Community

Ethnic Studies Holds Panel

Defines Goals, Clears Misconceptions

by Natalie Park

Tuesday February 7, 2006

"There is opposition to Ethnic Studies. It comes from a political right, and it’s national. If you go onto David Horowitz’s website, that’s what you’re going to hear again and again. Anytime anyone of us hears someone say something that isn’t true, we need to make people responsible for it. It’s fallacious," said labor history professor Priscilla Murolo, a panelist at the Jan. 26 Ethnic Studies panel discussion in Reisinger.

Moderated by junior Teo Beauchamp and featuring senior Sarah Ihmoud and junior Rachelle Cruz as panelists, the event was sparsely attended. Yet if one more person came away from the evening with a clearer understanding of the Ethnic Studies campaign’s prerogatives and goals, perhaps it was not important that the room was not filled to capacity.

One of the problems related to the Ethnic Studies campaign last semester were the rumors and general confusion between all parties involved – the Coalition, the Senate, the administration and the student body.

Murolo, a member of the newly organized Ethnic Studies Committee, recalled being appalled at a meeting in Slonim House last fall when she heard the misconceptions that were being spread – such as rumors that the college would require everyone to take an Ethnic Studies course.

The questions and answers exchanged during the panel were a step toward creating a dialogue to clarify the definition and purpose of Ethnic Studies for the Coalition as well as for bystanders who were still confused. According to the panel, Ethnic Studies is not a concrete concept, but one that changes depending on various factors, including the geographic location of the college, the demographic of students of color, what subjects are covered in the pre-existing curriculum, as well as how the school already organizes its course catalog. In Sarah Lawrence’s case, courses that may fall under the heading of "Women’s Studies" may be derived from many different disciplines, such as literature or history. The panel expects Ethnic Studies to come to fruition in a similar way.

Reasons for the necessity of Ethnic Studies were outlined.

One of the most pragmatic reasons for creating the label of Ethnic Studies is that it would make it easier to identify in the course catalog which classes would offer materials examining the issues of people of color in the United States. Beyond the label, creating Ethnic Studies would establish a permanent infrastructure in which classes cannot fall through the cracks simply because guest professors who were teaching them have left, an experience Cruz has had in the past. Murolo quipped that the school would never fail to offer a French class, but that it could, and has, neglected to reinstate classes that involved Ethnic Studies materials. Beauchamp stressed that another key benefit of Ethnic Studies would be to encourage "a greater influx of students of color, and to have the courses to reflect them."

When asked what the courses will be about, Murolo responded, "Ethnic Studies developed as a study of people in the U.S., a question of assimilation, politics, prejudice and racism.

Look at who are the people studied in Ethnic Studies in 1950; it would be the Italians and Jews because they were coming into colleges for the first time, and then in the 60s and 70s, Asian Americans and Latinos. It reflects who’s there. There’s a logic."

At one point, Ihmoud requested that those in the audience not regard the table that the panel was seated at as a boundary, and to freely express their own ideas.

The dialogue has merely begun and hopefully everyone will keep it going.

The Coalition meets on Thursdays at 9 p.m. in Common Ground in Bates where Ethnic Studies and other issues are discussed.