Bloomsbury Academic Schooling as Uncertainty: An Ethnographic Memoir in Comparative Education

In todays uncertain world, few beliefs remain as firmly entrenched as the optimistic view that more schooling will inevitably lead to a better life. Rich or poor, black or white, we fervently await higher wages, better health, and greater happiness from our advanced degrees. Though this may be true in the aggregate, how do we explain the circumstances when schooling fails to produce certainty or even does us harm? Schooling as Uncertainty addresses this question by combining ethnography and memoir as it guides readers on a 25-year journey through fieldwork and familyhood in Tanzania and academic life in the USA, Vavrus reflects on her quest for certainty, beginning as a graduate student and young mother and continuing to the present as a tenured professor. Using reflexive, longitudinal ethnographic research the book simultaneously examines how African women employ schooling to counter the uncertainties of marriage, child rearing, employment, and HIV/AIDS. Adopting a narrative approach, Vavrus tells the story of how her life became entangled with a community on Kilimanjaro and how she, and the women around her, sought greater security through schooling and, to varying degrees, succeeded. She also examines how our successes have been circumscribed by economic and social inequalities that disproportionately affect daughters, mothers, and professional women the world over. Review Fran Vavrus' book is an extraordinary exploration into education, family, and identity. The book showcases her skill as a researcher, the value of long-term reflection on one's own role in the context of international education, and the ways in which women's experiences can be ignored or hidden Her honesty in sharing vulnerable moments in her life, will be illuminating for people at varied points in their own journeys.Supriya Baily, Associate Professor of International Education, George Mason University, USAPropelled by the author's 30 years of ethnographic experience and her willingness to explore the relationships that have shaped her work, this book provides a lyrical and powerful analysis of the ways that people try-and too often fail-to use formal schooling to make their lives more certain. Its is theoretically pathbreaking, analytically rich, and it asks the questions that need to be at the heart of our understanding of schooling around the world. This is a tour de force.Nancy Kendall, Professor of Educational Policy Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USAThis book is a compelling and genre-bending exploration of (un)certainty in schooling, development, research, and life itself. Through careful analysis of data and lived experiences, Vavrus calls us to critically question our perceived entanglements with both individuals and institutions.Matthew A.M. Thomas, Senior Lecturer of Comparative Education & Sociology of Education, The University of Sydney, Australia About the Author Frances Vavrus is Professor and Director of Graduate Programs in Comparative and International Development Education at the University of Minnesota, USA. She is Chair of the Joint ILO/UNESCO Committee on the Application of the Recommendations Concerning Teaching Personnel and the author of Rethinking Case Study Research (2017) and Teaching in Tension (2013).