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I've been thinking about the mixed messaging coming from UVM admin. They claim to support diversity, yet are cutting programs that, historically, BIPOC and women had far less access to than white men. This is especially true in Classics. 1/13 @UAunion @UVMHumanities @uvmdei
I worry that as programs are cut and faculty are not replaced, disciplines like Classics will become, once again, entrenched in the "ivory tower." This is especially dangerous in the US context. 2/13
William Sanders Scarborough, born a slave, earned his BA and MA from Oberlin, wrote a textbook, First Lessons in Greek, and was president of Wilberforce University. Commenting on the life of Scarborough, Catherine Conybeare states "If any single thing structures this life, 3/13
it is Scarborough’s reaction to an infamous saying of one John C. Calhoun, ‘that if he could find a [black person] who knew the Greek syntax, he would then believe that the [black person] was a human being and should be treated as a man.’" 4/13
Studying Latin and Greek not only served as a metric of one's humanity, but played an important role in the performance of white womanhood. 5/13
As Prins notes, for this reason Greek could be mobilized "across categories of race and class to redefine female character." Anna Julia Cooper, in Voice from the South: By a Woman of the South, discusses Classics in her essay on the importance of education for black women. 7/13
I worry what Latin and Greek will signify in the future as access to Classics becomes more exclusive. I worry that it will, again, divide us rather than offer opportunities to explore our shared humanity, both the good and bad parts of it. 10/13
So who will study Classics if institutions like UVM abandon the humanities? Those with access to an elite education, and white supremacists. 12/13
Many of us are working to make Classics more inclusive. But that can't happen without institutional support. I worry that UVM is making decisions that are deeply political without even realizing it. The decisions made about the education we offer our students are political. 13/13
