Dr hab. Katarzyna Majbroda on teaching in anthropology [IDUB Teaching Award]
Applications are open until 31 August for the third edition of the IDUB Teaching Award. We are speaking with the laureate of the first edition of the award – dr hab. Katarzyna Majbroda, prof. UWr, a literary scholar and anthropologist, whose interests include theories and methodologies in the humanities and social sciences, open education, environmental anthropology, posthumanism and citizen science. Katarzyna Majbroda coordinates the Climate Change Team at the University of Wrocław and serves as the Dean’s Representative for Sustainable Development and Relations with the Social Environment at the Faculty of Historical and Pedagogical Sciences. She also leads a research team within the NCN OPUS 27 grant Local Experience of the Climate Crisis and a Just Energy Transition around the Turów Mining and Energy Complex in Lower Silesia.
Openness, relations and exercises in imagination
How does one become a master of teaching at a university? What must be done with students to be counted among the prestigious circle of “the best of the best” teachers?
That is a difficult question, because I don’t really feel that I am a master of teaching. Yet that is the name and formula of the award, so I was very pleased to become the laureate of the first edition of the “Excellence Initiative – Research University” programme prize. It is a way of recognising the work and commitment of academics who, in rather unfavourable circumstances, focus not only on writing scholarly publications, securing external funding or running research grants, but also find the time, energy and ideas to develop university education in interesting ways. This phenomenon has a broader context, because the University of Wrocław – like all other universities in Poland – as a research university, primarily rewards scholarly publications as well as our involvement in projects and research grants. This is perfectly understandable in the current higher education system, but it is also the result of a well-recognised neoliberal logic and thoroughly economic way of thinking, where the most highly valued undertakings and academic practices are those that generate broadly conceived profit – not necessarily financial, but in the form of points, which later translate into high scores in evaluation. All these procedures are extremely important for the university as an institution. Therefore, it is worth appreciating that the university also promotes teaching and supports those academics who wish to engage in this often undervalued but extremely important field of academic activity.
The teaching award has strictly defined criteria, whereas at the university there is also a plebiscite for the most popular lecturer. That is nice too, although a more subjective distinction. In your view, what are the criteria for being a good teacher?
The foundation is to think about teaching in terms of open and inclusive education. I don’t treat my classes at the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology as a kind of reality show designed to bring popularity – that’s not my ambition. What I do consider very important is to show students that what we discuss and learn in class makes sense – that it is not just a façade but something grounded in social and cultural reality. It is good when we think of academic knowledge not only as something one-directional, passed on to students in the classroom, but as more circular. A good approach is to show students that their knowledge, their experience, their personal background, their cultural and social capital – all of this enriches academic knowledge and strongly influences how courses are shaped. University teaching simply does not function as a one-way transfer of knowledge from academic staff to students; it is much more relational in character. And I think this inclusivity of teaching is very important. Just as important is offering courses that are close to social life and to cultural, ecological or geopolitical issues. For me, attentiveness to society and critical anthropological awareness are crucial in teaching.
And what does that mean in concrete terms for a cultural anthropologist or ethnologist? What courses do you teach, and how do you bring students closer to social reality?
I teach a wide range of courses – the offer has been broad for many years. At present, these include seminars on anthropological theories and methods, but also more broadly on the methods of social sciences and the humanities. I also teach Anthropology of Education and a course entitled Anthropology of the Future, which I greatly value. Although it is an elective, it attracts considerable interest because it allows us to step beyond the reality in which we function, to lean towards the future, to anticipate. In these classes we do a lot of projecting and imagining.
That sounds contradictory: “anthropology of the future” – a bit like the futurology of history.
Is it a cognitive dissonance? It is an attempt at anticipation – predicting and forecasting the future directions and shapes of present social and cultural phenomena. They are also, in a way, exercises in imagination, futurological exercises (What if…? And what then…?). This is very important, because anthropology aspires not only to diagnose what is here and now. While keeping a finger on the pulse and engaging with contemporary issues of social life, it also seeks to forecast the future and to mobilise society to prepare for what is already emerging on the horizon and will soon become reality.
Could you give an example of such a future that is about to become reality?
We see them in the context of the climate crisis, the environmental crisis, and also various geopolitical crises. We try to forecast in which directions these phenomena will develop and what might be done to prevent at least some of these crises. This is not necessarily utopian thinking, but an awareness of the value of forecasting and anticipating. It is a mode of thought that is needed not only in socio-cultural anthropology. This is also how I see the role of the university – to develop broadly understood prevention and to prepare society for different scenarios of the future.
And how does this translate into university teaching? What does “the best of the best” teaching look like? Are there methods that are explicitly rewarded in the ID-UB competition?
Yes, the competition rewards various methods and research tools. I try to adapt these methods and work in a laboratory fashion, as far as possible. I value, for instance, the courses I have run since 2015 using the tutorial method. This is a method of working with students based on partnership and accompanying them in the process of gaining knowledge. In the case of developmental tutoring, it is also a moment for pause and self-reflection – a chance for students to consider their needs, their competences, skills and goals. I greatly value this. Equally important is the fundamental practice of conversation, discussion, debate – this lies at the very core of the humanities, including socio-cultural anthropology. The empirical, fieldwork dimension of teaching is also essential: ethnographic research, going out into the realities of different social groups and local communities.
