a space to engage one another. I support Professor Levinson's idea that we must have a “big tent” in our council. I hope we can find and create the space to do so.
In that spirit, I turn now to a few essential questions sparked by my reading of Professor Levinson's presidential address.
中文翻译：
对布拉德利·莱文森的回应
我很高兴有机会与一篇基于 Bradley Levinson 2016 年 11 月总统演讲中的言论的文章进行书面学术对话。它还包括一些其他数据点。其中包括我在 2016 年亲自出席该演讲，以及 2017 年至 2018 年与作者的其他通信。该信件由《人类学与教育季刊》(AEQ)的编辑团队调解。下面，我将尽力记下我与莱文森教授分享的据我所知的信件。
我参加了 Levison 教授最初的演讲；我在现场见证了它的开始，也一直坚持到了它的结束。后来，应AEQ编辑（Sally Galman 和 Laura Valdiviezo）的要求，我阅读了原始演讲的一个版本，并对原始手稿给出了明确而直接的反馈，并提出了修改建议。出于对莱文森教授的尊重以及发表主席言论的重要性，我签署了我的评论。几年后（2021年），我读到了本期AEQ中出现的该文章的早期版本。作为他的特权，莱文森教授没有对他原来的演讲进行重大修改（尽管我建议这样做）。我读了这篇演讲的另一版本，包括开头的小插图及其相应的评论——现在在本期发布的版本。值得称赞的是，Levison 教授向前AEQ编辑（Lesley Bartlett 和 Stacey Lee）推荐了我作为潜在的受访者。他还提到了我早期参与他的演讲。
我曾担任人类学和教育委员会（CAE）主席，并发表过主席演讲。这不简单; 它有自己的一系列焦虑。我可以想象在前总统唐纳德·特朗普充满争议和争议的选举的阴影下发表这样的讲话，这震惊了许多人，增加了一层难度。对于任何必须向理事会发表学术演讲的人，我都抱有真正的同情心。
在探讨莱文森教授的主席演讲时，我将利用对其的多次评论以及我对其含义的好奇心。除非有必要，我不会逐条分析。相反，我将评论共识点，同时提出问题供我们作为理事会考虑。
莱文森教授概述了这次任务中出现的三个问题，对我来说，这些问题都是重要且有意义的问题。事实上，在我 2018 年对该演讲的最初评论中，我写道莱文森教授正在探索一项重要的调查，该调查有可能推动一场有意义的对话。我当时建议他的倒数第二段（他现在已对其进行编辑以包括最后两句话）中有力量，他写道：但在过去的几年里——尤其是我担任总统的三年——我对[使命]变得更加熟悉。我越熟悉，它就越对我作为人类学家的身份密不可分的一些情感产生摩擦。（莱文森，2023，211）
我当时向莱文森教授建议：“这段话引人入胜，发人深省。事实上，它可能会激发会员国之间的对话和反思。我建议从这里开始。” 他选择以您在文章中看到的内容开头，在结构中保持其地址基本相同，并添加了他的反思。最后，我演讲的信息可以归结为以下几点：“推进教育问题的解决方案”的概念并没有抓住我们许多人在工作的许多时刻所做的事情，因此它似乎是不够的使命宣言的开头部分。然而，除了陈述的语法之外，我试图质疑我们领域想象的更深层的考古学。*我们都产生了有关教育的民族志知识（情境化的知识、反射性的知识等），并且我们都以不同的形式传播这些知识面向不同的受众。我们所做的一切都应该保持对社会正义的坚定承诺，但以普世的方式不断扩大我们作为教育人类学家的工作和身份。这就是我希望在原来的地址中促进的“大帐篷”。
*我感谢罗德尼霍普森的一些措辞。
作为理事会，我们应该举起、翻转、审查和质疑使命宣言及其在 CAE 中的作用。在我看来，深入参与使命的作用有很大的可能性。我认为，这次访问不应成为安理会成员资格的试金石。我也不认为该任务应该仅仅用于评估任何人的奖学金的质量或意义。我相信这一使命是有抱负的，就像许多其他使命宣言或章程文件一样。正是在这些不同的理解中，我认为必须有一个相互接触的空间。我支持莱文森教授的想法，即我们的理事会必须有一个“大帐篷”。我希望我们能够找到并创造空间来做到这一点。
本着这种精神，我现在谈谈我在阅读莱文森教授的主席讲话时引发的几个基本问题。
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