info February 17, 2015 Academic, Politics

Not Major Enough

There are nine majors out of the thirty-eight offered at Amherst College that focus on specific regional areas. Of those nine regional areas, six are European* (seven if you count the Classics major, which you should). One is America, but not Central America or South America. The last of these majors is the catch-all Asian Languages and Civilizations.

Nothing on Latin American, Caribbean, or African regions.

Do I even have to say it?

Fine.

In a world where academia is hugely Eurocentric, a world that is still very much feeling the effects of colonialism and that is increasingly characterized by interactions among people with different roots, are we seriously going to pretend this isn’t a big deal?

I’m not going to get into very specific and unimportant details such as, should they choose to, an Amherst student could potentially obtain a Five College certificate in Latin American Studies, or how a Spanish major could potentially also encompass Latin American cultures. For similar reasons, I’m not going to argue that one major, Asian Languages and Civilizations can adequately cover “the languages, societies, and cultures of the major civilizations that stretch from the Arab World to Japan” when the major civilizations that stretch from Russia to France demand seven separate and specific areas of study.

Do I really have to say it?

That’s the academic equivalent of calling Africa a country.

Yes, there is a nice variety of courses actually offered at the college that represent specific cultural groups and non-European perspectives. These courses are so, so important, and I don’t want to minimize their impact. In fact, I think if the college really tried to, a Latin American studies department could be forged around courses currently offered at the college with minimal expansion. The Asian Languages and Cultures monolith could easily be broken into separate departments.

And it wouldn’t just be a change in name. It would be institutional recognition for the validity (academic and otherwise) of histories, cultures and languages outside of Europe.

I guess I’ll just have to wait on it.

* American Studies, Asian Lang/Civ, Classics, English, European Studies, French, German, Russian, Spanish.

26Comments

Add yours

1

unknown on February 17, 2015 at 11:16 pm
Reply

Yaas
2

Anonymous on February 18, 2015 at 2:11 am
Reply

Whatever
3

Anonymous on February 18, 2015 at 6:02 am
Reply

Amherst College is overly focused on the West issues because, well, it’s located in the West. I wouldn’t expect a university in Seoul, Delhi, or Beijing to have separate departments of French, German, and Classics either. And I think rather than increasing funding for a bunch of humanities departments, we’d be better off promoting the science majors more. Amherst is already well-known as a top college in the humanities, but not many people are aware that it is top-notch in the sciences as well. Sciences need to be given more of a voice in the college.
- 4
  
  camidmngz on February 18, 2015 at 10:04 am
  Reply
  
  That’s a pretty passive attitude to have. If institutions (especially ones like Amherst) don’t make changes Eurocentrism is never going to die. And last time I checked America ISN’T Europe, so why the disproportionate focus on that region? To me, it’s jarring but I understand why it might seem insignificant to you. PS they are already putting a lot of focus on sciences/maths especially with the construction of a new science center. I don’t get your comment.
  - 5
    
    Anonymous on February 18, 2015 at 1:52 pm
    
    Amherst has always been a “white” institution, it still is even to this day, culturally speaking. It’s located in America but it was founded by white people who had European backgrounds, so no wonder it’s Eurocentric and America-centric. In fact, one might say it’s Emily Dickinson-centric, naturally. But anyway, Amherst is way too small to harbor realistic ambitions to be a truly “global” institution where all cultures are studied equally. There are only 450 students a class. For some of the smaller humanities departments, it’s hard even to get more than 5 majors a year: how do you think it would ever be sustainable to have more than 60 departments, some of which would have only 1-2 people majoring in them per year? How would you justify the funding? If you’re Berkeley or Michigan or Harvard it might be realistic to do this, but not at a small liberal arts college. There is no dire need to make Amherst College a global institution.
    
    But Eurocentrism in an institution isn’t necessarily bad, anymore than Asia-centrism or Africa-centrism would be in any other institution. In fact as an international student, I look forward more to taking classes about Dickinson, Shakespeare, and Plato at Amherst rather than taking classes on Chinese history. I know this attitude might not be common, even among international students, but my line of thought is: I’ve gone halfway around the world to a place which is renowned for teaching about dead white European males; why should I spend my time studying Asian history when I can do that in Asia? I mean, if you go on a trip to Thailand, you wouldn’t spend your time there eating McDonald’s right? The important thing is to remember that the European way of looking at things is just one viewpoint. I think the wealth of options available in studying non-European cultures already available at Amherst and the Five Colleges is more than sufficient to remind us of this.
  - 6
    
    camidmngz on February 18, 2015 at 2:08 pm
    
    Following that logic, it makes no sense to change the mascot because Amherst was founded by white men so who cares how current students feel! Also, if there’s such little interest in the humanities wouldn’t it make sense to consolidate all the majors that focus on Europe into a “European Languages and Civilizations” major? That way they might get more than five applicants a year!
  - 7
    
    Anonymous on February 20, 2015 at 12:27 pm
    
    Following that logic, it makes no sense to change the mascot because Amherst was founded by white men so who cares how current students feel!
    
