Nearly two months after University of Texas at Austin President Jim Davis announced plans to consolidate seven ethnic and gender studies departments, students and faculty say they’re still in the dark and bracing for what comes next.
On Feb.12, Davis announced a consolidation set to take effect in fall 2027.
Then, on Apr. 2, interim College of Liberal Arts Dean David Sosa sent an email to faculty announcing the consolidation will now begin in fall 2026, a year earlier than previously expected.
Seven departments will be merged into two new ones. French and Italian, Germanic Studies, and Slavic and Eurasian Studies will form the Department of European and Eurasian Studies.
Meanwhile, African and African Diaspora Studies, American Studies, Mexican American and Latina/o Studies, and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies will become the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis.
Faculty had been warned last fall that changes were coming but were officially notified just before Davis’ announcement.
Davis said the consolidation is necessary for a “balanced and challenging educational experience.” He pointed to “size, scope, academic mission, student demand, student-to-faculty ratio, resource allocation, and other dimensions.”
Some faculty and staff aren’t so sure.
“I think this is the first step to erasure,” said Karma Chavez, chair of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies, speaking in her capacity as a professor.
“The reasoning is questionable,” said Luis Guevara, graduate program administrator for Mexican American and Latina/o Studies, noting that other smaller departments in the College of Liberal Arts are not under review.
More than 800 students are currently pursuing degrees across the affected departments, according to the Texas Tribune. (Full disclosure: The author is currently pursuing a minor at UT Austin in Mexican American and Latina/o Studies.)
Guevara added that the department has been successful by its own measures, citing a survey in which 57% of respondents said their major prepared them “extremely well” for their careers or further schooling, and 23% said, “very well.”
Neither Davis nor the dean of the College of Liberal Arts replied to requests for comment from The Barbed Wire by press time.
In an email to The Barbed Wire, Chavez said faculty were “certainly surprised” by the accelerated timeline.
Chavez said Interim Dean Sosa explained the move was necessary ahead of the 2027 legislative session.She believes this is because “upper admin doesn’t want any more legislation that will target UT.”
“This is all political, and so the timeline will not be attending to faculty, staff, or student needs or concerns,” Chavez wrote. “It’s a real shame.”
Lauren Gutterman, a professor in American Studies and Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies, sees the consolidation as a part of a “right-wing political effort to censor teaching and learning on these topics.”
The Republican-led political changes to higher education began with Senate Bill 17, which passed in 2023 and banned diversity, equity and inclusion offices and programming at public universities. In 2025, Senate Bill 37 passed, which further limited faculty control over curriculum and governance.
At the federal level, the Trump administration sent a “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education” letter to UT Austin in October 2025, tying federal funding to Trump’s ideological compliance. UT did not respond, leaving its position unclear.
Across Texas, universities are rolling back race- and gender-related programs. Texas Christian University has restructured programs. Texas A&M and the University of North Texas are closing their women’s and gender studies programs after political backlash, while Texas Tech University is among those reducing or reshaping related courses.
Chavez and colleagues had proposed a School of Global Cultures to preserve departmental autonomy. The proposal was denied by UT Austin leadership.
In his announcement, Davis wrote, “It is important to bear in mind that many subjects worthy of research and teaching do not necessarily need to be isolated as their own small academic departments.”
Chavez said that logic misunderstands ethnic studies.
“It’s very hard for us to fit within traditional structures because our work is inherently interdisciplinary,” she said. “We are the only ones qualified to evaluate the quality of our work because we are interdisciplinary scholars.”
Faculty worry the consolidation will eliminate not just departments, but roles and courses. Lilia Rosas, a professor of Mexican American and Latino/a Studies, said positions like graduate advising, communications, and community outreach could be combined and classes deemed redundant.
“It raises questions about oversight (of) classes that will now, perhaps, not be considered important,” Rosas said.
Chavez expects remaining faculty to disperse into other departments rather than join what she called “this new 80-person department that’s not intellectually justified.”
Rosas worries about her own future.
“I do wonder if there’ll still be a place for me here,” she said. “(But) there’s a part of me that knows my amazing colleagues and I are willing to say we still matter and we’re still here.”
For now, students can finish their degrees and faculty are expected to keep their jobs. But Chavez believes majors could be next.
“They said they’re going to engage in curriculum audits,” she said. “They haven’t given us any details… but I would surmise that (they’ll say), ‘I don’t think we need a specific major in Mexican American and Latino studies or African and African Diaspora Studies or Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.’”
Those fears intensified after the Texas Board of Regents updated Rule 3004, which governs how “controversial” topics are taught. The rule requires multiple viewpoints, syllabus disclosures, and content deemed “germane,” but leaves those terms undefined — raising concerns about administrative overreach.
Rosas said the change, paired with consolidation, felt like “a gut punch.”
“They’re coming at us from different angles,” Chavez said, adding she fears syllabus reviews could be automated and used to flag “controversial” material, forcing changes or cancellations.
Other universities offer a warning. The University of Iowa attempted a similar consolidation in 2025; when its Board of Regents did not approve the new school, the major was eliminated.
Rosas fears UT is on a similar path to erase the ethnic, gender and sexuality studies altogether.
“If it’s done slow, it will be death by a thousand cuts,” she said. “Slowly, it’ll be harder and harder for us to justify our classes.”
For many students, the stakes are personal.
“It was the place where a lot of us who were BIPOC, queer, or working class finally found a home,” Rosas said of ethnic and gender studies. “They function both as a place for us to be seen and as a place for others to practice allyship.”
“It gives us a safe space,” said Jordyn Butler, a senior majoring in African and African Diaspora Studies.
Butler said those spaces have already shrunk. The Multicultural Engagement Center closed after SB 17, and a camp for new Black students lost funding.
“We’ve gone from being very supported to totally unsupported (and) left like fish flapping on a dry beach,” Butler said.
She’s now applying to nursing schools in Atlanta and said she would choose a Historically Black University if starting over.
“I really wouldn’t have chosen to come here if I knew those fields wouldn’t be accessible to me,” said Madison Wright, a senior double majoring in Race, Indigeneity and Migration and Mexican American and Latina/o Studies.
“We’re losing great minds — professors and students,” Butler said. “We are great students. We’re smart. We’re going to change the world, but you’re losing us.”
Rosas sees broader implications.
“If you think ethnic studies and women’s and gender and sexuality studies are the only programs to go, pay attention,” she said. “This university is reinventing itself around a lens less committed to knowledge-making and more committed to business and efficiency.”
Chavez, despite everything, isn’t ready to leave.
“I want to stay here and keep doing the work I’ve been doing,” she said, “and keep fighting for students to have the freedom to learn what they want.”
