Perspective seminars draw international attention

By Dexter Gauntlett
Daily Bruin Reporter

The 50 honors collegium Perspective seminars on Sept. 11, which
rapidly gained the interest of students who rushed to sign up for
the courses, have also drawn both positive and negative
international attention.

Columnists from The New York Times, Newsweek and The London
Sunday Times issued varying opinions of the seminars, thus
prompting UCLA provost and Perspective seminar instructor Brian
Copenhaver to respond in a recent letter to the New York Times.

In Tom Kuntz’s Nov. 4 New York Times column ““ titled
“Academe on War: Man (and Woman) The Psychobabble
Detectors!” ““ Kuntz listed 12 of the Perspective course
titles and their descriptions, including “Navigating Between
Blithesome Optimism and Cultural Despair” and
“Women’s Participation in Political
Violence.”

“I was quite uncomfortable with the headline because I
thought it would give the reader an inaccurate impression of what
the seminars were about, and anything inaccurate is
negative,” Copenhaver said.

In his response, which has not been published, Copenhaver
criticized Kuntz for not reporting on Perspective classes that
address Islam, the Taliban, Afghanistan and other issues, which
Copenhaver said are “obviously central to the future of our
country.”

Though his column was intended to allow readers to independently
form an opinion on the seminars after viewing the list of 12
examples, Kuntz quoted Bryan Appleyard’s piece from the
Sunday London Times, which called the classes
“daft.”

In his column, Kuntz quoted Appleyard’s article as saying:
“An unprecedented assault on mainland America is being turned
into sentimental psychobabble, an occasion for nationwide
counseling or politically correct pseudo-courses.”

Appleyard said most of the courses struck him as absurd, and the
courses are considered to have more of a therapeutic value than
serious academic work.

“It’s the university playing social worker or
priest,” Appleyard said.

Students from the seminar mentioned in the two columns,
“Blithesome Optimism and Cultural Despair,” said they
were pleased with the class and acknowledged that it could be
therapeutic and instructive.

“The readings in the class are good because they start a
topic or an idea, and we apply it to what happened on Sept.
11,” said fifth-year English student Regina Williams.
“It is therapeutic, but it’s not like we’re
getting four units for it; we’re just getting one.”

All seminars are one unit and can only be taken for a pass/no
pass grade.

Art history professor Albert Boime, who instructs the
“Blithesome Optimism” seminar, said he was astonished
at Kuntz’s reaction.

“I would like to know how he would manage something like
this in a university context,” Boime said.

Supporting the seminar series, Donna Foote’s Nov. 12
column in Newsweek, titled “Home Front: Islam, Arabic and
Afghanistan 101,” said the national emergency meant more
opportunities to teach at UCLA.

“Instead of hitting the streets with anti-war
demonstrations, undergrads are hitting the books,” she said
in her column.

Enrollment in Arabic and Iranian studies classes is way up, and
the series of seminars is almost completely full, she said in her
article.

Foote also applauded the university’s response in the week
of the attacks when it sought out volunteers to design the unique
seminars.

Alex Christiansen, a first-year biology student in Boime’s
seminar, sees the class as a source for information he
wouldn’t normally come across.

“The class is an update about what’s going on
currently,” he said. “Living in the dorms, I kind of
feel out of touch, so coming here once a week I feel kept up on
current events and other historical things.”

“Without the seminar I certainly don’t think I would
be in an environment to discuss these issues with other people and
see if other people see the same things I do,” he
continued.