The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, February 26, 2001, Image 3

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vTTALION y
Iby Cindy Gallegos ■
The Battalion
Today, hip-hop music caters to a large population and
African-American athletes dominate the sports scene as
some of the highest ranking athletes. The influences of black
culture are evident in today’s increasingly diverse society.
However, some Texas A&M professors and students are still
evaluating the cultural climate of this University and sug
gesting some necessary adjustments.
Dr. Albert Broussard, an associate professor of history,
said he remembers when Nobel Prize-winning scientist
William Shockley produced a theory that blacks were
racially inferior. Broussard said this idea of racial inferior
ity was later proven to be a fallacy that many were aware
of all along.
Broussard said he would never let racism become an
obstacle in achieving his immediate goals or his ambition
of becoming a professor. Although he was aware that
racism was present, his parents instilled in him the nec-
cessity to work hard.
“We were aware that racism was present,” Broussard
said. “It was present in California. It’s present at Texas
A&M, but it wasn’t ever going to be the obstacle to keep you
from succeeding if you were willing to pay the price. The
price, of course, was ... hard work. That if you worked hard
enough, ultimately you could reach your goal.”
Dr. Douglas Brooks, an assistant professor of English,
said the major manifestation of inequality while he was in
school was related to number ratios. Brooks also said he wit
nessed gender discrimination.
“Most of the schools I’ve attended have been largely up
per-middle class and white,” Brooks said. “Surely this can’t
be and isn’t reflective of this country’s pool of intellect and
talent. But I’ve also seen a lot of discrimination against
women in my educational past, especially when I was lit
graduate school at an Ivy League institution.”
The United States is becoming more diverse with time!
Broussard said that in California, the white population is no
longer the majority population and Texas is closely follow
ing its path.
“People don’t want to accept that fact,” Broussard said.
“They don’t want to discuss it, let alone accept it, because it
has implications.”
The University’s minority population is not reflective of
the state’s minority population. According to some, this fac
tor could be a major weakness for the University and a dis
service to the students.
Assistant English professor Ahmed Siraj claims that the
efforts of the University to promote multiculturalism, in
cluding multicultultural days and requirements in the cur
riculum, are good, but these steps may encourage the Uni
versity to become oblivious to the need for a more culturally
diverse atmosphere. •;
“It can serve as a screen to stop the University from dev
ing what it really has to do to make Texas A&M a first-class f
comprehensive university,” Siraj said. “Which is to mak£
sure that the University represents the diversity of the state
and its racial composition and also represent something of
the international cultural of universities these days.”
Siraj explains that among the students he has spoken to,
especially minorities and students who have progressive pa-
litical views, his general sense is that this campus is not their
See Diversity on Page 4.
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