Regional Studies: A War Baby Grows Up

Surrounded by Victorian fireplaces, mammoth sky-lights, and an unused swimming pool, the administrators of the University's three Regional Studies Programs are guiding almost 70 carefully selected graduate students through investigations that seem curiously out of place in the elaborate Gold Coast surroundings of 16 Dunster Street. For not only are the programs on East Asia, the Soviet Union, and the Middle East--among the newest at the University, but they are also dramatic illustrations of the interest of American higher education in the revolutionary area stretching from Egypt to Japan, and from Lithuania to Siberia.

All three programs, leading to a Master of Arts degree, attempt to give each student a broad background in the history and culture of his area, extensive language training, and an understanding of the forces at work in the present day. In a sense the program tries to get behind the headlines without studying the headlines, and the modern orientation often leads students back into early periods of history.

The programs are kept small--none can admit more than 20 students each year to the two-year program--but the small number of students is no indication of the great variety of courses open to these potential area specialists. In the East Asia program, for example, there are 51 possible courses scattered through various departments--History, Government, General Education, Fine Arts, Anthropology, Economics, Social Relations, and Far Eastern Languages and Literatures. It may seem a big jump from "Advanced Mandarin Conversation" to "The Representation of Nature in Europe and Asiatic Art," but to the East Asia student, the gap merely shows the great distance he must span to became truly well-versed in his area.

Seminars, Integration

In addition to the multitude of courses available in other departments, each program also offers its own area seminar. Also, in all three fields there are post-doctoral students and experts pursuing research of many kinds, and although technically there is no contact between the M.A. students and the researchers they are bound to influence each other in many ways. Seminars, special courses, and informal acquaintance all provide chances for integrating those in Regional Studies with more specialized scholars.

Visiting experts are also a great source of information about a region. Last year in the Middle East program, for example, a labor delegation from Iran passed through Cambridge, and gave the students the first non-governmental view of the country they had seen. "It was refreshing to get their viewpoint," recalls Richard N. Frye, associate professor of the Middle East Program. "They gave us an impression of the country vastly different from the usual reports."

In a sense, the whole idea of regional studies which cut across many disciplines is an attempt to get away from usual reports and one-sided knowledge. Graduates of the program may go into the government, private business, or further academic training, but whatever field they finally enter, they should bring to their work a broad understanding of an entire region--not just a century, or a country, or a king.

War Impetus

The demand for broad knowledge about an area comes directly out of the Second World War. Total war required total information, and the government was forced to bring together some experts who had lived in a country, and knew the language, others who knew the history or the economy, and others who understood geography and military techniques.

"After the war we saw the need for pulling all of this together in the universities," declares William L. Langer, Coolidge of the Committee on Regional Studies. "The need for integrating our knowledge of an area-became extremely important," he says.

As chairman of the committee which sets policy for all three programs, Langer has a good perspective on Regional Studies. "Our area programs are not intended to be comprehensive in the sense of giving a complete and finished understanding, but they do give a pretty good over-all view of language, history, and the general problems. They have all worked very well."

The East Asia program is the best example of an area program that has evolved directly from the war, and it has also, as Langer says, worked very well indeed.

Second World War Harvard bore little resemblance to its Ivy League counterpart. For the armed services took over the Cambridge area, and with them came their various training programs. One such study group was the Army Special Training Program (ASTP) on China and Japan. In this course, selected officers and enlisted men were sent to the University for intensive study in those fields.

Saturation Course

Since the graduates of this course were needed desperately by the Army for duty in the Far East, speed was a necessity. The students had to spend as much as six hours a day studying the languages, and experts on the economy, history, geography, and culture of the areas fired lectures at the students as quickly as they could assimilate them.

It was plainly a saturation course, but whereas skeptical educators could see evils in this revolutionary type of schooling, its results amazed the educational world. The graduates of the short courses, it was found, were often better equipped than the regular college student to tackle the complexities of the Far East.

