Survey of Eurocentric Views on Agriculture in Students at ... · Survey of Eurocentric Views on Agriculture in Students at a Land-Grant Institution Survey of Eurocentric Views on

Abstract

Introduction

In this preliminary study, we posited that subtlebut normative socio-cultural Eurocentric views heldby students could tend to subvert efforts at land-grant institutions to help students become morecompetent to reap the opportunities of increasingglobalization. We designed and administered asimple attitudinal questionnaire to a sample offreshmen and seniors (in the College of Agricultureand Life Sciences at Virginia Tech, a land-grantinstitution) to measure the intensity of theiragreement with 16 Eurocentric propositions aboutagriculture advanced by David Landes (Landes,1998), a leading proponent of Eurocentric explana-tions of modern economic history. We found thatboth freshmen and seniors held Eurocentric viewsof agriculture. Although seniors' views tended to beless intense than freshmen's, they were still far frombeing immune to Eurocentric socio-culturalinfluences. Academic exposure and/or socialmaturity were likely causes of the lower intensity ofseniors' views. We think that students' Eurocentricviews on agriculture are probably associated withsocio-cultural conditioning embedded historicallyby precept and example in the (essentially neo-European) North American psyche as proposed byHughes (2003). More comprehensive and in-depthsurveys are needed to better characterize theorigins and intensity of Eurocentric socio-culturalviews and how such views may impact graduates'global competency.

The landmark mandate of a "people-serving"land-grant system of higher education in the USA(created by the 1862 Morrill Act) was to trulydemocratize university access and thereby facilitatemeeting the national need for skilled humanresources in agriculture and industry over the long

term (Ross, 1942; Eddy, 1957; Cross, 1999; Herren andCraig, 2002). But it was essentially nationalistic andpopulist in its conception. Land-grant universitieswere chartered to provide access to agriculture andengineering education that would meet long term USsocio-economic economic development needs (Nevins,1962; Edmond, 1978; Williams, 1991; Geiger, 2000).Indeed, the curricula have been remarkably effectivein achieving this intent. However, a question might beposed of whether the land-grant system's putativenationalistic and populist tendencies might fostersome degree of insular bias in views and attitudes in its“outputs” – its graduates.

Why should this question be posed? For much ofthe period following the creation of the land-grantinstitutions, the US agricultural and industrialeconomy has been self-sufficient and self-sustaining,largely protected and relatively immune to changesimposed from the rest of the world. A very strong casecan be made that this situation has changed remark-ably in the last two decades. Dramatic and revolution-ary changes in communication and technology haveled to increasing internationalization of commerce,capital, and labor. The USA is becoming increasinglylinked with the global economy and more and moreinterdependent with other nations and other peoples.An increasingly international market has beencreated, not only for conventional products andcommodities, but also for professionals, knowledge,research, and educational services (GASEPA, 1998;Ohmae, 1990; Friedman, 1999; Hirst and Thompson,1999; Kellogg, 2004; Hudzik, 2004).

Faced with these dramatic changes, administra-tors and faculty at many land-grant institutions aretrying to refine and adapt their 21st century mission tobetter face the challenges of increasing globalization(van den Bor et al., 1995; National Research Council,1996; GASEPA, 1998). Clear definition of the chal-lenges and concerted policy responses appear to belacking or inadequate (Allen, 2004; de Lauder, 2004;

1

2

3

Crop and Soil Environmental Sciences Department, Associate Professor and Professor, respectivelyResearch Statistician, Center for Agribusiness ExcellenceAdministrator, Special Projects

NACTA

Survey of Eurocentric Views on Agriculture in

Students at a Land-Grant Institution

Survey of Eurocentric Views on Agriculture in

Students at a Land-Grant Institution

N. Persaud and D.J. ParrishVirginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Blacksburg, VA. 24061-0404

H. WangTarleton State UniversityStephenville, TX 76401

J.A. MuffoOhio Board of Regents

Columbus, OH 43215-3414

1

2

3

32 NACTA Journal • June 2008

Hudzik, 2004). On the other hand, administrativeincentives to facilitate international outreach,exchanges, and linkages are increasingly common;and faculty-driven curriculum and course changesnow frequently include overt international contentor flavor. These efforts are designed to provide amore globally aware and competent faculty andstudent body.

