American Studies Department records

Robert W. Bolwell founded what is now known as the American Studies Department in 1938. He had an A.B. degree from Case Western University, M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Columbia University, and was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He was a professor of English and American Literature and taught at GW from 1920-57. In 1938 he established the American Thought and Civilization major, and for twenty-five years it resided as a special program with in the English Department. In 1968 American Studies left the English Department, to establish itself as a separate program with departmental status. In line with changing social as well as academic interests, the program's first director, Robert Walker, took the lead in recruiting the College's first black professor, J. Saunders Redding, who The New York Times once called "probably the most eminent Negro writer of nonfiction in the country." The program added affiliations with the Library of Congress and Smithsonian Institution.

In the 1970's professors Bernard Mergen, Howard Gillette, Letitia Woods Brown, and Frederick Gutheim brought with them interests in African-American studies, urban and social history, as well as popular and material culture and added courses which helped grow the program. In 1980, courses in folklore were expanded under the direction of John Vlach. The arrival of Marcus Cunliffe as University professor and the expansion of the program's journal "American Studies International" added further stature, and in the coming years both the undergraduate and graduate programs were strengthened.

The Department currently offers three degrees: B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. The faculty and students who make up the American Studies Department combine interests drawn from a variety of perspectives and methods of inquiry: history, folklife, cultural studies, literary analysis, as well as the study of art, architecture, and visual culture. However, most faculty and students find their intellectual pursuits intersecting at some point around questions of public culture and/or public history. Students at all levels develop individualized, interdisciplinary programs of study in consultation with faculty advisors.

Since 1975, George Washington University has offered a unique interdisciplinary Master's program in historic preservation through its departments of American Studies and History. The program affords a strong intellectual perspective on critical issues in the preservation and a sound practical training for the field.

The Department published the journal "American Studies International."

N.B. This history note was written in 2005