Chicano Studies at UT and the Resignation of Américo Paredes

By Nick Schwellenbach
for Professor Zamora, HIS 366N
December 2003

The new director should be bilingual, that is, to be able to say 'yassuh' and sí senor.
-Américo Paredes[1]

 

In 1999 the University of Texas at Austin (UT) lost of one of its best, Professor Américo Paredes, who died that year. Remembered by many as a friend and mentor, Professor Paredes, a Mexican-American, was unique at UT; his intellectual work was groundbreaking in several ways. He begun UT's excellent Folklore program which in part grew out of his work on the folklore and songs of life and struggle of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans at the US-Mexico border. Just as important was his role in the beginning of the Mexican American Studies (MAS) department and center, the Center for Mexican American Studies (CMAS) in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Its first director, his experience at CMAS was wrought with frustration with the administration, although there was significant progress in building the department and CMAS. This frustration culminated with his resignation as director of CMAS in 1972. Paredes' resignation was one personal manifestation of somewhat antagonistic negotiations involved in the carving out of space for Chicano students at UT.

Paredes' and Chicano students, whom he felt he was loyal to, had an antagonistic relationship with the administration partly due to the different conceptualizations of what CMAS and MAS should become. This can be viewed as a particular moment of conflict between stakeholders at UT over what UT or particular spaces in UT are to be. This does not mean that Paredes' resignation was determined by structural forces. However Paredes' choice to resign did take place in that antagonistic context. Administrators and students as other actors in this context also had choices, yet they play roles within the stage, which here exists as the university. These roles, students and administrators, are not essential, but are highly shaped by the hierarchical power structure of the university and its numerous socializing aspects. Therefore any attempt by students or faculty siding with those students to pursue aims at odds with the administration's aims at any particular moment is by nature antagonistic, particularly when those aims are geared toward changing aspects of the university. Like Paredes, who sought to uncover Mexican-American resistance to oppression by Anglos in South Texas, I seek to reveal a chapter of Paredes' life and of UT's that have been silenced.

Methodology

In this paper I use a variety of sources to piece together a story and interpretation that makes sense logically and in relation to the sources themselves. Initially I sought information on the beginnings of the Center for Mexican American Studies, knowing that it was a product of the Chicano student movement(s) in the late 60s and early 70s. Upon Professor Emilio Zamora's suggestion I started with the Américo Paredes archives in the Nettie Lee Benson Latin American Collection at UT. The archives are arranged topically, with Paredes' documents relating to CMAS in one section. The first folder I examined contained a variety of letters between Paredes and faculty, mostly. After reading several letters referring to a 'struggle' with the UT administration, but lacking elaboration of what that 'struggle' was, I discovered a letter from Paredes to "Colleagues in the Mexican-American Studies Program, Students and Other Interested Parties", henceforth referred to as the Letter. The Letter, 5 pages long, is the most complete explanation I have found by Paredes himself of why he resigned as director of CMAS and of his interpretation of the administration's actions.

I have used the Letter, and other letters as starting points in my investigation to form my inquiry, why did Paredes resign, and as personal accounts, especially Paredes', of what happened. Individual perspectives are always biased, yet because of Paredes' positionality in space and time, as director of CMAS when these things were happening, he has provided insight into why he did what he did, and pointed me in the direction of larger historical and structural explanations.

Additionally in Paredes' archives numerous newspaper clippings by Paredes during the period of his resignation were useful. Covering his resignation, his views of it, other faculty's, students' and administrators', as well as the actions of the just mentioned parties, the Austin-American Statesman and The Daily Texan offer an additional, more detached perspective and record of the period than do personal letters.

