Why is Princeton Provincializing the Study of Europe?
Joseph Gonzalez ‘28
Every so often, the complexities of the world break through the orange bubble that is Princeton University. There are occasional reminders of the world outside, like the pro-Ukraine flag-waving event outside FitzRandolph Gate, reminding us that a major conflict in Europe is still ongoing four years later. Even as a veteran, it still feels like something happening in a remote place. It was only when I attended the European Cultural Studies (ECS) Faber Colloquium, a requirement for the European Studies minor I am pursuing, that I reflected on Europe’s significance and the debt Princeton as an institution owes to Europe, from its architecture to its precept system.
The Colloquium featured University of Chicago professor Dipesh Chakrabarty on the 25th anniversary of his influential book “Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference.” Professor Chakrabarty argues that while Europe should still be studied because Western thought remains embedded in modern political and historical thought worldwide, it must be provincialized by treating Europe not as the universal center of history, but just another particular tradition among many. In one sense, he is not wrong in his analysis – Europe’s place and importance in the world has surely fallen.
As one of the only students here who lived to see the fall of the Berlin Wall and the celebration of the fall of the Soviet Union, I argue here that something critical has been lost with recent changes to how European history, politics, languages and culture are taught at Princeton. The former dual European Studies program has been replaced by a program that undermines rigorous study as it attempts toprovincialize Europe in line with Princeton’s current interdisciplinary approach to “studies.”
“This Week in History: Debating the role of interdisciplinary humanities in a Princeton education” recently appeared in the Daily Princetonian. It is about the historical debates over interdisciplinary approaches that led to the creation of the intensive year-long Humanities Sequence, known as HUM. I have completed the sequence and the Humanistic Studies minor, and I am proud of it. It also serves as proof that the debate over interdisciplinary studies as an approach is over. This concept, once looked down upon, is now celebrated by Princeton as a forward-thinking academic innovation. The university has also proudly announced its new minor in European Studies. Officially, the new minor is a joint offering of European Cultural Studies (ECS) and the Program in Contemporary European Politics and Society (EPS), designed to provide students with a “comprehensive exploration of Europe” by blending the humanities and social sciences. It also explicitly replaces the old ECS and EPS certificates.
The official description of the new minor is appealing. However, merging ECS and EPS into a single European Studies minor signals a concerning shift in Princeton’s curricular reform. What seems like a broadening of access might actually marginalize the field. By combining these two distinct intellectual paths under one interdisciplinary umbrella, Princeton risks reducing serious engagement with Europe’s political and cultural traditions. By design, it means less depth, less specialization, and diminished confidence in Europe’s importance as a subject worth dedicated study. To compare, let’s review what each program offered before the change.
The original ECS program was founded in 1975 and was one of Princeton’s oldest undergraduate certificate programs. It was created through collaboration among faculty under the leadership of one of America’s leading cultural historians, Carl E. Schorske. Its history mattered because it represented a serious institutional commitment to the study of European civilization, culture, and intellectual life.
Its structure also reflected a clearly distinct intellectual identity. The ECS certificate allowed students to fulfill the program either through two core ECS courses or the Humanities sequence, plus two additional upper-level courses. The program’s own description emphasized how students from diverse disciplines could gather around the humanities and the arts while still integrating those courses with their majors, independent work, and even studying abroad.
The old Contemporary European Politics (EPS) certificate was different. It required one gateway seminar and four courses, including both history and social science distribution requirements with an emphasis on European politics and society. There was also a need for sufficient foreign-language proficiency to use research materials for senior thesis work. Most importantly, it required that the senior thesis be on a subject related to contemporary European politics and society, unless an alternative independent project was approved.
These two programs were not the same. That was the point. One leaned more heavily toward culture, intellectual history, and the humanities. The other demanded engagement with politics, society, and language, as well as independent research. Their coexistence gave Princeton students choices about how to engage in the study of Europe. Merging them into one minor does not preserve both. It inevitably diminishes them. That is what seems to be happening here.
The new requirements for the European Studies minor consist of five courses: one prerequisite and four electives, split between ECS and EPS. But there is no independent work requirement and no language requirement. Students participate in a senior colloquium, but the structure no longer preserves the sharper demands once built into EPS.
“Interdisciplinary” may have become one of the most celebrated words in higher education. However, interdisciplinarity is not equivalent to rigor. It also is not the same as intellectual breadth, and certainly not the same as depth. When a program removes language requirements and independent research obligations, it is difficult to argue that academic seriousness has improved. Simplification does not equal enrichment. Princeton describes the new minor as a “comprehensive” and “global” study of Europe. But what appears comprehensive on paper does not translate into genuine comprehensiveness in practice.
What is lost is not just a credential but also a way of thinking about education. The disappearance of distinct European cultural and political identities suggests that preserving separation no longer matters as much as it once did as a topic of academic inquiry. And that should be a concern: the academic politics surrounding Europe as a subject, where it is often treated less as a civilization to be studied seriously than as a problem in the larger context of colonialism and multiculturalism.
Princeton might see this as progress, but I believe something valuable is being lost; it reflects a concerning aspect of what a university still considers worth preserving. Europe should be studied with a critical eye. Its imperial projects, exclusions, and contradictions are part of its history and should be discussed, warts and all. But students should question why the decision was made to provincialize Europe, when we are the inheritors of that Western tradition. As a minority first generation low income student with a GED, I might not be the face you expect to see on the barricades, but perhaps someone should have been manning the gates and waving the flag to make sure we did not forget how much it matters.
Joseph Gonzalez ‘28 is an Army and Marine Corps combat veteran and transfer student from Brentwood, NY, majoring in History. He is a PFS Writing Fellow.