Opinion
Ethnic Studies, Western Civ, And Navel Gazing
"I can be pretty sure that if I ask to talk to 'the person in charge,' I will be facing a person of my race." In the annual Disorientation guide, a pamphlet put out by campus activist groups, a piece entitled "White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack" by Peggy McIntosh includes this in a list of advantages which she, as a white person, enjoys over people of other races. That is, of course, racism. Ms. McIntosh's privilege is not that she expects to be treated respectfully or not discriminated against: she feels it is enough simply to deal with someone of her own race, as if race were the be-all and end-all of all human interaction.

This idea, unfortunately, is so common that many Stanford students seem to regard it as self-evident. The perpetual string of complaints about the racial make-up of Stanford's faculty always come back to the claim that with out more professors of race X, students of race X will have nowhere to turn for advisors (the professors of race Y, of course, have a different skin color, so they couldn't possibly understand a student of race X). All of these students would be horrified at the idea that one race is better than another, they're just different. That's why each race needs its own advisors and its own dorm. All equal, but separate.

The claim that each race needs its own ethnic studies program rests on the same fallacy. The belief that the study of a race is its own discipline, and that African-American history is different from white or chicano/a history rather than all three being inherent intermingled, is frightening. It leads to the abandonment of a shared discussion of different ideas, replacing it with a set of sterile intellectual enclaves unable to communicate with each other.

There is a grave danger in believing that the history (or literature, or anything else) of one race can be chopped off from the others and become its own province. The reality is a far more interesting network of ideas criss-crossing from person to person across almost any boundary imaginable. At few times in history, and never in the United States, have races been divided from each other to the point that ideas were not being interchanged. Not only is it inaccurate, it is counterproductive, since much of the value of an idea is not the idea itself, but its comparison to other ideas. That is the greatest risk in the current obsession about so-called diversity: that it leads to the abandonment of a far more important kind of diversity - a diversity of ideas.

All this has been said before, often in this paper. However, conservatives should not expect to simply sit back pointing out this flaw in each successive multicultural proposal. Instead, conservatives need to drive it out of their own arguments. The right-wing focus on protecting the study of Western civilization, and demanding that the study of the Western canon be a central part of every education, while deriding any attempt to add other books as political correctness represents the same sort of navel gazing.

The Western canon is important for a number of reasons. It forms a common base of ideas which not only allows us to communicate, but allows us to understand why, to a large degree, America is the way it is. In her article, Ms. McIntosh suggests that one of the core elements of "white privilege" is a more innate knowledge of the customs and standards of American culture. To remove Western culture from the curriculum would hurt minorities far more than white students because it is that portion of the curriculum more than any other which provides students which an understanding of how to work within modern America.

Conservatives, however, often make the unfortunate mistake of suggesting that once the traditional Greek philosophers, French playwrights, and so on have been read, a student's education in the humanities can be considered sufficient. But what value is there in reading the Western canon in a void? To do that would be no different than studying black literature and no other. Ideas have to be contrasted with other ones to be useful. Just as the left is wrong to separate racial studies from the all others, the right is wrong to study only the Western canon.

All Stanford graduates should read, not only Plato and Shakespeare, but a selection of works not traditionally present in Western civilization style courses. They should do this not to be politically correct, and not out of some ill-defined notion of inclusiveness, but simply because it provides a better education to do so. To study only the so-called "dead white males" or to not study them is like staring at the side of a square: all you can see is two dimensions. Only be examining it from different angles can anyone really begin to understand it in depth.

No student should graduate Stanford without having their ideas challenged, and this applies to conservatives just as much as liberals. Stanford should not teach that America is a terrible, elitist country, but no student should graduate without knowing why some people want to. It cuts both ways: Stanford should not indoctrinate students into thinking that America is a great country, but it should at least expose students to the argument.

Henry Towsner is a sophomore majoring in Mathematical and Computational Science. He wishes he could gaze at his earlobe, too, but he can't.

Page last modified on Wednesday, 01-Mar-2006 23:57:07 MST.