We’re excited about the new undertaking our blog bollaborator, Tim Bowman, has at West Texas A&M. In the following post, he describes the launch of this great new center for the study of the U.S. West and Borderlands, as well as his work as its Associate Director.
I am delighted to announce the formation of a new academic institution at West Texas A&M University (WT). In the fall of 2016, a small group of scholars launched the Center for the Study of the American West (CSAW), which is housed in the Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum (PPHM) on the campus of WT. CSAW is devoted to the promotion and development of interdisciplinary scholarship on the High Plains as well as the greater North American West through undergraduate and postgraduate education, research development, public outreach, and the coordination of collaborative opportunities between CSAW and the PPHM, the Cornette Library on WT’s campus, and other institutions and community partners. Our mission is a straightforward one: to promote the study of the North American West as a product of broad historical forces.
How do we accomplish this? Part of it is through an endowed lecture series. The purpose of any endowed lectureship is to create a corpus of funds to generate an annual income substantial enough to attract noted scholars; our program, in particular, includes a public lecture, classroom lecture, and an event focused on student interaction and discussion. The biannual Gary L. Nall Lecture Series does all of the above, in keeping with CSAW’s mission. CSAW’s launch event in October of 2016 featured none other than noted western scholar Patricia Nelson Limerick, while the spring semester will feature writer, historian, and journalist S.C. Gwynne. Future Nall lectures will be given by prominent scholars such as borderlands historian Brian DeLay, who will be speaking on campus during the fall semester of 2017.
CSAW is also offering research grants to sponsor research for faculty, students and staff from WT to travel to other institutions, as well as for scholars from other institutions who would benefit from the use of WT and PPHM archives. Grants of up to $2,000 are available depending on the researcher’s need. Additionally, outside scholars will receive support from CSAW’s interns with arrangements for their stay in Canyon. Information on the grants—which include the CSAW Research Grant, the Jo Stewart Randel Grant, and the CSAW Student Research Grant—can be found here.
Another innovative program that CSAW offers is a minor field in Western American Studies for WT undergraduates. The minor is an interdisciplinary program designed to provide students a specialization in issues that are important to the region. Students will also gain experience in community involvement through an internship requirement as well as being presented with the opportunity to publish an original piece of written work in the Panhandle-Plains Historical Review, which is an historical journal devoted to studying the immediate region. Courses cover a variety of subjects, such as North American Borderlands History, Environmental Law, American Regionalism, Herpetology, Literature of the Southwest, Mexican-American History, as well as many other exciting fields of study relevant into understand the local and greater Wests.
CSAW’s director Alex Hunt, assistant director Maureen Hubbart, and myself (as associate director) are thrilled about these as well as several other opportunities and programs that CSAW is currently developing. It is my sincere hope that readers will contact me should they like any additional information about the goings-on at CSAW, the PPHM, or the larger WT campus.
Borderlands History 