An historic contextualization of the development of educational anthropology provides the frame from within which extant theoretical and methodological issues are critically delimited. Possibilities for future areas of activity and concern are explored, and specific recommendations for future directions are presented (Author)

Reviews and criticizes papers by Rist, Fienberg, and Erickson in this issue of the Quarterly. (JM)

Concludes that in addition to using multivariate methods to analyze their data, investigators need to begin thinking in terms of large-scale randomized controlled field trails (i.e., experiments). One of the challenges for the ethnographic educational researcher is to demonstrate the superiority of the anthropological field method over the more…

Responds to papers in this Quarterly by Colley and Smith. (JM)

Claude Goldenberg's claim that there are compatibilities between minority children's home and school experiences is critiqued on the following points: (1) the methodology is not ethnographic; (2) home-school cultural compatibilities are not demonstrated; and (3) the model of literacy acquisition is not supported by current theory and research.…

Discusses distinctions between the anthropology of education and educational research. Although the educationist generally has a technocist view of the reality of schooling (how to do it more efficiently), the anthropologist deals with the relational reality of schooling (what events mean to participants). (SLD)