The English department filled two new positions this week in Contemporary Comparative American Ethnic Literature.

They will likely be included in the Comparative American Studies Program.

Warren Liu of UC Berkeley accepted the tenure-track English department position. Liu’s work focuses on experimental fiction and poetry as a way of studying ethnic and racial constructions in America.

Mayumi Takada, also of UC Berkeley, will fill the three-year visiting professor position.

“Clearly literature, cultural studies, film, visual media and performance are all important and productive sites where English and CAS overlap,” Takada said. Takada’s work focuses on a comparison of 20th century African-American and Asian-American film and literature.

While the two positions are rooted in the English department, consideration was given to CAS from the beginning of the search process.

“The job is an English department job, but from the beginning we talked about it very much as something complementing CAS,” English department chair Nick Jones said. “We’ll leave it open to year-to-year negotiations as to whether the courses taught by the candidate would count for CAS, but that’s up to [CAS], not to us.”

The English department asked CAS core faculty members Meredith Raimondo and Gina Perez to participate in the search process.

The two positions will work under the current CAS model, which allows faculty from other departments to be a part of the Program Committee. Currently, professors from the History, African American Studies, Sociology, Gender and Women’s Studies and Rhetoric and Composition departments are members of the committee. Whether the new English positions might be part of that committee is still to be decided.

“I think if whoever comes is interested, then there certainly is a possibility of being with the CAS program committee in the same way that Mr. Mitchell, Mr. Maeda, and Mr. Dhingra are all in other departments, but part of CAS as well,” Raimondo said.

The two new positions came during an exciting time for the program, which is in its first year of implementation. Currently there are seven declared CAS majors. CAS Acting Director and History Professor Gary Kornblith expects the number will increase by the end of the year as second-semester sophomores declare majors. Kornblith’s assessment is supported by this year’s enrollment results for the two core CAS courses, both of which were filled to capacity.

CAS courses have been generating wide student interest. This semester’s one-credit mini course, “Themes in Native American Feminism,” in particular, has already exceeded expectations. The by-application course received 52 applications for 20 spots, not including the handful of inquiries from students received up to one week after the application deadline. Course instructor Professor Andrea Smith of the University of Michigan agreed to teach one extra section in order to accommodate all the applicants.

CAS is also in the process of restructuring its major requirements, and recently submitted revisions to the Educational Plans and Policies Committee. The major now includes three concentrations: Identity and Diversity; Globalization, Transnationalism and Nation; and Histories and Practices of Social Change. The revisions also include a required fieldwork portion to the 300-level research class. These changes will be reflected in the 2004-2005 Course Catalog, which will also have an updated list of courses in other departments that can be counted towards the CAS major. Liu’s and Takada’s English courses are likely to become a part of that list.

Liu, who is planning to teach a first-year seminar on literary and cinematic depictions of LA focusing on racial tensions and urban “dystopia,” is excited about the position and the possibility to work with CAS.

“One interesting aspect of this particular position is its emphasis on comparative and expansive approaches to understanding issues of ethnicity, allowing for a great deal of flexibility not only in teaching strategy, but also in developing new models for scholarship,” said Liu.

Raimondo is visionary and optimistic about the direction CAS is headed.

“I’d love for more faculty in all the identity areas, especially whose focus is on Native American studies. That can happen in direct and indirect ways, and maybe at a time in the future we’ll get more faculty in CAS. It may be in more cooperative relationships with departments like [what happened in] the English search,” said Raimondo.

“Personally, I would be excited to work with the CAS department to develop curriculum and to think about ways to increase interdiscipinarity among both teachers and students,” said Liu.

The CAS program in fact was a deciding factor for Liu. “The fact that Oberlin put the time and energy into developing CAS made a huge impact on my decision to accept the job thereit indicated to me that Oberlin is serious and invested in creating new forums and new methods for teaching and researching issues that really do affect all Americans, wherever and whatever they are,” added Liu.