Defining global competency and the globallycompetent student remains elusive. For the purposeof this study, we conceive it as an embedded mentalframework – or perhaps a “world view” – thatprompts and enables a student to analyze natureand society in a truly global context. This impliessome level of comprehension and appreciation of theinternational dimensions of the student's chosenfield of study. There is a growing view among leadersand decision-makers in US higher education thatcollege graduates should be able to help us competein an international environment. The motive is stillperhaps self or national interest; but such interestscan best be served by gaining a sophisticationregarding the international/global context withinwhich we are increasingly enmeshed.

“Eurocentric diffusionism” is the implicit belief(or interpretation of history) that the rise of Europeto modernity and world geo-political and economicdominance was due to unique European qualities ofrace, environment, culture, mind, or spirit and thatprogress for the rest of the world resulted from thediffusion of European civilization (Trevor-Roper,1965; Blaut, 1993). This ethno-historical model foranalyzing world progress and developmentsoriginated in the 16th century and, not surprisingly,reached its zenith during the period of Europeancolonialism. As racist or pejorative as this notionmay (or may not) be, it still remains an overt orcovert basis for many present theories of economicdevelopment, modernization, and a new world order(Levine and Campbell, 1972). It is Eurocentric inthat it invents a permanent world core (WesternEurope), in which socio-economic and culturalevolution is natural and continuous, and a perma-nent periphery (European colonies and, indeed, allthe rest of the world), in which cultural evolution ismainly an effect of the emanation and diffusion ofideas, commodities, settlers, and political controlfrom the core.

Eurocentrism provided the chauvinist rationalefor colonialism and was an ideological substratumcommon to colonialist, imperialist, and racistdiscourse (Blaut, 1993). Although this Eurocentriccolonialist understanding of recent history is basedon fallacious assumptions and not supported byhistorical facts, it is still quite prevalent (Blaut,1993; Shohat and Stam, 1994). It is vigorouslyadvocated – sometimes in more subtle ways,sometimes very overtly – in the widely read writingsof sociologists and historians such as Max Weber,Lynn White, Jr., Robert Brenner, Eric L. Jones,

Michael Mann, John A. Hall, Jared Diamond, andDavid Landes (Blaut, 2000). Landes is representativeof these Eurocentric historians (Blaut 2000).Following in the footsteps of Weber, Landes (1998)vigorously defends the thesis of Europeanexceptionalism: that natural endowments (a temper-ate climate, adequate water, the absence of virulentdisease) together with socio-cultural characteristics(decentralized authority, democracy, emphasis onprivate property rights, culture of inventiveness,distinction between the secular and the religious,empiricism, and a rational, ordered, hard-workingpopulace) gave the developed Western world (notablywestern Europe) an enormous economic advantage.

The purpose of this preliminary study was toexplore the degree to which students in a College ofAgriculture and Life Sciences (CALS) at a land-grantinstitution (Virginia Tech) may hold Eurocentric viewsof agriculture. We posit that such Eurocentric viewswould be antithetical to efforts to foster a globalperspective in the design and content of truly globalagricultural curricula (Rist, 1994; de Lauder, 2004).Also, if such Eurocentric views exist and can beidentified, it would help guide efforts and increase therate of progress towards a goal of increasing globalcompetency of students.

With the help of the Office of AcademicAssessment at Virginia Tech, we prepared a simpleattitudinal survey, consisting of 16 Eurocentricpropositions about agriculture. We framed thesepropositions into a multiple-choice questionnairedesigned to measure the intensity of agreement withthese propositions. All propositions were posited byeconomist David Landes (Landes, 1998), whosewritings nicely capture Eurocentric theories ofeconomic history. Following the guidelines ofHenderson et al. (1987), Angelo and Cross (1993), andFowler (1993), we edited each proposition stringentlyto ensure validity (Does it measure what it is intendedto measure?) and reliability (Is it unambiguous andnon-contradictory, ensuring consistent interpretationand response across respondents?). To guaranteeanonymity, the questionnaire requested no studentidentification except an optional request that eachindicate gender.

