As prospective students stumble through campus tours this month, I wonder which Tufts they are being presented: the Tufts composed of students, educators and administrators, or the Tufts advertised on bulletins and in magazines? As the relatively new administration embarks on its first years with us, let it be our hope and confidence that it will work fervently in closing this gap. As I reflect, however, on my past four years, "active citizenship" and "research education" are campus buzzwords that evoke bittersweet feelings from me, as if by reflex.
Recently, a major concern at Tufts has been that of minority representation and integration. In fact, President Monaco hopes to chair a diversity council that may address these issues of diversity. What, however, is meant by the phrase, "issues of diversity?" Is it simply an issue of minority student representation in a government body? Or is it just a matter of raising the quota of accepted applicants who come from working−class, colored or marginal communities? Although student−body demographic redistribution is important and necessary, it is sorely insufficient, and such insufficiency has become all the more apparent during my time here at Tufts. Individual empowerment and structural change must be part of any initiative taken on by the administration for profound, long−lasting betterment to ensue.
Over the summer, I watched how the Capen House, where the Africana Center resides, underwent a facelift. Forty−plus years overdue for attention, 8 Professors Row continues to be renovated. In the most sadistic of ironies, the house enjoys new leather seats as it continues to struggle with an alleged termite infestation. Interestingly, this contradiction best characterizes the current initiative for an Africana Studies department spearheaded by Tufts students and reluctantly taken on by Dean Berger−Sweeney. The attention given by the administration, though relieving, is akin to new leather seats in a termite−infested house. Perhaps we shouldn't be so surprised by this type of hollow attention when, despite the strong support of a group of non−Tufts professors for an Africana Studies department last year, their report was not mentioned in the dean's letter.
In this letter, which was released on Sept. 14, the recently appointed Dean Berger−Sweeney argued for an Africana Studies program instead of an Africana Studies department, and she appointed a team of faculty members to review and propose a comprehensive program that may be considered by the full Arts and Sciences faculty as soon as the next academic year. I would like to address two shortcomings in such an approach. In supporting a program instead of a department, Dean Berger−Sweeney refers to other successful programs such as International Relations and Community Health, but she fails to mention how these programs have the support of the Fletcher School and the Medical School, respectively. What type of departmental support would a nascent Africana Studies program have? What about the Latino Studies program, the American Studies program or the Women's Studies program, among others, that may experience relative institutional neglect as well?
Benefits that come with "department status" include the ability to hire and tenure faculty with departmental statements and voting capacity, as well as considerable funding that is not simply petty cash. This brings me to my second point: the appointed initiative team. Not all of the nine faculty members are tenured yet. Contributing to a continually sensitive and historically complex subject (i.e., the status of marginal groups within academia) may be significantly limited by the fear of backlash if livelihood is not secured. The politics of a tenure−track may understandably but woefully frustrate an all too necessary direct, candid and effective discussion. Moreover, without bringing into question the faculty members' distinction in education and research within their respective fields, I ask what critical lens they will bring to the discussion given that not all have engaged critical theories due to the nature of their disciplines. Besides, when a lot of our administration comes from what is usually called the "hard sciences," of which neuroscience is prime here at Tufts, we are left to hope that decisions will be made on the unmediated experiences of background and upbringing. Given the deficiency of a strong critical framework cognizant of systemic disparity and unaware bias, such hope is at best precarious and is usually overridden by fiscal concern, micro−managing strategies and an anemic liberal agenda.
We must move beyond inclusive multiculturalism and toward radical, egalitarian integration. We simply cannot add and stir and hope for the best. We must challenge ourselves to thorough transformation both individually and structurally. An Africana Studies program that lacks the institutional support of established departments and is lumped together with other similar programs under a single diversity office is sorely insufficient and dilutes the transformative potential of all programs involved. Hiring, giving tenure and budgeting capacity are all significantly limited by a grouping of various programs under a consolidated management, which is the administration's current proposed plan. Various horizontal, dialogical relations between various programs are always needed, even more so now, whereas a single vertical, hierarchical relation between all programs and the administration may bring more problems than it resolves.
Of course, activism presupposes awareness. In a so−called post−racial, post−queer America, awareness of the current systemic disparities is no longer optional but indispensible, especially for Tufts, which prides itself in cutting−edge research and scholarship. A note to the Board of Trustees: Innovation, courage and determination are also found outside the laboratory. In her letter, however, Dean Berger−Sweeney argued that curricular initiatives be kept optional, suggestive and subject to the affinity and expertise of university faculty. Again, this seems symptomatic of a liberal agenda that moves toward inclusion as one collects exotic souvenirs for display purposes only. If we are required to take math, science and literature courses, which do not explicitly foment active citizenship, shouldn't we be required to engage seriously and critically with those issues that directly though subtly affect us and our world? Isn't that equally, if not more so, conducive to the educational vision of Tufts University? Lamentably, the current "required" courses might themselves be shot through with an affluent, Eurocentric, heteronormative, patriarchal bias.
I repeat, in our hurting world, awareness cannot remain an option, an additional credit or a "cool" course to fill a schedule. It must become integral to a liberal arts education that looks towards critical thinking. And no, re−hauling current courses to include "minority topics" is not enough. We do not simply need Black History Month. We need Black consciousness. We do not simply need Latino Heritage Week. We need to confront the Latino experience. We do not simply need a class unit on feminism. We need feminist pedagogy. In terms of university education, then, we must require serious engagement with critical theory. Otherwise, we will produce at best well−meaning, but anemic, graduates.
I submit these thoughts with the humility accorded by my limited vision, but I refuse to allow these limitations to frustrate my desire, our need to truly better our education and in the process ourselves.
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