Welcome to the website for the Ethnic Studies Program at Florida Atlantic University (FAU). The Program was started in 1984 and has quickly grown to become an important academic unit within the institution. The program is interdisciplinary and therefore introduces students to an expanding range of past and current academic research in the social sciences, arts, and humanities. Students are prepared to use and develop theoretical, analytical, and methodological approaches to critical issues relating to the study of the realities and conditions of persons of various racial and/or ethnic backgrounds. The Program stresses that scholarly examination of racial and ethnic communities helps illuminate the parallels, contradictions and strengths evident in every community. Thus, while the specific subject matter of the program is race and ethnicity, the implications of what is taught extend to other kinds of communities throughout the world.