In this comment, on Terri McCarty's Presidential Address, I focus on her dynamic approach to investigation that contributes to a vibrant and constructively critical exploration of the place of basic research, critical policy analysis, and activism in the anthropology of education and the social sciences more broadly.

I chronicle the changes in my research, especially those that have moved me closer to C. Wright Mills's call for a "sociological imagination" and Dell Hymes's reinvented anthropology. As I spend more time attempting to create and describe equitable educational environments and less time documenting educational inequality, I have adopted a version…

Students with learning disabilities work to avoid difficult tasks while trying to appear competent ("passing"). They also check, monitor, and evaluate their actions, a form of "metacognition." These are flip sides of the same coin of strategic interaction and are context-bound, not context-free activities. (Author/LHW)

Studies the use of microcomputers in four elementary school classrooms and their effect on classroom organization, teacher-student relations, and curriculum. Concludes that how people use a microcomputer, and not the machine's inherent features, determines how a microcomputer will be used in education. (FMW)

Discusses the social or interactional dimension that accompanies the academic aspects of schooling. Characterizes the competent student as one who integrates academic content and interactional form in teacher-directed activities. Emphasizes that teachers and students cooperatively contribute to the social organization of the classroom. (Author/BE)