The current director of CMAS, José Limón, was a member of the Chicano student group Mexican-American Student/Youth Organization (originally MASO, later MAYO), and assistant director of CMAS under Paredes, not to mention one of Paredes' friends. I interviewed him and his comments were useful especially in terms of "filling in the gaps" in the archives and offering a firsthand and "behind the scenes" account. The remembrance of events 30 years prior is an activity prone to discrepancies, yet when possible I fact-checked Limón's statements against the historical record in textual sources. Regardless of accuracy in factual recall, which turned out to be a minor issue in Limón's case, his interpretation of events were irreplaceable, being near the center of the event. Furthermore the particular aspects of the episode Limón recalled possibly reflect his positionality in the situation and experiences since then. I have attempted to take this into account.

Several secondary sources were referred to in the process of research and writing. Three texts related to UT explicitly. Ronnie Dugger's Our Invaded Universities was an excellent resource in understanding the politics and history of UT's administration in the 1960s and early 70s. Beverly Burr's undergraduate thesis, The History of Student Activism at UT: 1960-1988, provided another panoramic sketch of politics at UT, but with an emphasis on the activity of student activists, instead of faculty or the administration as in Dugger's book. Entrepreneurialization, Resistance and the Crisis of the Universities: A Case Study of the University of Texas at Austin, a PhD dissertation by Sociology graduate Robert Ovetz, provided useful conceptualizations of antagonisms at UT for the purposes of this paper.

Other secondary sources influenced this paper. Griswold and Castillo's North to Aztlán: A History of Mexican-Americans in the United States offered a history of Mexican-Americans in which I could situate this discussion. Numerous texts and conversations which I can not possibly name have had an immense influence in how I arrange, categorize and organize the ideas presented here.

Before I elaborate further I will uncover my own positionality. As a student engaged in progressive politics at UT I cannot help but express empathy with what some would call the subaltern, in this case, Américo Paredes and Chicano students. However like Peter Burke, speaking to a conference of socialist historians, stated, "although I consider myself a socialist and a historian, I'm not a socialist historian"[2]. I do not want to reduce the complexities of the historical record to a simplistic, ideological account. Whether this is the case or not only you, the reader, can be the judge. And although I seek to have nuance in this examination I do want to uncover an episode in history that has been silenced.[3]

In an official University of Texas at Austin obituary for Paredes[4] this moment of conflict between him and the UT administration has not been included. To be fair, an obituary is not a place to bring up any old grudges, yet the point remains. Certain aspects of what actually happened in the past are absent, while others are emphasized. I intend to give voice to something that has happened, something that has been deemphasized, yet significant.

Through the use of sources mentioned above I seek to create a hermeneutic account that makes sense logically and in accordance with the facts and the context. I hope to offer an explanation that goes deeper than surface cause and effect and this means examining the power relations of the university and its role in shaping, as well as its implications in this particular context.

A Lost Document

On January 17, 1972 a student about to graduate with an Ethnic Studies BA- Mexican-American Studies concentration was "informed by a degree checker that no such program existed"[5] and was forced with another student to change majors. When investigated it was discovered that the MAS program documentation had been misplaced in the provost of arts and sciences' office. This documentation had not been circulated for faculty approval, which was necessary for the implementation of new programs. Vice Provost (he is also referred to as Dean in Paredes' letters) James Roach stated that the program was "lost in his secretary's file" and attributed the loss to "many administrative changes" when the program was supposed to be circulated.

Roach received a resignation on January 20, 1972 from Professor Paredes who took this administrative "mistake" as his cue to resign as director of CMAS[6]. Citing continuing difficulties with the administration, particularly with Vice Provost Roach who became something of a villain because of his alleged attitude towards MAS program, Paredes expressed that he had enough of what he called "tokenism and tergiversation"[7] and as stated in a speech to Chicano students "to carry the fight any longer would be just what the administration wants."[8] Therefore he quit.

This set off something of a controversy. The Chicano student group, MAYO, charged Roach with racism, MAYO's president at the time said Roach "has proven himself to be antagonistic and racist towards our Mexican-American Studies program."[9] MAYO also protested the administration's handling of the Mexican American Studies program while demanding several changes.

