PERSPECTIVES ON UCLA’S ETHNIC STUDIES DECISION : Con: Departmental Status Is Critical

From their inception, many Chicano studies programs and departments were viewed as vehicles to foster a broadening of intellectual discourse that would include as subjects Latinos, blacks and Asians.

That many faculty and administrators were threatened by such a paradigm, which would require interdisciplinary scholarship, is not surprising, given the general bias in higher education that emphasizes specialization and rewards clear disciplinary boundaries for teaching and scholarship. Contrary to popular misconceptions, ethnic studies departments do not Balkanize students and faculty along racial and ethnic lines. They are often the only departments on campus that provide the needed comparative analysis of communities that can only enhance the critical-thinking skills of all students and provide greater understanding of the racial and ethnic tensions that permeate American society. On many campuses, they are the only safe space for students to question the status quo and to begin the intellectual odyssey that has become more challenging for today’s students.

Although campus administrators have argued that department status is not necessary with joint appointments and borrowing of faculty from other departments, not many departments would agree that such an academic structure promotes high-quality research and curriculum. Department status is critical for ethnic-studies programs, since the need to develop a cohesive, interdisciplinary unit for curriculum development, teaching and research requires budgetary autonomy to select faculty that will best meet those needs.

It is well known that borrowed faculty and joint appointments are risky for untenured faculty. The onerous requirements for junior faculty to publish in disciplinary trade journals and the pressure to meet home department teaching obligations result in Chicano studies programs receiving little if any benefits from faculty that are borrowed or who share appointments.

Often, those joint faculty who do commit research and teaching time in Chicano studies suffer the wrath of their colleagues either during the tenure and promotion process or through exclusion of perks. There must be a critical mass of scholars committed to the development of a program, and these individuals must be evaluated and hired by their peers. This is virtually impossible in Chicano studies programs or departments that rely on affirmative-action hires in other disciplines. The assumption that a Chicano in social welfare or literature has expertise or interest in Chicano studies due to his or her having brown skin is as ludicrous as assuming that an Anglo faculty member in physics has expertise in colonial history.

Visionary education requires us to go beyond traditional models, to expand our intellectual horizons and to take risks on diversity that initially challenge the status quo. This is beyond the politics of entitlement, but a recognition of legitimate areas of investigation.