Asian-American studies began on the West Coast during the 1960s as part of a trend to pluralize college curricula. Now, the Dartmouth administration is considering creating its own minor in the field.
The Pan Asian Council, which seeks to facilitate communication between student-run Asian-American campus organizations and build coalitions between Asian communities, has recently worked with faculty and the administration to disseminate information about AAS.
Statistically speaking, however, Dartmouth students encompassing all ethnicities have shown interest in an AAS minor. The Pan Asian Council is currently circulating a signature letter addressed to the deanery with names of students, faculty, and alumni.
"So far, we have collected over 600 signatures," said Morna Ha '04, who has been working on AAS curricular development for the past two years. "It helps to have interactions with people who will take a proactive approach to make sure the initiative is sustained."
Marie Choi '06, an intern for the Pan Asian Council and a lead advocate of the program, said the expansion of AAS into Dartmouth's curriculum is an opportunity to enhance the College's reputation for diversity.
"AAS is not a community issue, but a campus issue pertaining to Dartmouth's academic mission," Choi said. "Dartmouth promises the students an education that prepares students to appreciate differences and similarities among all societies, and AAS should be an integral part of that mission."
History professor Vernon Takeshita, who specializes in Asian-American history and is advising to initiators of the AAS campaign, said the rationale for an AAS curriculum concerns the intimate connection between consequences of the United States' international decisions and Asia's movement toward globalization and immigration.
"Personal interest is a legitimate reason to pursue Asian-American Studies as a way to explore relations of family history, but there are larger issues," he said. "Discrimination that occurred in Asia is a reflection of America's current civil rights laws and diplomatic agreements."
Members of the Pan Asian Council submitted an open letter May 1 urging the institution of a program at the College to Dean of the Faculty Michael Gazzaniga.
"AAS as an academic field has experienced tremendous growth in the past few decades and will add to Dartmouth's illustrious curriculum," the letter stated. "Furthermore, the number of Asian and Asian-American students has been on the rise yet their representation in the curriculum is lacking: the 2002 Race Matters Conference Report specifically calls for equal states for ethnic studies."
The letter also presented other recommendations, the most important one being the hiring of more tenure-track professors. Choi said that no Dartmouth professor in the AAS field is tenure-tracked, which makes the attainment of the minor that much more difficult.
Takeshita agreed that attaining more professors in the field of AAS is the first step in the process of implementing the program.
"Everything is contingent on an increase in faculty," said Takeshita, who currently teaches two history classes in the Asian-American field. "Student interest in the classes is not a problem, but a program can not exist without a faculty to teach the topic."
But the administration's response was not hopeful.
According to Choi, no one has explicitly said they do not believe AAS should exist, but neither has anyone taken a leadership role to advocate creating the minor.
"The main response is that 'change takes time,'" Choi said. "As students, we understand the notion of progress, but we can not delay further action on the part of the administration and the deanery."
Chien Wen Kung '04, who objected to an AAS program two years ago, said he has grown more sympathetic to student organizations on campus but remains skeptical that ethnic student programs are too political.
"I attended a symposium workshop, which confirmed my suspicions that ethnic programs have specific political and social objectives," Kung said. "I think of academia more as disinterested inquiry taking precedence over the political agenda."
Kung argued that once AAS is established, there is no end to other minority groups pushing for "their place in the sun."
"If a student is passionate about Asian-American studies, they will naturally gravitate towards these issues," he said. "I am a firm believer that an education should enable students to transcend identities, rather than reinforce identities," he said.
Kung called programs such as AAS a "pet program" because most people pushing for policies such as an AAS minor are solely Asian-American students.