The administration reacted both to Paredes and to the actions of MAYO. Provost of Arts and Sciences Stanley Ross and Vice Provost Roach both called Paredes' allegations of administrative opposition to MAS misguided. Roach in a Daily Texan article stated that "Paredes assumed opposition where none existed."[10] And Ross responded to a Daily Texan editorial which supported Paredes' claims, with a letter to the editor attempting to dispel those claims of intentional mismanagement [11]. Ross also publicly supported Roach and defended him in response to charges of racism.[12]

A lost document touched off a firestorm in the University, but it was more of a 'last straw' than a reason in itself.

Con su pluma en su mano

The immediate and most literal explanation for Paredes' resignation was he was angry because of the misplaced document.[13] There are a few reasons why this would be so. Two students, who were near graduating, had to change majors. This also meant that Paredes was a director of an officially non-existent program. Yet this explanation falls short. Paredes himself points at a trend of administrative actions and attitudes as the real reason why he resigned[14]. The lost document was a symbol for Paredes of how the administration felt towards Mexican-Americans. According to José Limón, "this became a kind of statement about his [Paredes] general feeling that in Texas, the state and also at the University [UT], the Mexican-American population was often ignored, not paid attention to."[15]

Limón points to Paredes' personality and background as exceptional factors in how the lost document was taken. Born in 1915 in Brownsville, Texas on the Texas-Mexico border, Paredes grew up in a region where the Mexican-American population was subjected to discrimination and oppression from many Anglos, especially the Texas Rangers. His scholarly work focused on the culture of the borderlands. Examining Mexican-American ballads, known as corridos, he sought to uncover the lives and struggles of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans at the border. He challenged stereotypical views of Mexican-Americans and the border, picking apart both popular and academic depictions.[16]

Paredes went to UT in the 1950s. Limón contrasts his experience of being a student at UT in the 1960s with Paredes', as a partial explanation of why Paredes was distrustful of the administration.[17] The 1950s were a conservative time not only for America generally, but for the universities as well. In fact UT was a whites-only university until 1950 when it allowed a black law student, who sued the Law School, admittance; it was not until 1956 when the University admitted black undergraduates.[18] Additionally Paredes already had a family and was a teaching assistant while he attended UT. So, according to Limón, Paredes did not have the most positive experience at UT and did not connect with the school much. In the 1960s the campus began to open up especially as Dean of Arts and Sciences John Silber began to hire liberal and radical professors[19] and as the civil rights movement and movement against the War in Vietnam politicized students[20]. The campus changed radically from being politically stifling to being one of the centers of activism in America.

Clearly Paredes' personal background had some influence in how he interpreted not only the lost document but other administrative behavior as well. Even so, Paredes makes a case. His allegations of administrative antagonism have merit, when viewed as a conflict over the realization of a student struggle's attempt to carve out space in the university. I will begin with Paredes' own statements, which are worth quoting at length, regarding Roach's behavior.

Dean Roach's negative reaction to the proposal was the only sour note in the atmosphere of harmony that prevailed for a few months after February 1971. But I had no reason to believe that he might short-stop our proposal. On the contrary, I had every reason to believe that he would push it through, not only because of the Provost's approval of the proposal but because of an exchange I had with Roach just before I left his office that day. I remarked that I would keep working for an independent Mexican-American Studies program. He answered that I could do so if I wished, but that he would oppose me. "This is all you're going to get," he said, putting his hand on the Mexican American concentration papers on his desk. (emphasis mine)

During the summer we set up the courses required for our program and arranged for their staffing. In the fall we registered ten students for the Ethnic Studies Major, Mexican-American concentration. All this was done with the knowledge and approval of Dean James Roach. And now, during the spring semester, we are told that the program was filed away, "by mistake" instead of being circulated among the faculty for approval; and therefore, it does not exist. I am very skeptical of the "mistake" explanation, unless "mistake" is intended to mean "miscalculation" rather than "oversight."[21]

