Government funding for area studies is controversial. The president of MESA wants you to think it isn't.
Tag: Title VI
Title VI verdict
I'm closely reading the new Title VI review prepared by a panel of the National Research Council for the National Academies, at the request of Congress. (Read the press release here.) I'm not quite done considering the implications of the review for language and area studies, and for Middle Eastern studies in particular. But I'm …
Accountability and Vindication (Title VI)
On March 28, 2007, Inside Higher Education's Scott Jaschik reported on the findings of the National Research Council study of Title VI. The article is here. Martin Kramer posted this comment at the site. Posted retroactively here at Sandbox. This report names and quotes me as a Title VI critic who feels vindicated by the …
Speaking Title VI Truth to Power
Tomorrow, Tuesday, the Committee to Review the Title VI and Fulbright-Hays International Education Programs will release its final report at a press briefing at the National Academies in Washington. There will be a live audio webcast of the briefing at 12:30 Eastern (details here). The committee has concluded a Congressionally mandated review of government programs …
Thank you, Senator Frist
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) gave a speech this past Sunday, and he said the following, which I am pleased to bring to the attention of my colleagues in Middle Eastern studies. As many of you know, since the Cold War, the United States has funded university-based Area Studies Centers to train men and …
Title VI: Bring the Languages Back
As I've just reported, the National Research Council of the National Academies has commenced its $1.5 million review of Title VI, the federal subsidy program for language and area studies in universities. The first question members of the review committee should ask themselves is this: is Title VI doing the job Congress thinks it's doing? …
Title VI: Let the games begin!
Remember Title VI? That's the federal subsidy program for area studies in universities. It's this money that funds 17 National Resource Centers on the Middle East at U.S. universities. (One example: the Middle East Institute at Columbia, directed by Rashid Khalidi.) An average National Resource Center, with fellowships in the package, will receive about half a million …
Squeezing goobers in Congress
Yesterday, President Bush announced a new National Security Language Initiative, which has the potential to fix America's debilitating deficit in foreign language proficiency in the military and government. I'll say more about it later, but I've already been struck by a few of the reactions in Middle Eastern studies. Consider this one. F. Gregory Gause …
Confessions of a Scheming Vice Provost
A little over a year ago, USA Today ran an editorial against H.R. 3077, the Title VI reform bill for the program that lavishes federal subsidies on area studies in universities. (Readers of this space know that I've been an ardent supporter of Title VI reform, and particularly of an advisory board that would match …
Title VI: A Majority for Defunding
Above are the results of the month-long Title VI poll, conducted at this website and at Campus-Watch.org. And here are the usual caveats: it's not scientific, it's only the opinions of people who visit these websites, people might have voted twice (though they couldn't from the same IP address), etc. Now, having said all that, …
Title VI: Turn on the Defogger
H.R. 3077 would create an advisory board for Title VI, the federal subsidies program for area studies (including Middle Eastern studies) in our universities. Part of the strategy of the bill's opponents has been defensive, to claim that Title VI is humming along just fine. If it ain't broke, why fix it? This is the …
H.R. 3077: The Education of Alan Dershowitz
On Monday of last week, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs plenum met in Faneuil Hall in Boston to honor Alan Dershowitz, renowned Harvard law professor. The JCPA is an umbrella for the nation's Jewish organizations. Dershowitz is highly regarded in the Jewish community, especially for his book The Case for Israel. He came to …
Continue reading H.R. 3077: The Education of Alan Dershowitz
USA Today, Duped by Michigan Profs!
USA Today runs an editorial this morning against the advisory board provision of H.R. 3077, the International Studies in Higher Education Act. The editorial opens by presenting the University of Michigan's faculty as scholars with their shoulders to the wheel: Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the University of Michigan has tried to help the …
H.R. 3077: The Dean’s Deception
Congress is back to business in Washington. That business includes H.R.3077, the International Studies in Higher Education Act, which the House of Representatives passed unanimously last autumn. Now the bill is in the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP), chaired by Senator Judd Gregg, a New Hampshire Republican. The bill, it will …
U. of California’s Deans Don’t Quite Get It
This morning's San Francisco Chronicle runs an op-ed on H.R. 3077 by two heavy-hitters in the University of California system: Geoffrey Garrett, vice provost and dean of the UCLA International Institute, and David Leonard, dean of International and Area Studies at Berkeley. It's the most intelligent thing that academics have produced so far in response …
Continue reading U. of California’s Deans Don’t Quite Get It
Yale Daily News Flunks Verbal
As a Princetonian, my expectations from Yale have never been very high. But I always assumed that the best of its students—or at least those students who edit the Yale Daily News—could read a text in English. This morning, even that assumption was shaken. I refer to an editorial in today's edition, under the headline: …
Nonsense on Title VI in the L.A. Times
The International Studies in Higher Education Act (H.R. 3077) would create an advisory board for Title VI, the federal subsidy program for area (and Middle Eastern) studies in universities. As I've argued before, such a board is the very least Congress can do to assure some return on the taxpayers' investment in these programs. I …
Can Congress Fix Middle Eastern Studies?
An address delivered by Martin Kramer on a panel entitled "Can Congress Fix Middle Eastern Studies?" at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, November 20, 2003. Posted retroactively at Sandbox. A meeting on Middle Eastern studies is becoming an annual event here at The Washington Institute. I spoke alone on this podium two years …
Title VI Fix Passes in House
Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the International Studies in Higher Education Act (H.R. 3077)—the Title VI fix that will establish an advisory board for the federal program that subsidizes Middle Eastern (and other area) studies in American universities. The bill, having won overwhelming bipartisan support in the House, now goes to the …
Title VI in Congress: Not on Our Dime
Back in June, the House Subcommittee on Select Education convened hearings on bias in Title VI, the program of government subsidies for area studies in universities. The indefatigable Stanley Kurtz, critic of Title VI, gave invaluable testimony and carried the day. Kurtz, Daniel Pipes, and I also urged readers to write to subcommittee chair Peter …
Lawrence of Academia?
Last month, academics who run a discussion log on Middle Eastern studies exchanged ideas on how to justify their Title VI federal subsidy. One of them posted this: The anecdote/argument that I find works best with gov't officals concerning the importance of Title VI funding is to note that Lawrence of Arabia was only in …
“Outreach” Outrage at Georgetown
In the debate over U.S. government funding for Middle East centers, supporters of the subsidies claim that evidence for bias in the centers is anecdotal. But collect enough anecdotes and you have a pattern. Centers that receive subsidies—National Resource Centers funded under Title VI of the Higher Education Act—are required to engage in "outreach" to …
Congress Probes Middle Eastern Studies
Consider this assessment of the influence of Edward Said on Middle Eastern studies: In a work published in 1978, [Edward Said] argued that Western meddling in the Middle East throughout much of the 20th Century produced the conflict and turbulence that continues to plague that region of the world....This theory reached its apex of popularity …
Stocking stuffer
From Martin Kramer, "Arabic Panic," Middle East Quarterly, Summer 2002, pp. 88-95. Posted retroactively at Sandbox. "During or after this crisis, [the academics] will find some pliant senator or congressman willing to propose additional budgets for Middle Eastern studies under the rubric of national security." I made that prediction in The Wall Street Journal on …
Outing “outreach”
From Martin Kramer, "Jihad 101," Middle East Quarterly, Spring 2002, pp. 87-95. Posted retroactively at Sandbox. In the United States, fourteen Middle East programs based in universities are National Resource Centers—that is, they benefit from a subsidy from the U.S. Department of Education. The subsidy is awarded following a competition held every three years. Programs …
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