A Peek Into the College of Arts & Sciences Through the Years

Anthony Hoyt and Cindy Stella are juniors at Santa Clara University and they are enrolled in Professor Amy Lueck’s English 103 class.  As English and history majors, Anthony and Cindy had a proclivity to pick a research topic which covered both of their fields of interest.  After weeks of deliberation, they decided to center their research around the Colleges of Arts and Sciences, and particularly that at their college, Santa Clara University.  Seeing as Santa Clara University is centrally located in Silicon Valley, the booming technology capital of the United States and the world, Anthony and Cindy took an approach highlighting the College of Arts and Sciences progress in the last forty years.

Within the last forty years, Anthony and Cindy focused directly on two school years in particular, 1973-1974 and 2015-2016.  These two time periods were strategically selected in order to represent two decades in which the arts, otherwise known as humanities, were at highs and lows.  The artifacts that were chosen for this exhibit were not forced to only be from the two years listed above. Instead, Anthony and Cindy wanted to tell as full of a story about the College of Arts and Sciences as possible given their restraints, including, but not limited to, resources, time, and opportunity. So, in other words there are multiple artifacts in this online exhibit, and the physical one showcased on November 29, 2016 not from the specific years of 1973-1974 and 2015-2016 so that the best and most full story of the College of Arts and Sciences could be told. Artifacts were chosen to exemplify the academic sampling, organization, and the  enhancement of the College of Arts and Sciences, as well as help narrate the larger story of the progression of the humanities over time.  However, no researcher can tell the story of the humanities without discussing the fluctuations within the field itself. Some of the selected artifacts, or lack thereof, demonstrate the discrepancies and ways in which the College of Arts and Sciences may not have been as prominent or strong of a force on campus as it had the potential to be.  All in all, this exhibit focuses on all aspects of the College of Arts and Sciences throughout the last forty plus years.