On Monday, Yale University announced that it was updating its art history curriculum to be less Eurocentric, replacing two introductory survey courses with new classes that will focus on art from areas beyond Europe and America. That’s a good thing, but naturally, some people perceived it as a slight to old white men, and the university is facing backlash over their decision.
“PC Idiocy Kills Classic Art History Class,” screamed the New York Post. “If you want to see smart people behave like philistines, just get them hooked on identity politics,” read one tweet.
Yale University is scrapping its introductory art history course because there were too many white male artists in the Renaissance.
This is not a joke.
If you want to see smart people behave like philistines, just get them hooked on identity politics.https://t.co/FbT2Ow7j85
— Andrew Doyle (@andrewdoyle_com) January 29, 2020
“This change is the latest response to student uneasiness over an idealized Western ‘canon’ — a product of an overwhelmingly white, straight, European and male cadre of artists,” the Yale Daily News wrote.
“Essential to this decision is the Department’s belief that no one survey course taught in the space of a semester could ever be comprehensive, and that no one survey course can be taken as the definitive survey of our discipline,” Tim Barringer, chair of Yale’s History of Art Department, and Marisa Bass, director of Undergraduate Studies, explained in a statement.
The new art history classes that will soon be available to Yale students include “Art and Politics,” “Global Craft,” “The Silk Road” and “Sacred Places.”
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