Senator Joins Call for UCI Multiculturalism

IRVINE — Two weeks after students began a hunger strike to demand an Asian-American studies program at UC Irvine, state Sen. Art Torres visited the campus Friday morning, telling strikers that he has been pressuring administrators to expand multiculturalism courses in the UC system.

Speaking before about 60 students in front of the hunger strike tent, the member of the Senate Education Committee vowed to fight for the creation of an Asian-American studies program at Irvine and to achieve departmental status for the Chicano studies program at UCLA.

Torres (D-Los Angeles) also hinted that he may ask legislators to withhold state funding from UCI to keep up the pressure.

Torres persuaded the Senate to delay a $833,000 payment for an addition to the UCLA law school to protest Chancellor Charles E. Young’s denial of departmental status for Chicano studies.

Camping out in front of the administration building, students have been taking turns in the hunger strike, each fasting for 24 hours. Protesters at UCLA on Friday announced that they have also started a hunger strike.

Torres is touring UC campuses to urge regents and administrators to pay more attention to ethnic studies. The perception among some educators that ethnic studies is not a “serious discipline” must be altered, he said.

A strong proponent of ethnic studies, the veteran lawmaker said multiculturalism studies are necessary to help students cope with an increasingly diverse population.

“Ethnic studies helps us understand each other,” Torres said. “It’s important that white, black, brown, yellow, red come together to rebuild California.”

To demonstrate the need for increased sensitivity, Torres referred to a poem a fellow legislator recently circulated.

Assemblyman Pete Knight (R-Palmdale) gave fellow Republicans a poem that described Latinos “as breeders, riding in a ‘Chebb’ truck and essentially doing away with the white race,” Torres said.

UC Irvine students reiterated their three demands Friday, calling on administrators to hire four Asian-American studies professors in the future, to have student input in all phases of staff hiring, and to designate two Asian-American studies program coordinators.

The campus now averages two Asian-American classes a quarter, with long waiting lists, students said. Although Asian-Americans make up more than 43% of the student population, Irvine is one of just two UC schools that do not have an Asian-American studies program.

“We are not asking for Asian-American studies to be created as a whole today, now,” said Charles Lee, co-chair of the Asian-Pacific Student Assn. “We are asking for a commitment for the future. . . . We feel that there hasn’t been adequate progress in the field of Asian-American studies, as well as in the field of ethnic studies as a whole.”

Acting Chancellor L. Dennis Smith has reassured students that searches for Asian-American studies faculty members are underway. Still, students said they have waited more than two years and seen no results.