After a lengthy debate over a proposed amendment, the faculty failed to vote on the new proposed distribution requirements at its meeting Monday. Time only allowed for the approval of a controversial amendment before a sufficient number of faculty members opted to postpone further debate.
Should the amendment be approved, the changes to the distribution requirements proposed by the Committee on Curriculum and Educational Policy (CEP) trim down the current requirements to one course in each of the following areas: a first-year seminar, mathematics or statistical reasoning, the arts, natural sciences, "international perspectives," and "exploring social differences."
Debate Monday concerned a change in the wording of the "international perspectives" provision that would exclude courses concentrating on European traditions from fulfilling that requirement. The amendment was offered and defended by professor John Holt of the religion department and co-sponsored by nearly 40 faculty members.
About a dozen professors addressed the proposed amendment. Many who opposed it argued that the division between "Eurocentric" and "non-Eurocentric" is increasingly blurred by globalization and improvements in communication. Others were concerned by the process of dividing the world into separate pools of cultures.
"It's a messy issue," said sociology professor and CEP member Nancy Riley. "Where do countries like Japan fit in?" she asked. Riley also noted that many of the divisions traditionally seen between regions of the world, such as the gap between the rich and the poor, can be seen within societies as well as between them.
Dov Waxman, also a member of the CEP, echoed these concerns, warning that rewording the requirement would result in "entrenching" the "dichotomy between East and West."
Several other professors worried that excluding the study of European culture from the requirement presumes that students are learning about such topics in high school. German professor Steve Cerf said that "nothing could be further from the truth."
Helen Cafferty, Cerf's colleague in the German department, agreed, noting that she has seen a change in the way courses dealing with European traditions are taught in the 20 years since the faculty instituted the current "non-Eurocentric" requirement. "They now regularly include a critique of colonial thought and an examination of difference," she said.
Other professors rose to defend the amendment. David Collings of the English department said that while many students do lack a knowledge of European culture and tradition, they are "far less aware" of other cultures.
Women's Studies professor Kristen Ghodsee expressed concern that the CEP proposal threatened the viability of area studies programs on campus. "As someone who has taught non-Eurocentric courses," she said, "I find that many students take them because they need the requirement, but that in the end they learn a lot."
After more than a half-hour of debate, the vote on the amendment was called. The faculty voted by paper ballot and the amendment was approved by a razor-thin margin of 48 to 47.
In other business, faculty members also approved a change in recently adopted credit/D/fail policy. All students, regardless of class year, will have six weeks to declare a course credit/D/fail. In past practice all students except for those in their first semester at Bowdoin have had only two weeks to do so.
Faculty will hold a special meeting Monday afternoon to resume the debate about the distribution requirements.