KalingaTV News Network
Bhubaneswar: The Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS) achieved another landmark recently with two popular textbooks in Anthropology curriculum taught in USA including two whole pages on the institution. More importantly, these two pages come from two popular textbooks namely ‘Window on Humanity-A Concise Introduction to Anthropology’ and ‘Mirror for Humanity-A Concise Introduction to Cultural Anthropology (8th Edition) written by Conrad Philip Kottak and are based on the findings of a noted research scholar from the country.
These two books are referred for introductory level anthropology course taught in universities across the USA.
It is learnt that the scholar based on whose work the textbook curriculum on KISS has been prepared happens to be Fulbright Scholar & Professor in Anthropology, Ms. Christine Finnan. She had joined KISS during 2014-15 for doing extensive research on the institute. As part of her research work, she gathered stories and personal accounts about the school and its impact by interviewing 160 people including students, alumni, parents, staff, teachers, administrators and visitors. Prof. Finnan keenly observed how the students of the institute are achieving success in academics, sports and cultural field. She also visited tribal villages to find out why parents send their children so far to KISS. Subsequently, her case study report on KISS was published in a reputed Anthropological journal, from which the author of the books has sourced information on KISS. The author of the textbooks has sourced most of the information from the article that appeared last year in the Sapiens, a reputed anthropological magazine. This is a matter of pride for India, Odisha, KISS as well as entire Indian tribal community.
Notably, KISS tells the story of how a small idea, backed by the passion of one individual grew into an institution that has now become a revolution. KISS is world’s largest anthropology laboratory today. The students of Anthropology far and wide will know about KISS as a preserver of the world’s first population – indigenous. As a result, thousands of university students in the US will now have some knowledge about Odisha, Tribals of Odisha and KISS. As KISS is a successful model for eradication of poverty through education, it has become a subject of research for many eminent and reputed anthropologists from India and abroad.
Ms Kalinga