Abstract:

As an important part of people’s daily life, diary is not only a way of recording educational life, but also plays a crucial role in historical research and culture shaping. But the educational value of diary in personal growth, family inheritance, historical research and other aspects has not been fully excavated. Through a dialogue with Alan Macfarlane, Professor of Social Anthropology Department of Cambridge University, this paper reiterates the important educational value of diary, which could be used as a way of recording the educational life, as a research method in historical anthropology, and as an action path to promote the growth of teachers and students. It also explains the main reasons for writing diary and the supplementary forms of diary such as weekly diary, monthly diary and letter, and puts forward the new style of diary writing named community writing, combined with the concept of common life of reading and writing in the New Education Initiative.

Key words: diary, educational values, social anthropology, community writing