So teaching does not take place only within university walls?
Exactly – it is not only theorising about the phenomena we observe and experience, but also engaging in that reality. Such practical engagement, or “praxis” in teaching, is extremely important for the university. Students’ participation in specific research projects provides them with experience, allows them to develop competences, and also shows them that knowledge-creation processes are not theoretical or superficial, but are usually entangled with empirical reality and draw from it.
When we ask an anthropologist about a laboratory, we think of bones and so on. But what about a cultural anthropologist or ethnologist “going out into reality”? What is in their laboratory? Do they go with students to demonstrations, for example? Or to the city council to see what is happening with greenery in Wrocław? Is that what “fieldwork” means?
Yes, researchers may indeed appear at demonstrations, in public offices, or in public spaces. And when it comes to the discipline I represent, socio-cultural anthropology, everything can potentially be “the field”. This openness, this almost boundless nature of the field, can sometimes be difficult for others to understand. Yet indeed, we can potentially be anywhere, and we are interested in very diverse phenomena – both urban and those connected with civilisation, politics, ecology. We are curious about tradition, heritage, new technologies, economic issues. It would be difficult to point to any area that could not be subjected to anthropological exploration, analysis and diagnosis.
And the laboratory itself?
“Laboratory” is a broad notion, and a useful one, because in the laboratory model of work our traditional tools and research methods come up against reality. This confrontation often requires us to change lenses, to seek new perspectives, and often gives rise to new challenges posed by reality – for example, the climate crisis, energy transition, or increased human mobility on various scales and in different dimensions. That is why we are constantly searching not only for new theories, but also for new methods, and in doing so we drive the dynamism of the discipline. At the level of teaching, practising this kind of laboratory work brings refreshment and openness. It allows the discipline to keep a finger on the pulse, to keep up with phenomena, and sometimes even to anticipate them. Of course, I would not want to romanticise teaching and claim that the possibilities are unlimited or that all courses can take on the laboratory model. That is not the case, nor would it make much sense. But in our Institute we also run field laboratories.
What kind of classes do you teach?
For example, Shaping Urban Culture in the Non-Governmental Sector. This is a course that involves students going out into the urban space, working with municipal institutions, NGOs, the third sector, and developing joint projects with them. Last year we carried out a project in cooperation with Przejście Dialogu, part of the Wrocław Centre for Social Development, entitled Social Laboratory – Courtyard Culture. It was a collaborative study of how the culture of public spaces, specifically Wrocław’s courtyards, is changing under the influence of people with refugee experience arriving from Ukraine. A very interesting project that opened up to difference and diversity, but also had a pragmatic value, since our diagnoses and recommendations can be used by decision-makers responsible for urban planning in Wrocław, who are striving to develop inclusive practices in this multicultural city.
But are courtyards in the 21st century, in 2025, still community-building spaces? Do the everyday lives of children and residents in courtyards, in tenement houses – for instance, in the colourful, graffiti-filled Nadodrze district of Wrocław – still shape our cultural identity?
It varies greatly, but courtyards have changed their function. They are no longer the breeding grounds of social relations they once were. They are no longer places where neighbourhood bonds are usually forged.
So no more meetings by the clothes dryer frame?
Nor are the frames themselves still there. But the function of courtyards has changed. Children often spend their time elsewhere or indoors, as new technologies encourage that. In general, we are more inward-looking and function within what could be called a “culture of the individual” – increasingly valuing the comfort of being alone with oneself, one’s needs and one’s interests, rather than in shared spaces such as courtyards.
And then, after anthropologists, psychologists and psychotherapists have to deal with it. Unfortunately.
Yes, it is certainly a civilisational problem, and Wrocław, too, feels this change in relations between people and space.
The great civilisational problems also include climate change and ecology. You are the coordinator of the Climate Change Team at the University of Wrocław and the Dean’s Plenipotentiary for Sustainable Development and Relations with the Social Environment at the Faculty.
Yes, and that is why an important aspect of the teaching I develop is raising students’ awareness of social, ecological and climate issues. Our curriculum, for example, includes a lecture entitled Socio-Cultural Anthropology in the Face of the Anthropocene and the Climate Crisis. I also run various electives that cultivate posthumanist and post-anthropocentric sensitivity, trying to show students that we function in a woven, relational reality, where the material, technological, environmental, economic, cultural and social are all intertwined. And that if we want to understand the reality in which we live, there is no sense in separating these domains or placing humans at the centre of the world. This change in thinking – from seeing reality as anthropocentric and hierarchical to understanding it as relational and entangled – is also a major challenge for university teaching. Ecological responsibility and sustainable, environmentally friendly practice are among the greatest challenges the university faces today. That is why last year the Team prepared the University of Wrocław Climate Responsibility Strategy, which should be available on the university’s website in the autumn. At the Faculty we also prepared a strategy tailored to its needs, and I hope that step by step we will implement its assumptions, keeping ecological responsibility in mind across various areas of our activities.
