What Does Our Discipline Mean? Uncertainties of Students in Perception of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology/Case Study of Kosova

Abstract

When in 2001 the Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology at University of Prishtina was opened for the first time, there was a lack of knowledge about this field of study. Students that enrolled in the Department came up with different reasons and motivations. Since then, the Department made changes and transformations to both the curriculum and the pedagogical approaches used. These changes opened the department to collaborative teaching methods. Over time, narrowly defined, traditional concepts of ethnology and anthropology were expanded into diverse methods, theories and approaches. This article considers the ways in which the department developed and how anthropology was perceived by the students. What were the dilemmas and uncertainties that accompanied students in their choice? How much did parents, relatives and their friends support them? If they would have another opportunity, would they make the same choice again? These are the questions that will be discussed in this paper, besides my personal experience and reflection, firstly as a student in this department and later as teaching assistant.