When hostilities with Japan ended in 1945, many returning veterans were increased in either beginning or continuing their studies of the Far East. Working through G.I. Bill benefits, these order, more mature students forced colleges throughout the country to expand their departments in the field of Asia. Here at Harvard, where the ASTP had worked so well, the University decided to retain the China-Japan program under the name of the Regional Program on East Asia.

In 1946 when the program was officially begun, a large number of applicants applied for admission into the two year M.A. curriculum. At that time, the first chairman, John K. Fairbank, professor of History, was forced to limit the enrollment to 12 students. The East Asia program had no funds of its own, and had to work within a restricted budget. These financial limitations still present hardships to the program today, with only about five scholarships available, all from general University resources.

Reischauer Chairman

Professor Fairbank remained at the head of the program through its early years, stepping down from the chairmanship in 1953, and making room for his colleague, Edwin O. Reischauer, of Far Eastern Languages. With Reischauer doing scholarly research this year, James R. Hightower, associate professor of Far Eastern Languages, has taken over temporarily. According to Hightower, the program still restricts its enrollment to about 12 students a year because it could not accept more and still keep up the high standard of work that has characterized the study group.

There is also a placement problem, Hightower adds, that does not affect the other study groups so acutely. With China closed to Americans, there are very few businesses that are looking for people in this field. This leaves the government and education as the main sources of employment.

But even in education, Hightower explains, there are few openings. "There was a great need for teachers right after the war but now the colleges have ceased expanding their Asian studies and most posts are filled by capable, young men." Therefore, the program tries to accept only as many students as it can place. Of course, it a student wants to go on in education, he generally tries for a Ph.D. in his particular field. But this advanced degree is not secured under the Regional Study Program. If a person is interested in doing doctorate work in Japan's economy, for instance, he would study under the department of Economics.

Although there was a decline in applicants during the days of the McCarthy hearings ("If you had a Harvard degree in Chinese studies you jut couldn't get a job"), Hightower says that in most years there are about the same number of people filling out application forms. About two-thirds of those who apply are accepted, mostly American and non-Harvard B.A., although there are two Harvard and three Radcliffe students enrolled at present.

Accent on Accents

The accent appears to be on language study, Hightower says, because you cannot study a land without knowing its language. At least half of the hours in the first year, and a quarter in the second are spent learning either Japanese or Chinese; Korean was formerly taught, but was dropped last year.

The backbone of the two-year program is the thesis requirement. Each student works on this individual research, and the best are printed in a mimeographed "Papers on China." The topics range from ancient times to the present Chinese Communist Party. The accent, however, is on the modern, not because the school pushes it, but because it seems to appeal to more students.

These student theses have been circulated in libraries throughout the country and have provided scholars with interesting and sometimes illuminating descussions of topics which have not been otherwise fully explored. The whole Far East, in fact, is wide open, a veritable gold mine for the enterprising scholar. M. A. candidates often use their theses as preliminaries to Ph.D. works, and from there, it is hoped, to works of outstanding scholarly merit.

The greatest dilemma of 16 Dunster Street is the presence in the same building of both the Russian Research Center and the Regional Program on the Soviet Union. Both are outstanding educational units, but the former is made up of a mature scholars who work on individual research projects. In the Center are such men as Merle Fainsod, professor of Government and an expert on the workings of the modern Russian state. Most of these scholars have at least a Ph.D. and have already published works of note.

Russian Contact?

But the Regional group is a teaching program which leads up to a M.A. degree. The students, for the most part, only have B.A.s and are more concerned with mastering the language than in writing a book. Yet, the Center is very close to this group, because the Center's faculty members are also the Regional Study's teachers.

The Regional group was planned during the Second World War when the United States and the Soviet Union were allies. It was thought that the two countries would have close contact in the peacetime years to follow, but as Adam Ulam, head of the Regional Studies, says, "We were overly optimistic, of course." Instead of preparing men for commerce with the Soviet Union, the study group has been funneling men into the State Department and into education.

