Ethnic groups on campus have opted to work for gaining courses about their respective racial groups instead of ethnic studies courses in general. Most recently, Asian-American students formed an initiative to pursue Asian-American studies at Harvard.

Some see no ideological conflict in working separately for race-specific courses.

“I don’t think any of these things—separate certificates, departments, whatever—conflict with each other,” says John H. Hsu ’03, a coalition member. “We all have the same goal.”

“A lot of what’s happened recently is the different movements trying to be very supportive of each other to get some positive things done,” says BSA President Brandon A. Gayle ’03. “There is no tension.”

But some say the current tack groups have taken—working separately for similar causes—is partially a result of wariness that working together will undermine the possibility of attaining their respective goals.

The BSA remains publicly supportive of other ethnic groups that want a stronger place in the curriculum. At the same time, some members worry that gains made for ethnic studies might negatively affect the Afro-American studies department.

“The movement for Latino studies is something the BSA is very strongly behind,” says Fred O. Smith ’04, a BSA board member. “We don’t want to lose what we do have and sacrifice it for something called ‘ethnic studies’ which may not become the powerhouse that the Af-Am department has become.”

The new student initiative for Asian-American studies is taking a similar tack.

“While we support the movement for ethnic studies in general, right now we’re really just concentrating on getting more Asian-American classes into the curriculum,” says Sophia Lai ’04, who is working in the group and is co-president of the Asian American Association. “We think it’s practical and reasonable to add more classes.”

The large Latino groups on campus are also publicly supporting other groups’ struggles while working to gain their own curriculum.

When Concilio Latino President Luis S. Hernandez, a Divinity School student, and RAZA President Maribel Hernandez ’04 lobbied Summers in March on behalf of a Latino studies curriculum, their petition said they also “pledge our support to the mutually inclusive causes of our fellow African-American, Asian-American and Native American students.”

Some students say the multi-faceted course the movement has taken leaves room for conflict down the line.

“It could create competition because the administration can’t create three new departments overnight,” says Allana N. Jackson ’03, treasurer of the Association of Black Harvard Women.

Others who hunger for a broader ideology-based coalition worry that mutual support will come to mean groups simply circulating each others’ requests over e-mail lists without genuine commitment.