Schooling as Uncertainty

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, USA *
Propelled 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, USA *
This 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 *
An unhesitatingly honest critical reflection on research, unfurled as braiding her own life, through marriage, children, and tenure, with the lives of the Tanzanian students she seeks to understand. In the meeting ground of academic discipline and community Frances Vavrus examines confronting, accepting, and domesticating uncertainty. * Joel Samoff, formerly Adjunct Professor of African Studies, Stanford University, USA *
This extraordinary book, at once raw and inspiring, invites readers into the life of one ethnographer and her engagement with a rural Tanzanian community and its school over almost three decades. Vavrus draws on her collected field notes from Tanzania and her own personal letters and journals to show us how schooling and its intersection with sexuality, child rearing, marriage, work, and public policy have changed over time in East Africa and North America. In an innovative combination of autobiography and ethnography, Vavrus invites us to both question – and celebrate - our precarious efforts to secure our own lives and livelihoods through schooling. * Karen Mundy, Professor of International and Comparative Education, University of Toronto, Canada *