    That’s a disingenuous comparison. Are you literally suggesting that grouping studies of different Asian regions into one “Asian studies” department is the same as supporting a mascot based on a historical figure who committed genocide? Tell me, is it insulting to Americans that we have a department of American studies instead of departments of Northern US studies, Southern US studies, and Midwest US studies? How about that we have a department of Gender studies, isn’t that also committing the grievous offense of lumping all genders into one big block? You’re trying to spin a moral appeal into your argument, but in reality it’s just a question of numbers and sustainability.
  - 8
    
    camidmngz on February 20, 2015 at 12:35 pm
    
    I was talking specifically about the idea that since white men thought it was okay 200 years ago, that’s just the way it is. And don’t underestimate the importance of legitimizing non-European histories for the many many students of African, Latin American, Caribbean, Middle Eastern and even Native American backgrounds. It’s not a simple queation of numbers and sustainability, though the resources and limitations of the college do come into play here. It’s a question of whose histories matter.
- 9
  
  Anonymous on February 19, 2015 at 12:48 am
  Reply
  
  Except that universities in Seoul and Beijing (not sure about Delhi but I would assume that they do too) DO have separate departments of French, German, and Classics. Yes they have their own departments for their respective cultures, histories, and languages, but to an absurd degree, Eastern universities have the same amount of separation of departments and majors in Eurocentric subjects as Western institutions.
  - 10
    
    Anonymous on February 20, 2015 at 12:30 pm
    
    You are right. I take back that statement of mind. I’m honestly very surprised at discovering that Peking University has separate departments for French, German, Russian, Japanese, Korean, and even Arabic languages. But I guess it is the biggest and most prestigious university in China. Still though, it’s unfair to compare that with Amherst College, which only has 1700 students. I’m pretty sure a college of a similar size in China or Korea would not have separate departments for different European languages.
11

terrasirradient on February 18, 2015 at 10:51 am
Reply

Unless one focuses on First Nation cultures, then the history of Central and South America is Eurocentric as well. Sometimes people forget Spain and Portugal are European. That being said, I have a question: Understanding that not any one college, especially one as small as Amherst, can keep up the quality and try to address every discipline at the same time, isn’t that what a four college and large University exchange is all about — to offer enormous opportunity without redundancy? I suspect — but honestly don’t know — but should one wish to major in Latin or South American History, a major could be assembled among the offering of courses in the immediate. I frequently crossed the river to Northampton to study Asian Art, which was not offered at Amherst during my tenure.
- 12
  
  camidmngz on February 18, 2015 at 12:33 pm
  Reply
  
  I completely agree, but that doesn’t mean that in studying Spain/Portugal one will come to understand contemporary Latin America. My problem isn’t so much that courses aren’t available (they definitely are, especially if you want to take some at the other Five Colleges), but that Amherst has not put the effort into consolidating these courses into recognized majors. Thus, students who want to pursue these studies are forced to go through the process of declaring and creating an independent major themselves or just settling for a certificate. These to me don’t have the same weight as an official Amherst College major and that has implications for students’ employment prospects, grad school, etc.
13

amherst18 on February 18, 2015 at 9:12 pm
Reply

Ultimately, I think the problem is not a deliberate eurocentrism but that Amherst, as a small college, simply can’t justify hiring several new tenure track professors in new fields when they are already searching for new faculty in growing programs (like math, which has exploded in popularity here) while also replacing retiring faculty in other bread-and-butter departments like history, chemistry, philosophy, etc.

There are plenty of selective institutions that have the size to support a separate ____ Studies department, but one trade-off of going to a small liberal arts college is that even with an endowment as big as ours, there will not be enough students and faculty to sustain all the majors that a big school can offer. NYU, for example, with far fewer resources than Amherst on a per-student basis, has the sheer numbers, as one of the nation’s largest private schools, to offer Africana Studies, Luso-Brazilian Studies, etc.
14

Anonymous on February 18, 2015 at 10:17 pm
Reply

maybe we should continue the eurocentric education because you identified alaska as canada. shouldnt we focus on american geography before we move on?
- 15
  
  jhildebrand15 on February 18, 2015 at 10:59 pm
  Reply
  
  The graphic is clearly meant to illustrate how people group geographic regions into useless stereotypes—Alaska is grouped with Canada because it belongs to Northernmost geographic area of North America. We both know that it’s not actually suggesting that Alaska falls within Canada’s national boundaries, that Mexico spans all of Central America and the Caribbean, or that Africa is a country.
  
