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Academic
Teaching social sciences Archive
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History in the future
Posted on September 14, 2009 | No CommentsThe explosion of digital information about all aspects of our lives, the places we live in, etc. will radically transform the way we write history in the future. Read on. -
Learning as doing: John Seely Brown’s exciting ideas
Posted on December 3, 2008 | No CommentsDuring my recent field work in India, I was impressed by the depth of social understanding by common people I met in the villages. Often, their views on the society were more sophisticated than many works I read in the academia. This has made me question not just what we learn in the social science disciplines, but also how we learn. I feel that the process of disengaged reading comfortably away from the hustle-bustle of the society compromises our learning. I have been thinking about how we can “teach” social sciences better and this talk by John Seely Brown was... -
Disciplinary training: More trained, less able
Posted on November 23, 2008 | 2 CommentsDuring fieldwork in India, I was amazed by the differences between common people that I interacted with, and the well trained students in the Western world. There were significant differences in the questions each asked and the observations they made. I was often left wondering if more training in the disciplinary world leads to less sophisticated understanding of this complex social world. Read on...
