Skocpol says that to her knowledge, the council has not yet made any discussion of cuts similar to those at Yale. Members are investigating other possible ways of cutting costs, she says, including attempts to move current Harvard personnel to other positions when posts open.

"I think we all know we have to trim expenses, in all departments, across the board," the sociology professor says. "I haven't noticed any panic."

And Skocpol says members of the Sociology Department are not worried about their positions going the way of their Yale counterparts.

"I don't think that the sociology department is concerned that it will be shrunk," she says.

Despite the possibilities for their colleagues at Yale, members of the Linguistic Department here, says Professor of Linguistics Susumo Kuno, do not think that their department is in danger.

"I'm not concerned about that," he says. "The elimination of a department of linguistics will turn a major university into something like a liberal arts college."

Kuno says that fellow faculty members "have a much better understanding of linguisitics and the role it can play" than at Yale. He calls the proposal to cut Yale's department "very unfortunate."

"I think this is disgraceful," he says. "If they accept the recommendations, they will be extremely shortsighted."

Kuno said that he and other linguists are concerned that Yale's department was not given a fair assessment. Those who made the recommendations, he says, had little knowledge of the field.

"I'm sure that concerned linguists will write to Yale protesting recommendations of the committee," he says.

South Asian Program First Victim?

One discipline, however, that may have exhausted its last defense against the recession is the study of Hindu-Urdu languages.

A professorship and associate professorship of Indo-Muslim culture in the Department of Near Middle Eastern Languages and Civilizations have until now been sustained by a private trust fund.

When Professor of Indo-Muslim Culture Annemarie Schimmel retires at the end of this academic year, Harvard will cease drawing from this fund, leaving the department without these two professors if another source of income is not found.

Schimmel and Associate Professor of Indo-Muslim Culture Ali S. Asani are the only professors at the University who teach courses specifically on South Asian Islamic culture and civilization. In addition, Schimmel teaches Persian and Turkish while Asani is the only scholar who teaches Hindi and Urdu.