According to Paredes, Dean Roach kept trying to change MAS from focusing on "Chicano Studies" to "ethnic" courses in general, before and after the 'lost paper' incident happened. Paredes believed that Roach deliberately kept the MAS program proposal from circulating among the faculty, which would have probably accepted it as a degree program, in order to replace it with a "watered-down proposal" which Roach approved of. Roach wanted to eliminate the Spanish language requirements and reduce the program in size so that it would "conform with the catalogue." One reason Paredes and students had problems with having MAS under Ethnic Studies versus separate MAS and Black Studies[22] because the two would have to split resources, rotating head of Ethnic Studies, etc.[23] which may cause problems down the road.

More generally the conflict with Roach seems to be over the varying conceptualizations of CMAS between Roach's and the administration's on the one hand and Paredes' and Chicano students' on the other. Paredes again,

In each instance, the immediate cause for disagreement has been the concept of 'ethnic studies' versus studies focused on a specific ethnic group…Perhaps I should explain my position about 'ethnic studies.' I support the teaching of ethnic studies courses within departments. I am strongly opposed, however, to degree programs built upon a general concept of ethnicity. Such 'ethnic studies' programs can too easily become a 'lands-and-peoples' sort of thing, not quite as broadening as a ten-days' trip around the world. The 'look-we-are-all-ethnics' approach may be valid for the primary grades, but it is highly questionable at the university level.

It is a different matter when a program brings together materials and methods from different disciplines and focuses them on one specific ethnic group. This approach, to my mind, justifies its reason for existence because of its fresh viewpoints into education, and because it can organize new knowledge that may be brought to bear on minority problems within our society.[24]

Here Paredes expresses desire for MAS to be critical and interdisciplinary in order to solve what he calls "minority problems". This is in opposition to what he calls a "lands-and-peoples sort of thing" where (as I see interpret it) like in elementary school, students will be exposed to different cultures in a superficial way as opposed to examining "one specific ethnic group" in an interdisciplinary way to gain new viewpoints that challenge stereotypes, to paraphrase Paredes. Paredes and students hoped that this department would be involved in advocacy for the Mexican-American community as part of its academic mission.

The concurrent MAYO demands yield additional understanding of the struggle by Chicano students to carve out space for themselves and the greater Mexican-American community at UT. These demands included

1. The ethnic studies program be abolished and a BA in Chicano studies and a separate BA in Black studies be established.

2. The director of Mexican-American studies be made directly responsible to the president of the University.
3. No person be appointed the director of the Mexican-American Studies Center without the approval of the Chicano students and faculty.
4. The establishment of a recruitment program for Chicanos; this must be done through the reinstatement of the Program for Educational Opportunities (PEO) and the Council of Legal Educational Opportunities (CLEO). These programs should be developed under the auspices of the Mexican-American Studies Center.
5. The hiring of more Chicano professors and the doubling of the present budget for the Mexican American Studies Center. The hiring of these instructors will be done under the auspices of the center.
6. The establishment of a clearing house for Mexican-American financial aids, scholarships, grants, fellowships, research assistance and loans.
7. A more viable program in bilingual education.[25]

These demands must be understood within the context of the Chicano student movement's direction during this period. Nationally the Chicano student movement sought to establish institutionalized departments within universities that would "enable Chicanos to study their heritage"[26]. Departments such as CMAS, established through Chicano struggle, would in turn contribute to the Chicano community in furthering its cultural and political agenda(s).

Each of the above demands supports my claim that what Paredes and Chicano students desired was a Center that was autonomous, accountable to the Chicano community at UT and Texas, and would be activist. Let me discuss these points briefly.

