DEARBORN – The push to create a minor degree in Arab American Studies cleared a major hurdle last week at the University of Michigan-Dearborn as the initiative was approved unanimously by the College of Arts, Sciences, and Letters Executive Committee.

The initiative now must be approved by Provost Kate Davy for it to officially pass and become a viable path for those seeking to add an extra concentration to their degrees at the local public university.

Hani Bawardi and Sally Howell, both assistant professors of history in the Department of Social Sciences and Center for Arab American Studies have led the effort to have the minor officially created and recognized by the university. Howell is also a co-editor of the book “Arab Detroit 9/11: Life in the Terror Decade,” and curator of the “Building Islam in Detroit” project.

Professor Ron Stockton,  Political Science, and Ivy Forsythe-Brown, Assistant Professor of Sociology, have also supported the initiative. 

Associate Provost Ismael Ahmed also supports the initiative, and recently spoke about the minor at an event featuring Yemeni Nobel Prize winner Tawwakul Karman in Dearborn.

The current school year is Howell’s third year on the faculty and Bawardi’s forth. They have been working to create the minor, a specialized secondary field of study, since 2009. Both were hired to lead up the university’s Center for Arab American Studies which was created in 2000. With a large population of Arab and Chaldean American students, and located in Dearborn, Michigan, home to the country’s most visible Arab community, the university has offered courses on Arab American literature, history and culture for several years now.  

“The plan to create the minor reflects the interests of several people on our campus – faculty who are eager to teach a wider array of ethnic studies courses that focus on Arab Americans, students with an interest in Arab and Muslim Americans, professional track students who hope to work in fields that will bring them in contact with Arab and Muslim Americans like law, social work, education, media, criminal justice, medicine, or the arts. We thought this would be a natural focus for us,” Howell said.

Howell said that interest in new Arab American studies classes has “gone through the roof” on campus since news of the minor’s progress has reached students.  A new course titled “History of the Muslim American Experience,” which will be taught this winter for the first time, filled to capacity quickly after word got around. Howell points out that that students interested in Arab American studies will now be able to pursue this area of study and receive academic credit for it in a new way, further advancing their career and graduate education goals. She believes that if the minor does get off the ground, more and more students will start signing up for a wide variety of classes in the field such as Gender, Family and Community among Arab Americans, Arab Detroit: Narratives of Space, Race and Power, Arabs and Muslims in the Mind of Americans, or course on Arab American political participation and activism, business and organizational histories, literature, comedy, and more.

The Center for Arab American Studies has also hosted several recent events such as a panel discussion on Howell’s book, the Tawwakul Karman visit, and a screening of the movie “Karama (Dignity) Has No Walls.” On Jan. 17, they will host a panel discussion with the Student Activities Office about the television series “All-American Muslim” In February they are working with others on campus to organize a debate about civil liberties, the U.S. Constitution, and newly created laws which is expected to include key lawmakers as well as law enforcement officials to describe their own daily experiences and to answer questions about the current law enforcement climate. 

Howell said that the type of student interested in Arab American Studies classes “reflects a cross section of our student body. All kinds of students are coming in. It’s a more diverse group than one might expect.”

If the degree is approved soon, perhaps the first student to qualify for the minor is one who hopes to work in the field of International Relations and has already taken most of the existing class offerings, Howell said. 

A decision on the final approval of the minor from the university administration is expected to occur in January after students get back from their holiday breaks.