The Graves of Academe: ‘Harvard needs an Ethnic Studies concentration’ (#711 in a series)

An article in the Harvard Crimson bewails the absence of an “Ethnic Studies” concentration at the university. You can find it here.

This was the overwhelming consensus reached by College students in a 2021 survey — one that [then-] incoming President Claudine Gay tacitly began to work towards as FAS Dean. But even the creation of a concentration would not be a catch-all solution to a far more deep-rooted problem: Harvard’s systematic neglect of ethnic studies in the social sciences.

As a Government concentrator, I’ve felt this neglect firsthand, as it’s been a struggle to find ethnic studies courses that would count towards my concentration. In a recent interview, the Government Department’s Director of Undergraduate Studies, Nara Dillon, acknowledged to me the lack of Ethnic Studies courses within both the Government department and the College more broadly, expressing hope that recent hires could meet this need….

Today, ethnic studies faces challenges far beyond the Government Department. This academic year, History & Literature counted 132 courses for credit in European Studies, as compared to 25 in Latin American Studies, while altogether failing to offer subfields for Indigenous, Middle Eastern, Pan-Asian, or Pan-African Studies. Even if these fields were to be created, the College’s area-focused history departments — that is, History, History & Literature, and History of Art and Architecture — only offer eight undergraduate-focused courses in Indigenous history, five in Latin American history, three in Middle Eastern history, nine in Pan-African history, and eight in Pan-Asian history.

When including courses offered by other social science and humanities departments, these counts rise to 19 courses in Indigenous Studies, 26 in Latin American Studies, 11 in Middle Eastern Studies, 45 in Pan-African Studies, 59 in Pan-Asian Studies, and 110 in European studies.

A total of 146 unique courses representing the entire non-white world is woefully inadequate when compared to the 110 courses that exist for European Studies alone. This disparity starkly illustrates the College’s prioritization of white academia.

Notably, these course counts diverge from those offered by the History & Literature concentration and the Ethnicity, Migration and Rights secondary because my analysis does not include language courses offered in subfields — by intention. As Villareal recognized, there is a clear difference between language learning and Ethnic Studies, as the latter “has a very clear, politicized stance.”

“If it is not focused on the project of decolonization, if it is not rooted directly in communities, if it is not intersectional,” she told me, then it’s not Ethnic Studies.

While language courses may not necessarily teach ethnic studies content, it remains clear that such courses can open avenues for students to learn ethnic studies, as recordings of the histories and societies of people of color are far from limited to the English language. With that in mind, there is no denying the complete inadequacy of Harvard’s language course offerings. Filipino — the standardized form of Tagalog, currently the fourth most common language in the U.S. — will only be offered for the first time next semester after years of student activism.

In contrast, even when only ten undergraduates graduated with a degree in the concentration in 2021-2022, Classics is seen as too intrinsically valuable not to teach. Don’t get me wrong; Harvard should offer Classics. But there is no excuse for treating the languages and histories of white people that have been dead for thousands of years as if they have more inherent value than those of billions of people of color today….

Though there’s no denying that Harvard College needs an Ethnic Studies concentration, we can’t stop there. An Ethnic Studies concentration is a first step, but if it barely has any courses, what have we really accomplished? And even if we add ethnic studies courses, how much have we really changed if they’re only accessible for undergraduate students in a single concentration?

While the promise of new Ethnic Studies hires is a start, we need more than promises — we need an Ethnic Studies department where professors are afforded the same degree of job security and basic respect as their colleagues in other departments via tenure.

Further, to recognize the intrinsic value of ethnic studies, Harvard College should create an ethnic studies course requirement — stamping it as essential to an undergraduate education — similar to UCLA in 2015 and Princeton in 2020….

And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.

Forgive them, Lord, they know not what they do.