The following short preamble served to introducethe questionnaire: “Comparatively, NorthAmerican/European agriculture is often considered tobe vastly more productive than that of other regions ofthe world. Many reasons have been advanced toexplain this perceived advantage. The explanationsbelow are suggested in David S. Landes' book 'TheWealth and Poverty of Nations: Why some are so richand some so poor' (650 pp., New York: Norton, 1998).We would like to have your frank and honest reactionsto Landes' explanations.”

We administered the questionnaire to 39 freshmenenrolled in an introductory overview of crop and soil

Materials and Methods

33NACTA Journal • June 2008

sciences class and to 25seniors in a senior seminarclass. Both classes arerequired in the Crop and SoilEnvironmental Sciencesmajor at Virginia Tech, aland-grant institutionfounded in 1872. We askedstudents to give their frankand honest reactions bychecking a box indicatingwhether they strongly agree,agree, have no opinion(neutral), disagree, orstrongly disagree with eachof the16 Eurocentric proposi-tions (Table 1) regardingNorth American/Europeanagriculture (Landes, 1998;Blaut, 2000). To makesubsequent cross-referencingof these questions easier inlater discussion of theresults, Table 1 associateskeywords with each proposi-tion.

In our view, a studentwith no Eurocentric biaswould (by definition) tend todisagree or strongly dis-agree with all of thesepropositions. The range ofchoices for the responses(strongly agree to stronglydisagree) was intended toassess the intensity ofEurocentric bias withrespect to the particularproposition. However, weclearly acknowledge that noattitudinal measure isperfect.

The responses weretreated as discrete ordinalvariables, i.e., as represent-ing some meaningful sequence on the five-pointintensity scale of Eurocentric bias. The scale intervalswere assumed to be uneven, since it was not possibleto say how much the bias intensity varied betweenany two points on the scale. As a result, only logicaloperations could and were performed on the resultingordinal dataset. A key consideration in the analysiswas how to interpret the “no opinion (neutral)”response. That choice could mean that the respondentagreed or disagreed with the proposition but decidedto remain neutral or that the respondent was unableto respond. We decided to interpret this response anindication that the respondent neither agreed nordisagreed; and therefore, for purposes of aggregation,“neutral” responses were counted in both of thebroader (agree or disagree) categories.

All respondents answered the questionnairecompletely, i.e., no missing data. The results, tabulatedas percentage of the total number of students giving aspecified response, are presented in Table 2 for the 39freshmen and in Table 3 for the 25 seniors. It was clearthat the of freshmen agreeing withEurocentric propositions were generally higher thanthe corresponding of seniors. Similarly, the

of freshmen disagreeing were generallylower than the corresponding of seniors.This would indicate that the freshmen had a greaterpropensity for Eurocentric views than did the seniors.

To make the results in Tables 2 and 3 more visuallytractable, we used “radar plots” to compare theaggregated of those strongly agreeing,

Results and Discussion

percentage

percentagepercentage

percentage

percentage

Table 1. Sixteen Eurocentric propositions regarding North American/Europeanagricultre advocated by Landes (1998)


Survey of Eurocentric

agreeing, and neutral with the aggregatedof those neutral, disagreeing, and strongly

disagreeing. This division can be visualized geomet-rically as two overlapping circles dividing eachsample into two categories: one with overall higherintensity of Eurocentric views the other with overalllower intensity of Eurocentric views. This aggrega-tion would result in a sum of the agree-ing and disagreeing for a given proposition to exceed100.

Figure 1 shows thiscomparison for the samplegroup of 39 freshmen.Examining each proposition( n u m b e r e d c l o c k w i s earound this radar plot), itcan be seen that morefreshmen disagreed thanagreed only for propositions5 and 7 (Figure 1). Thoseagreeing and disagreeingwere practically the samefor propositions 4 and 8. Forall other propositions, thoseagreeing were overwhelm-ingly greater than thosedisagreeing. Overall, a highlevel of Eurocentric viewson agriculture was presentin the freshmen sample. It isnot clear why propositions4, 5, 7, and 8 were not in linewith this overall tendency.The answer likely liesdeeper within the ethno-psychology of an Americanversion of Eurocentrism(sometimes identified asneo-Eurocentrism) andwould require much morein-depth investigation.

