Mission Statement
Introduction
The Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute Center for Persian Studies (RICPS), established in Fall 2004 as a unit within the School of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures (SLLC) at the University of Maryland College Park (UMCP), has a threefold mission. First, to inaugurate a world-class academic program in Persian language and literature, most broadly defined and inclusive of the Iranian world’s millennia-old heritage as well as its modern and contemporary linguistic and literary traditions. Second, to foster, throughout UMCP and beyond, the growth of teaching and scholarship in all aspects of the contemporary and classical cultures and civilizations within the Iranian world, and in all Persian-speaking societies, both contemporary (Iran, Afghanistan, Persian-speaking Central Asia and the emerging Persian-speaking diasporas and ethnic minorities the world over) and historical (Ancient Persia, Medieval Central Asia and Anatolia, pre-modern Caucasus, pre-colonial India, etc.). Third, to help enhance mutual understanding between Americans of all ethnic, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds and those of Iranian and Persian-speaking parentage with the larger US society by interpreting Persian and Iranian cultures and civilizations now and into the foreseeable future.
The Academic Program in Persian Language and Literature
With the appointment of Professor Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, an internationally recognized scholar and teacher, as founding director, RICPS’s first mission is well underway. Persian-language courses previously offered through UMCP’s FOLA Program, are now offered with the prefix PERS and a full program of undergraduate major and minor courses of study in Persian has been submitted for approval. With expected approval date of May 2005, full implementation of the undergraduate program in Persian Studies, the first of its kind in the US, will begin by fall semester 2005. To the delight of all interested students, Professor Karimi offered an English-language undergraduate course, Introduction to Persian Literature, in fall 2004, which can be used as partial fulfillment of the requirements for a major or minor in Persian Studies; it will also be repeated again next fall. RICPS has also drafted a proposal for a Master of Arts (MA) degree in Persian Studies to be inaugurated in fall 2006. At this time, undergraduate students of the University of Maryland system and other universities in the greater Maryland-DC-Virginia area, can participate in this program either directly or through existing intercollegiate consortial arrangements. For now, Ph.D. students can concentrate on Persian Studies through two existing programs: Comparative Literature and Women’s Studies. An individualized Ph.D. Program tailored to the specific interests and needs of advanced students may also be instituted in the College of Arts and Humanities (ARHU) in the near future. In addition, efforts are underway to add to the Ph.D. Programs currently offered through the SLLC and elsewhere in ARHU.
Course Offerings on Iranian and Persian-speaking Societies and Civilizations
RICPS’s second mission, offering English-language courses on various aspects of the Persian/ Iranian culture area (other then language and literature), will have to be initiated as soon as possible. Some key undergraduate courses in Iranian history offered through the history department could be the foundation on which other important offerings – in art history, in government and politics, and in contemporary cultural studies such as Iranian cinema and Persian music could follow shortly thereafter. Moreover, UMCP officials view the start of the Arabic Program in SLLC in 2002 and of RICPS in 2004 as important initial steps in raising the profile of Middle Eastern and Islamic studies on all levels of the university. The UMCP seems poised to take better advantage of the prime location it occupies as a flagship state institution of higher education in the closest possible proximity of the nation’s capital to harness the vast human and material resources in and around Washington DC. Such institutions as the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian Institution, the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars, and numerous other nearby centers of scholarship, can certainly make UMCP a hub of scholarly activity concentrated on the Middle East and the Islamic world. Already, with the active support of the sizable Iranian-American community in the area and with help from the embassies of Afghanistan and Tajikistan, RICPS has all the makings of a magnet for a variety if fruitful interactions – in politics and government as well as in cultural, artistic, and scholastic spheres – with Iran and the Persian-speaking world, even in the absence of full-fledged diplomatic relations between Iran and the US.
The University and its Surrounding Community
The third mission of RICPS takes it beyond the campus of the University of Maryland, among a clientele that stretches from the immediate area around the campus and the state all the way to the world at large. Estimates of Iranians living in the United States range between 1 and 1.5 million people, a notable minority by any standard. Dispersed from its homeland largely since the late 1970s, the Iranian-American community is a presence in urban areas around the US, from California to Maine and from Florida to Washington State; the greatest areas of concentration being southern and northern California. With an estimated population of 100,000 or more, the DC Metropolitan area ranks third, right behind those two. In education, social status, and wealth, this community ranks among the highest of all ethnic minorities living in America.
Clearly, such a community has definable cultural and scholastic needs, desires and ambitions, and adequate resources to support efforts of all kinds aimed at fulfilling them without prejudice, beyond particular political, social, or religious orientations, allegiances, and or preferences. It wishes to celebrate the achievements of the culture it belongs to and showcase its contributions, both past and present, to human history; it also endeavors to be informed of the latest trends and tendencies in the native culture. More importantly, it has lofty aspirations for the children it raises, aspirations that include all the privileges of life in a democratic society plus an anchoring in those aspects of the ancestral culture that it deems worth passing on. First and foremost on the list is mastery of the Persian language, the most central index of cultural identity among all speakers of Persian. At the present time, only a dozen or so universities in the US offer full-fledged academic programs in the Persian language, consisting of at least a three-year course of study with the possibility of further education in higher levels of language-learning and in cultural studies.
RICPS’s first mission is in part an attempt to make these services available to the community, and it stands to reason that the community should step forward to support future efforts in that direction. As citizens and taxpayers, members of the Iranian and Persian-speaking communities also support efforts aimed at making courses available to all university-age students to inform them about the Persian culture and to share their joy at celebrating its achievements in the past and its ambition to play a part in the global world of the future. For that reason, RICPS will seek partnerships with prominent and engaged community leaders to expand its offerings to all the diverse facets of Persian literature and culture, and to introduce courses in English on Iranian history from the antiquity to the present day, on the Iranian world’s achievements in diverse arts and crafts, and in exploring the political culture and social structures that govern modern-day Persian-speaking countries; in short, RICPS plans to develop and offer all the courses that would interpret the ancient culture of Persian world to all Americans of the twenty-first century.
Finally, to foster an environment of active scholarly and cultural exchange equal to the curious minds of the future, even beyond the university classes, RICPS plans to sponsor or cosponsor a series of community-supported academic, artistic, and cultural events – conferences, seminars, performances, presentations, lectures, exhibits, etc. on the campus of the University of Maryland at College Park. At the present time, these plans consist of at least one international conference every year, at least one signature annual lecture series, and as many other similar events as possible. For a list of projected events, please see [link here]. In a word, Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute Center for Persian Studies endeavors to bring the Persian world to the doorstep of every citizen with curiosity enough to seek information and knowledge and the will to seize this opportunity to develop a better understanding of the cultural universe that has nurtured modern Iranians and other Persian-speakers.
