Thomas Holt, a professor of history at the University of Chicago who used to hold an appointment in Harvard’s Af Am department, says there is little doubt that the losses of Dawson and Bobo, both social scientists, have diminished the department’s strength in that area. But he does say that weakness in that area “is only a recent development and does not reflect any long-term trend in the department’s focus.”

AN UNCERTAIN FUTURE

Gates says the eight faculty appointments he hopes to make this upcoming year are geared towards improving the African wing of the department.

Harvard’s current emphasis on African American over African studies has earned the department its share of critics.

“Harvard’s is a controversial program. [Gates] does not have a strong Afrocentrist program, so people who are Afrocentrist would not want to call it number one,” Rickford says.

The five recruits in African studies, according to Gates, are in the areas of anthropology, developmental economics, literature, religion, and politics.

“If we are successful in our recruitment efforts, Harvard will have an African studies department as splendid and as renowned as our department of African American studies,” he says.

But if the department is to return to its past position of prominence, it will have to do so under a new leader.

Gates says he decided to step down as chair because he has been at the post for too long.

“Fifteen years is long enough. I was beginning to feel like Mobutu,” he jokes, referring to the former dictator of Zaire, Mobutu Sésé Seko.

Gates’ role as chair has differed sharply from that of the heads of Harvard’s more established departments. Those departments typically change chairs every few years, and the role of the chair is largely to keep the already-strong department on course. Gates, however, has had to take a more active role—actually building, rather than simply maintaining, the department’s reputation.

His decision to step down will present the department with its largest test to date—whether, for all its troubles, it will be able to stand alone, without the stewardship of the man who has been its shepherd for the past 15 years.

Gates is confident that despite the host of problems the department has faced over the last three years, it will continue to set the pace in its field.

“I wouldn’t step down if I thought the department were vulnerable in any way,” he says. “Once we make these appointments, the department will be as strong as ever.”

—Staff writer William C. Marra can be reached at wmarra@fas.harvard.edu.