The correspondingradar-plot comparison forthe group of 25 seniors isgiven in Figure 2. The gapbetween the categories ofEurocentric views clearlynarrowed for seniors ascompared to freshmen.Compared to freshmen,seniors showed a lowerintensity of Eurocentricviews for 8 of the 16 proposi-tions, indicated by a higher

disagreeingthan agreeing. On the otherhand, there was little or nodifference between fresh-men and seniors for proposi-tions 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 15.

For each proposition thedifference in

between the high and low intensity categories forfreshmen were calculated and plotted in Figure 3.More disagreement than agreement for a givenproposition would plot below the zero line; the distancebelow the zero line indicating the magnitude of thedifference. Similarly, more agreement than disagree-ment would plot above the zero line with the distanceabove indicating the magnitude of the difference. Forcomparison, the corresponding differences for seniors

percent-age

percentage

percentage

percentage

Table 2. Responses of 39 freshmen responding to 16 Eurocentric propositions on

North American agriculture expressed as % of total.

Table 3. Responses of 25 seniors responding to 16 Eurocentric propositions on

North American agriculture expressed as % of total.



were also calculated and plotted in Figure 3. Foreach proposition, the relative positions of theplotted points for freshmen and seniors above andbelow the zero line reveal differences between thetwo sample groups for each proposition much moresharply and quantitatively than the visual compari-son of Figures 1 and 2.

Based on Figures 1 through 3, it may be tempt-ing to conclude that 4 years of exposure to under-graduate agricultural courses lowers intensity ofEurocentric views. But it is also possible that liberaleducation components of the broader curriculumcould have been the agents for change. In addition,

seniors are four years olderand might be expected to bemore mature and moresophisticated in a variety ofways areas.

To visualize differencesi n t h e d e g r e e o fEurocentrism associatedwith academic level, twofurther radar plots wereg e n e r a t e d c o m p a r i n gfreshmen versus seniors –one plotting responders whoagreed (Figure 4) with theviews and another plottingresponders who disagreed(Figure 5). As before, theaggregatedincluded neutral respon-dents in both broad catego-ries (agree or disagree).These plots clearly showthat seniors were lessEurocentric for practicallyal l proposit ions thanfreshmen.

Explaining why sam-ples of university-levelstudents in agriculture froma variety of academic andsocio-economic backgroundwould hold Eurocentricviews of agriculture wellinto their senior year may bequite complex. For onething, it undoubtedlyreflects how ingrained andunconscious such biases (if,indeed, they are biases) maybe. Eurocentric views ingeneral are historically andculturally embedded in the(essentially neo-European)North American psyche(Levine and Campbell,1972; Blaut, 1993; Shohatand Stam, 1994; Mowitt,2001; Hughes, 2003) .

Despite the passage of over 225 years since theDeclaration of Independence, North American socio-culture remains strongly European and uniquelyconditioned by the events and ideologies associatedwith European colonialist expansion.

Eurocentric diffusionism has shaped overall USnational attitudes and ideologies concerning society,politics, race, environment, psychology, and technol-ogy (Blaut, 1993, 2000). Hughes (2003) reduces theseattitudes to five basic and commonly-shared socio-cultural convictions that pervade North American(and essentially neo-European) politics, culture, and

percentage



socio-economics and give an enduring meaning toAmerican nationalism. He calls them the "myths" ofchosen nation, nature's nation, Christian nation,millennial nation, and innocent nation; not in thesense that they are patently untrue, but in the sensethat they are the commonly shared socio-culturalconvictions that, when intertwined and combinedwith the American Creed (We hold these truths to beself-evident, that all men are created equal, that theyare endowed by their Creator with certain unalien-able rights, that among these are life, liberty, andpursuit of happiness.) give an enduring meaning toAmerican nationalism (Hughes, 2003).

Hughes (2003) discusses these five myths in greatdetail. They are briefly summarized below:

1. The concept of 'chosenness' rooted inPuritanism, originally meant 'chosen for the good ofthe neighbor'. Woven into the fabric of Americannationalism it came to mean that America was chosenfor a special and redeeming role on the world stage.