This department has a total of about 20 students in each of its two classes,--admitting one of every four applicants for admission. In addition, there are special students, sometimes consisting of State Department trainees to learn from the best possible source. And Harvard certainly has one of the best possible sources.

There has been criticism of the whole idea of Regional studies because it is not specialized enough--a person in the M.A. program has to take courses not directly connected with his real field. Also, there is an oral general exam on three fields at the end of the second year, as well as a written and oral exam in Russian.

But Ulam says the department is not necessarily limited to scholars: "We are fashioned to meet the needs of people who do not necessarily want to become scholars--people who are mainly interested in putting their fact in the water and seeing how it feels. Some go all the way. Others go in half way and then go into government."

If the Soviet Union program is now firmly accepted and respected, the program on the Middle East is just barely getting started. As Derwood W. Lockwood, lecturer on Anthropology and Executive Secretary of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, observes, "We're the baby of the group --both in age and finances."

Initiated in 1954 with substantial backing from American business interests, the Middle Eastern program will produce its first batch of eight graduates this June. They will learn at least one of the four languages taught--Arabic, Turkish, Persian and Hebrew and will generally survey the area from economics to religion. Actually, the eight M.A.'s are only one part of the work of the Middle Eastern Center, which also sponsors independent research and grants doctoral degrees jointly with other University departments. It was the M.A. program, however, which brought the greatest response--especially from private business.

Starting Fight

"We had a fight to get the Center started," Frye notes. "After much talk, we finally persuaded the university to call a meeting of prominent people from American oil companies, the airlines, and the State and Defense Departments. We thought that these people would be interested in very specific training, in oil economics for example. But they told us to leave that to them." Frye says that both the government and business representatives were looking for an over-all approach to the area--its background and languages. "We were really taken aback. We had expected them to respond to such general training, although it was precisely what we had desired all the time."

The effect of the meeting, Frye points out, was proof that the University was "going into a field which was crying for people. There was little adequate training anywhere in the country."

Actually, five other universities had already taken up the challenge by the time Harvard got around established its Center, but all were small and new. The new strategic importance of the Middle East--both in resources and location--required many more people with a knowledge of the area. In addition, as Frye points out, the whole area is going through "nothing less than a basic revolution. The impact of the West is really reaching down to the people on all levels, and we must begin to understand the changes in what was a sleeping part of the world."

There had, of course, always been fine scholars of the Middle East, but as Lockard observes, "Their interests were largely medieval, Biblical, or archaeological. They were all aware of problems in the modern period, but there was never any formal study as such."

A formal study of the modern Middle East required, first of all, the establishment of boundaries--even if the are somewhat artificial. From Iran in the east, the Center includes all of the traditional "Near East," as well as Egypt in North Africa. Frye hopes the Center will expand into Afghanistan, Pakistan, and other areas of Africa, but for the present, the Center is somewhat overwhelmed by the areas already included.

Vastly more important that mere technical boundaries was the addition of more scholars to the University staff. Frye, brilliant young linguist and historian, had carried much of the load himself until Sir Hamilton A. R. Gibb was appointed University Professor and Richard Jewett Professor of Arabic in 1954. Langer calls him "one of the very greatest living Arabists," and with his special interest the impact of the West upon Arab Society, the British scholar is certain to be a continuing inspiration for the Center.

Although the University has provided most financial support for the Center, American business intedests--especially the oil companies--have helped substantially. These companies not only send their own employees to the Center for additional training, but they look over the students for personal purposes. Although no students will finish the M.A. program until June, companies at that time may be somewhat surprised to find that a majority of the present students want to go on with their academic training.

It is not hard to see why many students would rather go on with their studies than go directly into either government or private industry, for the research projects now under way at the post-doctoral level and indeed significant. One Iranian economist, for instance, is investigating the many "fringe benefits" that Iran reaps from foreign oil industries--a project that will be of great use to the other industries and nations involved.

At no level in the Middle Eastern Center, either post- or pre-doctoral, do the students or professors involve themselves in day-to-day political controversies. "We just don't want to get involved in the Soviet-Iran or