Hillsdale students can’t learn about Indian epic poetry, Confucian philosophy, or the Japanese language, at least not through the college’s course offerings. It’s time to broaden our perspectives at Hillsdale.
The college’s defense of the liberal arts and the Western tradition provides many excellent classes to explore the intricacies of Western philosophy, religion, and culture. Juxtaposing the guiding principles of the East with the West would enhance the study and appreciation of the Western tradition while allowing students to explore the other half of the world.
The college largely overlooks the richness of non-Western cultures. I can identify a total of four offerings on the East: History of the Far East, Introduction to World Religions, Introduction to Islam, and Introduction to Eastern Religion. This inadequacy leaves students largely ignorant about the broader dynamics of the rest of the world.
To fix this flaw, Hillsdale should add a non-Western language and offer upper-level electives geared toward studying the West’s interaction with the East.
If Hillsdale seeks to produce America’s next great statesmen and leaders, it must provide instruction in these areas. Many Hillsdale students will go on to work in Washington, D.C., and many national security circles require critical language skills for top positions. Diplomatic and intelligence agencies select candidates skilled in Chinese, Hindi, or Japanese.
Several students across campus are already learning non-Western languages, such as Russian, Chinese, and Swahili on their own. Hillsdale could support these students with the basic infrastructure to deepen their studies by offering course credits and guided instruction. Not only does this support benefit the student but it will also follow the mission of the college.
These languages advance the college’s goal to be a trustee of the Western heritage by unveiling the close relationship interwoven between the intellectual traditions of the East and the West.
The recent addition of Polish as an interdisciplinary class is a positive example of the college expanding languages. Although Polish is not necessarily a non-Western language, it is a good starting point for how the college can teach new languages. The college can expand its course offerings while including a small part of the Eastern tradition by hiring or using existing faculty fluent in a critical language to teach these courses.
Hillsdale’s lack of upper-level courses studying the Eastern tradition creates an intellectual blind spot in the student’s education. The East provides a history rich with great works of literature, philosophic discovery, religious inquiry, and political instruction. For Hillsdale students not to learn the joy of the great Indian epic the “Mahabharata,” the fascinating tales of China’s “Journey to the West,” or the beauty of Japan’s “The Narrow Road to the Deep North.”
Hillsdale should provide at least one upper-level elective course each academic year in the politics, history, English, philosophy, and religion departments focused on some type of Eastern interaction with the Western tradition. Expanding those course offerings to be more specified would deepen the intellectual value.
Some claim that these courses might draw students away from the Western tradition. For example, English students might not be able to fully explore the intricacies of American and English literature if they are preoccupied with taking courses outside of the West.
One application of that value is learning how to address the problems facing the West’s relations with the East today.
The lessons from the East and other non-Western cultures could give us an insight into how the Communist Chinese Party maintains control over one of the most populous nations in the world, why North Korea’s citizens do not revolt against the tyrannical Kims, and how Africa might be the next center for innovation and industry. By ignoring the East we risk rushing into the unknown. Exploring the East opens a new lens to view the Western tradition.