  I think engaging the actual argument here is more important than trying to zing the author.
- 16
  
  camidmngz on February 19, 2015 at 12:11 am
  Reply
  
  Actually that region is called Shitty Music And Bears.
17

Anonymous on February 18, 2015 at 10:39 pm
Reply

What about anthropology? If you study anthropology you could potentially focus on any culture you’d like and even spend a year writing a thesis about it.
- 18
  
  camidmngz on February 19, 2015 at 12:13 am
  Reply
  
  That’s cool and I might be interested in that but I’m more interested in discussing the glaring difference between how we treat Eurocentric studies and other perspectives, cultures, languages and histories.
19

amherst18 on February 19, 2015 at 8:52 am
Reply

But there are many classes offered throughout the college that focus on eurocentrism as a phenomenon in intellectual history–for example, that was the topic of my entire freshman seminar, “Asia in the European Mind.” And there are many faculty spread out among departments like history and poli sci who do a lot of work in this area. If they don’t have a separate departmental label, are they really less effective?
- 20
  
  camidmngz on February 19, 2015 at 11:23 am
  Reply
  
  Not necessarily but the questiont then is, with more recognition would they be MORE effective? I think so.
21

Anonymous on February 19, 2015 at 3:25 pm
Reply

This is a fantastic article, that really resonated with me as a former Asian Languages and Civilizations major. I graduated with a degree in it yet I never took courses outside of my regional concentration. If you asked me about my Amherst experience studying China for example (after noticing my degree), I’d barely know anything to talk about, which was always frustrating to me. And I’ve consistently had to explain to employers that though I have a degree in Asian Civ, I technically only studied one language/culture. Always wished there was a more specific option there. Thanks for this!
22

Anonymous on February 19, 2015 at 3:29 pm
Reply

Here’s the though…a lot of these are languages: Spanish, Russian, and German teach these languages for the most part, and then have a culture/literature component, which usually is also listed as European Studies. So…what do we do there?
23

Elaine Vilorio on February 23, 2015 at 12:13 am
Reply

The “Five College certificate in Latin American Studies” also covers Caribbean and Latino studies, to clarify. It’s formally called Latin American, Caribbean and Latino Studies. Here’s a link to it for anyone who’s interested: https://www.fivecolleges.edu/latinamericanstudies/.

Also to supplement this article, there’s an ad hoc Latino Studies committee working to make Latino Studies a major or a tract within an existing department. If the author or anyone would like to know more about that, you can contact me, Dean Rick Lopez, or La Causa.

It’s also noteworthy to add that creating a department is more difficult than meets the eye. Amherst College is a bureaucratic institution,as are virtually all institutions. One has to take into account that professors who teach Latin American studies courses, for example, may be jointly-appointed, so they have obligations to two departments that already exist, or they may have administrative duties. For example, Rick Lopez, the go-to Latin American historian in the History department is a dean AND is a joint professor in Environmental Studies and History. Professor Corrales, who is the Latin Americanist in the poly sci department is also the head of the department. The burden of creating a department falls on professors, with accompanying student support of course. But professors will be the ones doing the work. If they already have other obligations, bringing them together to create a department is difficult. One would then think hiring more professors not bound by existing departments might help. But while Amherst College is a wealthy institution, it still houses competing interests and so competing desired allocations of wealth, which means departments are vying for hiring lines. Why should a new department get a line while another one has been waiting to get one? I just want to share that it’s not a simple as “minimal expansion.”

Thanks for bringing this topic to light through your article!
- 24
  
  camidmngz on February 23, 2015 at 1:00 am
  Reply
  
  I never meant to insinuate that creating a department was easy, I know it’s not! Like your comment shows, it’s incredibly complicated. I’m glad to hear that there is a committee working on at least a Latin American studies department. I’ve also gotten feedback from people saying that the Asian Languages and Civilizations department is fantastic and works extremely well. I’m not trying to undermine the work professors are currently doing. I just wanted to talk about the huge overrepresentation of Eurocentric studies and maybe rally people who care (and they’re out there) to put some pressure on the administration. Thanks for this comment.
  - 25
    
    Elaine Vilorio on February 23, 2015 at 1:25 am
    
    Appreciate the clarifications
    
    Also as a last note, Latino Studies is different from Latin American Studies. The former focuses on the diaspora of people from Latin America and the latter on the inhabitants of Latin America.
    
    Looking forward to more posts from you
    
    Have a restful night Camila!
26

Anonymous on February 27, 2015 at 10:32 pm
Reply

Ugh stop writing things, you’re so annoying

Share this:

Like this:

Related