The first demand for separate BAs for both Chicano and Black studies was also supported by the Blacks, an African-American student group.[27] One reason for desiring separation was to avoid conflict over having to split resources. Another was to demand more for each and to be able to develop the two programs in different directions if so desired. The MAS degree that students wanted would have been 36 credit hours[28], and they compromised at 33[29], most liberal arts degree were around 24 hours and this was the amount of "watered-down" program that Paredes refers to. And this desired degree contained Spanish language requirements, "in reality a double major"[30]. The administration responded to this demand by talking it to death, stating that the Ethnic Studies program already existed and suits as an "umbrella"[31].

Demands 2-5 all are attempts to circumvent the established hierarchy of the University in order to make MAS and CMAS more autonomous and to make it accountable to the Chicano community. Demands 4-6 involve gaining resources for the Chicano community, under the "auspices of the Center" which was intended to be under control of Chicano students and faculty.

When reading the responses of the administration by President Spurr I couldn't help but feel that the administration knew that MAYO was attempting to escape the university hierarchy and that the administration had to stop this. For example, referring to demand #2,

If Mexican-American Studies are to flourish and attain academic distinction - a goal which members of the administration share with members of MAYO and the Mexican-American faculty - the program must be within the mainstream of the University. Accordingly, we do not feel that this suggestion is in the best interests of the program.[32]

Spurr goes on to state the hierarchy that all academic programs must report through. Respond to the third demand, "It is the responsibility of the appropriate dean to recommend and of the President to appoint such administrative officers."[33] To the fifth, "the Center and the instructional program may submit budgetary requests with appropriate justifications."[34] And to the sixth, "It would be unwise to assign responsibility for administrative services to an academic unit concerned with instructional and organized research programs."[35] Instead of viewing these demands as youthful naivety, to be rectified by an administrative rebuttal stating the "way things are", the demands of MAYO and the frustration and resignation of Paredes are the results of desiring to carve out a space at UT, accountable to Mexican-Americans.

The conceptualization of MAS held by the students was partially unable to be translated into the logic of the university. In terms of credit hours and requirements it was translatable, but in terms of what the program meant it was not so clear. The administration sought an academic program, what the students sought was something more than just another topic of inquiry.

Because the [ethnic studies] movement has been organized around demands for free spaces which it could control and use as it wishes autonomous from the university as a whole, the offensive struggles that won the programs and the resources were soon turned on the defensive in order to defend them.[36]

Ovetz discusses the modern public university in the United States as acting as a social factory, training, socializing and instilling discipline in American youths to prepare them for the world of capitalist work. I will not enter into a discussion of this here, but it offers a useful way of thinking about the University. It is not monolithic and as stated in the quote above can be subverted to other ends, such as supporting the Chicano community. These "free" or semi-autonomous spaces can threaten the role of the university as social factory if they do not fulfill their functions described as "attaining academic distinction" which is judged by the administration. The desires by students and Paredes to make CMAS and MAS accountable to the Chicano community were countered by administrative moves to bring the content of MAS, studying Mexican-Americans, into a form that was in accordance with the hierarchy of the university as well as its primary role. These roles are constantly in tension and neither one or the other are completely dominant as long as the program exists within the university or Chicano students and faculty, for lack of a better word, care.

Conclusion

The resignation of Professor Américo Paredes was a salient moment in the struggle for Chicano studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Accusations of racism, student protest and other controversies were all part and parcel of a somewhat antagonistic process of the carving out of space for Chicano students at UT and the ensuing negotiation of how that space would be constituted. Paredes' personal past had a part to play in how he perceived administrative actions and thus how he acted, yet his own actions took place within a context of struggle that continues to this day.

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Bibliography

Bass, Liz and Mike Fresques. "Ross Admits Mistake: Error Delays Chicano Studies Program." 1/31/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications

Burr, Beverly. 1988. History of Student Activism at UT: 1960-1988. unpublished undergraduate thesis.

Con su pluma en su mano: A few words about don Americo Paredes.
http://chicanas.com/americo.html

Dugger, Ronnie. 1974. Our Invaded Universities: Form, Reform and New Starts, aNonfiction Play in Five Stages. Toronto, Canada: George J. McLeod Limited.