And what does such transdisciplinarity mean in academic practice?
It is above all about drawing on the knowledge, tools, experience and perspectives of different disciplines, researchers and social partners. It is an attempt to go beyond our existing anthropological, cultural studies or philological thinking – beyond any discipline closed within its own boundaries. The idea is to network these competences and develop various projects through collaborative thinking, critical attentiveness and cooperation, including with social partners. This is entirely possible within university teaching. With this in mind, just before the summer break, our Faculty invited representatives of municipal institutions and cultural centres from Lower Silesia, who – together with social partners already forming the External Stakeholder Council – are helping to establish a Regional Council. This body will formally begin work at the start of the 2025/26 academic year, strengthening cooperation and expanding our educational offer and opportunities.
And what kind of topics do your students choose for their BA and MA dissertations? What anthropological phenomena are they writing about?
A great variety – the range of interests is huge. For example, the clear trend of escapism in the Bieszczady mountains. I’m curious to learn why some people drop everything and retreat into nature. They also write about the difficult relations of local communities with mines and power plants, about transformations in social life, about walking as a method of architectural design, about the challenges of modern cities, the climate crisis, permaculture, about relations between humans and matter, plants, animals and technology. At the Institute I recently examined MA theses on machismo in Mexico, or on contemporary shamans in the West. There are theses on the refugee crisis and what is happening in Poland, Europe and the world. The breadth of these topics is great, and that is encouraging, because it shows that future anthropology graduates are highly open-minded, curious about the world and attentive – and that has a direct effect on what anthropological knowledge looks like and on the areas of our research and interest. It is extremely important to appreciate teaching, which is not treated seriously, for instance, in evaluation processes. A lot has been said recently about the so-called third evaluation criterion – universities’ relations with their social and economic environment – as if completely silencing the teaching dimension, which in fact is often the area where such cooperation with the broader environment and with social partners arises most naturally. When we go out into the neighbourhood around the university or the institute – into the streets, to the people who live in a given district of the city – it is precisely there that cooperation takes root, interdependencies form, and collaborative thinking is set in motion. And that is a vital space for teaching. It is a space that fosters relations with the social environment and also strongly supports the university’s social sensitivity and responsibility. Teaching also plays an important role in the creation and circulation of academic knowledge – and this flow is multidirectional and circular. This awareness is crucial, and yet it is often overlooked and undervalued.
Overlooked? I thought it had always been important.
It has always been said that academic teaching is important, but today we place it within broader contexts, reflecting on the social needs and problems that the university as an institution should address, if academia is to strengthen its essential role in its environment – in the local area, in the district, in the city, in the region. We do not conduct research and write publications solely for ourselves, driving the circulation of ideas within academia. The role of teaching and of broadly conceived education in processes of knowledge creation is often underestimated, but it is in fact a key element in the development of social and citizen science. This is becoming an increasingly visible current of scholarship – not only in the “bio-”, “techno-” or “info-” sciences, but also in the social sciences and the humanities. In the current evaluation process, when the university’s activity is assessed as an institution and when we as academics are assessed, the teaching dimension is often overlooked, with attention focused instead on publications and research grants. It is practically invisible even within the third criterion, although many of the relations and joint undertakings of universities with their social environment begin precisely with teaching activities that extend beyond the academy.
We focus on citations, on points…
Yes, for some time now those have been the rules of the game: we focus on points, and “point-itis” and “grant-itis” are everywhere. We have, admittedly, learnt these rules and usually cope quite well, even if we criticise the neoliberal, market-driven system that drives them – as well as the global trend of universities becoming increasingly like corporations oriented towards profit and competitiveness. But that is a separate issue. Teaching is the lifeblood of academic knowledge – we remember this not only when “the best of the best – in search of teaching excellence” awards are given, but also in the everyday reality of the university and in academic-social collaborations.
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Applications for the third edition of the teaching award are now open! We encourage you to take part in the competition!!!
The IDUB Teaching Excellence Awards competition, “The Best Among the Best – In Pursuit of Teaching Excellence”, is one of the initiatives under the “Excellence Initiative – Research University (IDUB)” programme, financed by the Polish Minister responsible for higher education and science for the years 2020–2026. The competition aims to enhance the quality of education and promote best practices in teaching at the University of Wrocław. Across the two previous editions, a total of 75 laureates have been recognised.
Academic staff from all units of the University of Wrocław are eligible to apply for the IDUB Teaching Excellence Award, provided they are employed on a full-time basis in a teaching, research-teaching, or research position on the day the competition is announced. Full details on how to apply for the award can be found on the IDUB website.
Read about other winners of the IDUB teaching award:
Prof. dr hab. Dagmara Jakimowicz, Wydział Biotechnologii
Dr hab. Maciej Matyka, prof. UWr, Wydział Fizyki i Astronomii
Prof. Paweł Gawrychowski, Wydział Matematyki i Informatyki
Dr Regina Solova o dydaktyce przekładu
Added by: Jacek Antczak
Date of publication: 14.08.2025
