Deciding to pursue Ethnicity, Race, & Migration has been integral to my academic experience at Yale.I decided to pair the ER&M major with Global Affairs, a selective international studies major that admits approximately 50 students per year.I have greatly benefited from the multidisciplinary approach that such a curriculum has provided.
Having Ethnicity, Race & Migration as an available course of study had a significant impact on my life. Not only were the courses very fun (full of discussions constituting some of my fondest memories of Yale), they were extremely substantive. As a member of the first graduating class of ER&M, I recall how the opportunity added a whole new layer of richness to my Yale education. The caliber of teaching in the ER&M department has always been unsurpassable: professors like Michael Denning, Patricia Passar, Bryan Hayashi, and of course, the superb Stephen Pitti chall
Ethnicity, Race, & Migration has fundamentally shaped the lens and language through which I view and discuss history, current events, and all the newsworthy and daily activities around me. Not only were my assumptions about race and ethnicity challenged, but in return, I also learned to confront and problematize the assumptions that many in our society hold in regards to who holds power and why. I reviewed the ways racial, sexual, cultural, and other minorities have protested inequalities and hypothesized about the strategies they can use in the future in order to affirm t
The Ethnicity, Race, and Migration major at Yale gave me tools to dissect, analyze, and challenge power in all its different forms. As a young Chicana, struggling to comprehend the grave injustices confronting my community, working alongside brilliant professors and students alike created an incredible opportunity to use multiple lenses of inquiry and analysis to make sense of the world in a way that honored my community and our shared histories.
As an undergraduate at Yale, I decided to major in Ethnicity, Race, and Migration to gain access to my own history as a first generation Chicana. The courses I took and the mentorship I received from my ER&M professors immediately fueled my community action work. I became a founder and active member of several student organizations, spearheading campaigns and educational projects on immigrant rights, bilingual education, and Black/Brown relations.
The decision to major in Ethnicity, Race & Migration shed a new light on my undergraduate education. The major privileges its students with the opportunity to rigorously study the human condition through multiple academic disciplines. As an African-American male from a low-income household in Chicago, I found countless compassionate and supportive professors with which to delve deeply into the theories, research methodologies, histories and discourses that frame the everyday challenges of marginalized communities.
With its interdisciplinary curriculum ER&M was open to redefining academic boundaries, which included providing a space for alternative approaches to research and documentation. This allowed me to explore more creative outlets and I believe it attracted other students who wished to do the same.
While a student at Yale, I majored in ER&M and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies. Without the work of generations of activists prior to my arrival at Yale, my studies would never have been possible. I’m extremely grateful for all their efforts to make the university a home for critical thought and progressive politics. The multi/trans/interdisciplinary education I received propelled me to energetic and fruitful work in a variety of arenas, from politics to art to translation to writing.
I stumbled into ER&M as my second major almost by accident. Each term, I would scour the Blue Book for classes that excited me, and each term, a large portion of the lectures and seminars on my list would fall under the ER&M umbrella. Many of my favorite professors at Yale – those who thought creatively about how to make the term “interdisciplinary” more than a stock buzzword; those who cared about infusing highbrow theory with a genuine concern for real-world problems – taught courses within ER&M, and I decided to sign up.
The best part of the ER&M program was the small and dedicated community of majors and faculty. Even though most of the classes we took were in other disciplines, the structure of the major and particularly the senior seminar allowed us to get to know each other, support each other’s growth, and encourage each other’s questioning. ER&M was my most important intellectual community in college. The interdisciplinary approach also paid off later in my career: I ended up getting a Ph.D.