Macguffin, 1973-75

In 1973, the School of Humanities was established within the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. It included the Departments of Classics; English; French; Germanic Languages and Literature; History; Linguistics; Philosophy; Slavic Languages and Literature; Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese; and Speech Communications, as well as the Programs in Comparative Literature and Religious Studies.¹ The unit for Cinema Studies, designed to promote film study as an academic discipline, was added to the School in 1974.²

The Board of Trustees approved the establishment of an undergraduate field of concentration for Comparative Literature in February 1975.³ Originally conceived as a graduate program, the Comparative Literature Program had been organized in April 1962 "to make possible a systematic study of subjects common to several literatures, and to enable students...to explore the interretlations of several modern literatures; the main currents, periods, and movements in modern European literary history; and the hteory of literature and crticism.⁴

The Language Laboratory and the Unit for Foreign Language Study and Research became the Language Learning Lboratory by action of the Board in July 1976, in order "to simplify the administrative structure of the units and provide better communication and more efficient operation."⁵

In February 1988, the School of Humanities was terminated, and "the college [adopted] the more common form of administration in which departmental and program exectutive officers report direction to the dean rather than to an intermediate office."⁶

1. Board of Trustees Transactions, 57th Report, April 18, 1973, p. 251.

2. On Learning and Teaching in L.A.S., No. 2, May 1975, pp. 4-6.

3. Board of Trustees Transactions, 58th Report, February 19, 1975, p. 183.

4. Board of Trustees Transactions, 52nd Report, April 18, 1962, p. 1413.

5. Board of Trustees Transactions, 59th Report, July 21, 1976, p. 18.

6. Board of Trustees Transactions, 64th Report, February 4, 1988, p. 467.