2. Nature's nation tends to affirm the naturalnessof the 'American Way' to the exclusion of any other

viable alternatives. Othert rad i t i ons and otherfolkways tend to be per-ceived as perverse andunworthy.

3. The Christian nationmyth is rooted in thetradition of adherence toBiblical teachings but, whenmarried to the myth ofchosenness, became thenotion of cultural superior-ity and a belief that God hadchosen America for a specialrole and privilege preciselybecause it was a Christiannation.

4. The millennial nationmyth insinuates thatAmerica is destined to usherin a millennial age offreedom and blessing for thewhole earth be it throughdomination or by moralforce of example andleadership. The millennialvision is well-described inthe imagery and wording onthe reverse side of the GreatSeal of the United States asthe unfinished pyramid(representing the Americannation and dated 1776 inRoman numerals) that risesabove a barren desertterrain. The all-seeing eye(of God) looks down withapproval beneath the Latininscription "annuit coeptis"

meaning "He has favored our undertakings". Belowthe pyramid is the inscription that truly underpinsthe millennial concept “ or “anew order of the ages”.

5. The innocent nation myth emerged out of aconflation of the previous four myths followingAmerica's involvement in two world wars and its riseto world dominance. In its current form it manifestsin the tendency to cloak actions at the national levelin an air of righteousness and innocence and there-fore to reject justifiable historical judgment andcriticism. It gives America a sense of absolution fromunsavory historical actions of state and serves as theapology for a reinvention of the 'manifest destiny'doctrine on a global scale.

Hughes (2003) also points out that whileAmerican capitalism promoted hard work andindividual effort it was distorted over time into a'Gospel of Wealth', a 'Law of Competition', 'UnbridledGreed', and 'Economic Survival of the Fittest'. Theseand other mythical dimensions of American capital-

novus ordo seclorum”

Favora

ble

clim

ate

Com

fort

ab

lecl

imate

Fer

tile

soil

s

Dis

tin

ctec

ozo

nes

Inven

tive

imm

igra

nts

Ven

ture

som

eim

mig

ran

ts

Sci

enti

fic-

min

ded

imm

igra

nts

Dem

ocr

ati

cvalu

es

Fam

ily

stru

ctu

r e

Fre

em

ark

et

Pri

vate

pr o

per

ty

Ch

rist

ian

ity

Les

sn

atu

ral

dis

ast

ers

Les

sd

isea

se-

rid

den

Deg

rad

ati

on

/over

pop

ula

tion

Over

pop

ula

tion

/cap

itali

sm



ism were (and still are) used to rationalize and justifynational geo-political self-interests, and to serve ashandmaid to the myths of chosenness, Christiannation, and millennial nation (Hughes, 2003). Themyths of chosen nation, nature's nation, andChristian nation along with the mythical dimensionsof American capitalism are very closely linked to neo-Eurocentric diffusionism (Blaut, 2000; Hughes,2003).

In this preliminary study, the 16 propositions ofEurocentric bias can be reasonably construed ascorollary to the five basic socio-cultural myths

proposed by Hughes (2003).However, only further andmore in-depth studies cand e t e r m i n e i n t e r -relationships between thesesocio-cultural myths andthe Eurocentric viewsreflected in the students'perceptions about NorthA m e r i c a n / E u r o p e a nagriculture.

Taken in its entirety,this limited study showsthat the views of the samplegroups of students weregenerally Eurocentric.Seniors tended to hold lessintense Eurocentric viewsthan freshmen but werestill far from being immuneto Eurocentr ic soc io -cultural influences. It isnot clear whether thedifferences in intensitybetween freshmen andseniors were due to aca-demic exposure or to socialmaturity. Nevertheless, ina period of rapid globaliza-tion, these observationssuggest that students mayneed to be guided andencouraged to unlearnEurocentric socio-culturalviews in order to be moreg l o b a l l y c o m p e t e n t(Shohat and Stam, 1994).

Summary

Literature CitedAllen, G. 2004. NASULGC

task force report oninternationalizing thecampus. Available athttp://www.nasulgc.org/comm_intprogs.htm.

