Asian American studies becomes a department
BY LETISIA MÁRQUEZ
ucla today
The UCLA community is celebrating the recent approval of the Department
of Asian American Studies, the first department among UCLA’s
four ethnic studies programs. The Executive Board of the Academic
Senate voted in favor of departmentalization last June, and campus
administrators gave their approval to the proposal in August.
Currently, the department offers about 60 undergraduate and graduate
courses and enrolls nearly 3,000 students.
“This is truly a celebratory moment for Asian-American studies
at UCLA,” said Don Nakanishi, director of UCLA’s Asian
American Studies Center. “Both the center and department will
continue to be national leaders in the field of Asian-American studies.”
UCLA has produced more scholars in the field of Asian-American studies
than any other university in the nation.
The center began offering classes in 1969. In 1976, Asian-American
studies became an interdepartmental degree program (IDP) in the
UCLA College. It offered both undergraduate and graduate degrees.
In fact, UCLA was the first university in the nation to offer a
graduate degree in Asian- American studies.
Today, the center is recognized as the preeminent multidisciplinary
research institute focusing on the Asian-American population. While
working closely with the new department, the center will continue
to publish two leading journals and many books, and will continue
work on archival collections, ethno-communications and community
partnerships.
The new department will help the university community “think
of Asian Americans as central actors at the university and in society
and to recognize UCLA as the key player in an emerging interdisciplinary
field,” said Min Zhou, department chairperson and a sociology
professor.
Having departmental status will “elevate the prestige of the
degree for students,” Zhou said, and enable the department
to hire its own faculty. As an IDP, Asian American Studies had to
hire faculty jointly with an academic department.
“UCLA has seen such a tremendous growth in Asian-American
students, and many of these students major and minor in Asian-American
studies,” Zhou said. During 2003-2004, about 160 undergraduates
majored in Asian-American studies, and 50 students minored in the
field. The new department also has a master of arts program and
two concurrent master’s degree programs with the public health
and social welfare departments.
To celebrate departmentalization and also mark the 35th anniversary
of the center, an Oct. 21 event in Chinatown is being planned. To
find out more about the celebration, see www.sscnet.ucla.edu/aasc.
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