Fitzgerald, Randy. "Paredes Exit Called Mistake." 1/28/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

Griswold del Castillo, Richard and Arnold de León. 1996. North to Aztlán: A History of Mexican Americans in the United States. New York, NY: Twayne Publishers.

Letter from Paredes to "Colleagues in the Mexican-American Studies Program, Students and Other Interested Parties." February, 1, 1972. Paredes Archives.

"Paredes Plans to Quit: Chicano Director Blasts Administration." 1/25/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

"Official University of Texas Obituary for don Americo Paredes." 5/5/1999.
http://www.utexas.edu/opa/news/99newreleases/nr_199905/nr_paredes990505.html

Ovetz, Robert. 1996. Entrepreneurialization, Resistance, and the Crisis of the Universities: A Case Study of the University of Texas at Austin. unpublished dissertation.

Ross, Stanley. "Editorial lacks truth." 2/2/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

Schwellenbach, Nicholas. Interview with José Limón. 11/25/2003. tape in author's possession.

Spurr, Stephen. "Administrative Response to the Issues Raised by Mexican-American Students." 2/11/1972. Paredes Archives.

Taylor, Leslie. "Ross Counters MAYO Charge." 2/24/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

Tosh, John. 2000. The Pursuit of History. Edinburgh, UK: Pearson Education.

Trouillot, Michel-Rolph. 1995. Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.

 

Footnotes

[1] "Paredes Plans to Quit: Chicano Director Blasts Administration." 1/25/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[2] Tosh 2000: 22.

[3] The salient concept of silence is core to Michel-Rolph Troullot's book Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History (1995). Silencing is the result of uneven sources and archives which are created. Silencing also occurs in the creation of historical narrative because of the previous reason, absence in sources and/or archives, or because of other reasons, such as the failure to conceptualize something that happened in a certain way because of prejudice.

[4] http://www.utexas.edu/opa/news/99newreleases/nr_199905/nr_paredes990505.html

[5] Bass, Liz and Mike Fresques. "Ross Admits Mistake: Error Delays Chicano Studies Program." 1/31/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[6] Letter from Paredes to Colleagues in the Mexican-American Studies Program, Students and Other Interested Parties. February, 1, 1972: 4.

[7] Ibid: 1.

[8] "Paredes Plans to Quit: Chicano Director Blasts Administration." 1/25/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[9] Taylor, Leslie. "Ross Counters MAYO Charge." 2/24/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[10] Fitzgerald, Randy. "Paredes Exit Called Mistake." 1/28/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[11] Ross, Stanley. "Editorial lacks truth." 2/2/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[12] Taylor, Leslie. "Ross Counters MAYO Charge." 2/24/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[13] Limón interview.

[14] Letter: 1.

[15] Limón interview.

[16] Con su pluma en su mano: A few words about don Américo Paredes.

[17] Limón interview.

[18] Ovetz 1996: 82.

[19] Dugger 1974.

[20] Burr 1988.

[21] Letter: 3.

[22] Letter: 2.

[23] Limón Interview.

[24] Letter: 1.

[25] Bass, Liz and Mike Fresques. "Ross Admits Mistake: Error Delays Chicano Studies Program." 1/31/1972. The Daily Texan. Austin, TX: Texas Student Publications.

[26] Griswold del Castillo and de Leon 1996: 132.

[27] Limón interview.

[28] The Letter: 4.

[29] Taylor, Leslie. "Spurr Promises Reply to 7 Mayo Demands." 2/10/1972. The Daily Texan.

[30] The Letter: 4.

[31] Spurr, Stephen. "Administrative Response to the Issues Raised by Mexican-American Students." 2/11/1972.

[32] Spurr 1972: 3.

[33] Spurr 1972: 4.

[34] Ibid.

[35] Ibid: 5.

[36] Ovetz 1996: 80.