Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Role of Field Schools in Training Field Scientists and Producing Scientific Knowledge in Primatology

University Of Texas At San Antonio, San Antonio TX

Investigators

Abstract

This doctoral dissertation research project investigates the significance and role of field schools in shaping of the discipline of primatology and the production of knowledge about primates. Field schools serve as important training grounds for future primatologists, offering valuable insights into how disciplinary practices and understandings are transmitted and transformed. By examining these crucial spaces of learning, this research contributes to an understanding of the dynamics involved in the creation and perpetuation of scientific knowledge. In addition to providing scientific training to a graduate student in anthropology, findings will be disseminated through academic publications, conference presentations, and public outreach efforts to enhance the public's understanding of the scientific process and the role of training in scientific disciplines. Research findings inform the development of inclusive, equitable, scientific training practices, benefiting both student experience and disciplinary standards. To expand understandings of the relationship between scientific training and disciplinary knowledge, the doctoral student employs an ethno-primatological approach. This combines primate behavioral observations with ethnographic techniques, in a comparative study of two field schools that train primatologists. The methods combine human and primate behavioral data with participant observation, interviews, surveys, and content analysis. The broader research contributes to science and technology studies, the science of scientific education, biological anthropology and primatology, and multispecies studies in cultural anthropology. This research is supported by the Cultural Anthropology, Science of Science: Discovery, Communication and Impact, and the Biological Anthropology programs. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.