Angelo, T.A. and K.P. Cross. 1993. Classroom assess-ment techniques: A handbook for college teach-ers. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Blaut, J.M. 1993. The colonizer's model of the world:Geographical diffusionism and Eurocentrichistory. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

Blaut, J.M. 2000. Eight Eurocentric historians. NewYork, NY: Guilford Press.

Cross, C.F. 1999. Justin Smith Morrill: Father of theland-grant colleges. East Lansing, Michigan,Michigan State University Press.



DeLauder, W. 2004. A globally competent NASULGCuniversity. Available at http://www.nasulgc.org/comm_intprogs.htm.

Dussel, E.D., J. Krauel, and V.C. Tuma. 2000. Europe,modernity, and Eurocentrism

Nepantla: Views from South 1: 465-478Eddy, E.D. 1957. Colleges for our land and time: The

land-grant idea in American education. NewYork, NY: Harper and Row.

Edmond, J.B. 1978. The magnificent charter: Theorigin and role of the Morrill land-grant collegesand universities. Hicksville, NY: ExpositionPress.

Fowler, F.J. 1993. Survey research methods. NewburyPark, CA: Sage Publications.

Friedman, T.L. 1999. The lexus and the olive tree:Understanding globalization. New York, NY:Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.

GASEPA. 1998. Globalizing agricultural science andeducation programs for America.

GASEPA Task Force, Washington, D.C., NationalAssociation of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges.

Geiger, R.L. (editor). 2000. The American college inthe nineteenth century. Nashville, TN:Vanderbilt University Press.

Henderson, M.E., L.L. Morris, and C.T. Firz-Gibbon.1987. How to measure attitudes. Newbury Park,CA: Sage Press.

Herren, R.V. and E.M. Craig. 2002. Whence we came:The land-grant tradition-origin, evolution, andimplications for the 21st century. Journal ofAgricultural Education 43: 88-100.

Hirst, P. and G. Thompson. 1999. Globalization inquestion. Cambridge, MA: Polity Press.

Hudzik, J. 2004. Why internationalize NASULGCinstitutions? Challenge and opportunity.Ava i l ab l e a t ht tp : / /www.nasu lgc . o rg /comm_intprogs.htm.

Hughes, R.T. 2003. Myths America lives by. Urbana,IL: University of Illinois Press.

Kellogg, E. 2004. Global competence and citizenship.Available at http://www.nasulgc.org/comm_intprogs.htm

Landes, D.S. 1998. The wealth and poverty ofnations: Why some are so rich and some so poor.New York, NY: Norton.

Levine , R.A. and D.T. Campbel l . 1972.Ethnocentrism: Theories of conflict, ethnicattitudes, and group behavior. New York, NY:John Wiley and Sons Inc.

Mowitt, J. 2001. In the wake of Eurocentrism: Anintroduction. Cultural Critique 47: 3-15

National Research Council. 1996. Colleges of agricul-ture at the land grant universities: Public serviceand public policy. Committee on the Future of theColleges of Agriculture in the Land GrantUniversity System, Washington, D.C., NationalAcademies Press

Nevins, A. 1962. The state universities and democ-racy. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press

Ohmae, K. 1990. The borderless world: Power andstrategy in the interlinked economy. New York,NY: HarperCollins.

Rist, M.C. 1991. Ethnocentric education. AmericanSchool Board Journal 178: 26-29.

Ross, E.D. 1942. Democracy's college: The land-grantmovement in the formative stage. Ames, IA: IowaState College Press.

Shohat, E. and R. Stam. 1994. UnthinkingEurocentrism. New York, NY: Routledge.

Trevor-Roper, H. 1965. The rise of Christian Europe.New York, NY: New York, Harcourt BraceJovanovich.

van den Bor, W., J.M. Bryden, and A.M. Fuller. 1995.Rethinking higher agricultural education in atime of globalization and rural restructuring.Journal Agricultural Education and Extension2:29 - 40.

Williams, R.L. 1991. The origins of federal support forhigher education: George W. Atherton and theland-grant college movement. University Park,Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania State Press.



Documents

Survey of Eurocentric Views on Agriculture in Students at ... · Survey of Eurocentric Views on Agriculture in Students at a Land-Grant Institution Survey of Eurocentric Views on