Five College Visiting Professor of Asian American Studies Nitasha Sharma said the goal of the series is to raise awareness of the roles Asian Americans have played in the U.S. "I'd like these scholars to heighten our awareness of Asian American scholars and their scholarship," she said. "An important aspect of their presence and the presence of ethnic studies departments/programs on college campuses is to see adequate representation of these groups and their histories as they've helped form the U.S."
Palumbo-Liu began his lecture on a light note. "I am honored to be lodged at the Lord Jeffrey Inn," he said. "We don't have lords in California–just terminators." His musing soon turned to the College mascot's more infamous role in the Indian Wars. In an observation that ultimately proved emblematic of his speech as a whole, Palumbo-Liu remarked that "behind these and many other great white male historical figures, there seems to be attached some hidden history."
An enthusiastic advocate of ethnic studies as an element to college curricula, Palumbo-Liu argued the importance of recognizing the race issue as an indispensable factor to understanding the world around us. He also acknowledged that fact that "some people have a hard time thinking of Asian American studies, or race and ethnic studies in general, as important to the academy."
With multiculturalism today enduring as much backlash as support and with conflicts of race prompting hypersensitivity in their regard, Palumbo-Liu said this was an important time to engage in discussions about race. "We are at an especially critical juncture in history, when the entire question of race and ethnicity seems moot to some and of unsurpassed urgency to others," he said.
Sharma later reiterated the dilemma more explicitly. "There has been a shift away from the study of race towards a coded discussion of difference as cultural, or in fact the idea that one should not see difference [color-blind], which is dangerous to its core," she said.
Palumbo-Liu posed a stark response to opponents of this view: "Did poor blacks in New Orleans receive less assistance than middle class whites? Do we wish not to perceive race as significant to our lives?"
Arguing for the relevance of race, Palumbo-Liu spoke at great length of the degree to which the influence of Asians and Asian Americans on American history has largely been underestimated. Among highlights of this segment was the role of Chinese workers who forged the transcontinental railroad but remain only vaguely acknowledged by American cultural histories. "The erasure of this historical reality allowed for a myth of American self-sufficiency to flourish," argued Palumbo-Liu.
Further, Palumbo-Liu said failures such as these deny us of a fuller, richer understanding of the United States and the world. "An account of America's implications in a complex, interdependent global history is deleted," he said.
Drawing parallels between such past omissions and the present, Palumbo-Liu said, "As the U.S. attempts to be further and further unilateral in its dealings with the rest of the world … such an integrated analysis is no less important today than it was more than a century ago."
Jacob Maguire '07 was particularly responsive to Palumbo-Liu's contention that concepts of race may be willfully manipulated. "The basic idea is that race and ethnicity are created and maintained, not discovered," said Maguire. "A helpful analogy might be that of a borderless world. If the entire world was one country, we would have no concept of nation-states at all. Like race and ethnicity, they occur and are defined in terms of opposition, and this calls their validity, although not their relevance, into question."
The lecture also discussed historical efforts to restrict immigration before Palumbo-Liu brought the focus to the modern day. Highlighting Asian influence on the War on Terror, Palumbo-Liu pointed out the cooperation of Philippines President Gloria Arroyo in providing military assistance to the U.S. as well as the general strategic necessity of maintaining open channels throughout Asia.
Summarizing the relevance of Asia and Asians to American interests, Palumbo-Liu asserted that U.S. interests in the Middle East have created a network that includes all of Asia. "Issues of trade, human labor, student visas, research privileges, security clearances are all reassessed with issues of race and ethnicity and national origin in mind," he said.
Palumbo-Liu concluded the lecture with a return to his appeal for ethnic studies. "Our social world has as one of its prime constituents race and ethnicity," he reiterated.
Palumbo-Liu referred back to the mission of any educational institution in his argument. "We cheat ourselves as both teachers and students if we settle for incomplete knowledge," he said. "Our mission should be precisely to have the most complete picture of our world as possible, and not to become complacent with what we already know, and how we know it."
President Anthony Marx said that the College has tried to address Asian Studies at the College by bringing in Five College faculty member Sharma. "We have also been able to provide for lectures such as that of Palumbo-Liu," he added.
On that same note, however, Sharma was careful to acknowledge the difficulty in establishing such a program. "I'm not sure I advocate an entire department of Asian American studies at Amherst College, in part due to the size of the faculty and because we simply don't live in a region with a critical Asian American mass," said Sharma. "That being said, increasing numbers of Asian American students makes it problematic that we don't have a full-time Asian Americanist." In light of this dilemma, Sharma suggested that the College participate in the Five College Asian American Studies certification program as a first step.
In light of Palumbo-Liu's persuasive argument for Asian Studies, and in light of the Asian Students Alliance's push to bring in such distinguished speakers to campus some think it is the College's responsibility to re-asses the merits of such a discipline. "The ASA's outspoken push for such a program last year seems to have stalled somewhere," said Ian Shin '06. "There's a lot more work to be done."