Publication: A Princeton Companion
Departments of instruction in the arts and sciences were first established at Princeton in 1904 as part of the reorganization of the curriculum that began soon after President Wilson's inauguration in 1902. Previously, the individual professor had presented his course proposals directly to the faculty after consultation with the president and other colleagues. With the increase in the faculty required for the introduction of Wilson's preceptorial system, and the greater complexity of the curriculum, organization of the faculty by departments became indispensable, and the University accordingly drew ``the several chairs in related subjects of study'' into the following eleven departments: Art and Archaeology; Biology; Chemistry; Classics; English; Geology; History, Politics, and Economics, Mathematics; Modern Languages, Philosophy; Physics. These were in addition to two existing departments of civil and electrical engineering. (Astronomy, one of Princeton's oldest disciplines, became a department a few years later.)
After 1904, through various evolutionary processes, the number of departments more than doubled. History, Politics, and Economics became separate departments, and later Economics generated Sociology, which in turn produced Anthropology, Modern Languages and Literatures separated into Germanic, Romance, and Slavic Languages and Literatures, and a new department of Oriental Studies subsequently divided into East Asian and Near Eastern Studies. Psychology and Statistics, originally subfields of Philosophy and Mathematics, became separate departments. Other new departments were added after a period of incubation under the wing of another department (Music), of a faculty committee (Religion), or of the Council of the Humanities. (Comparative Literature). Biochemical Sciences was developed by the two departments from which it derived its name. By these different means the number of separate departments in the arts and sciences had grown to twenty-six by 1976.
In addition, two of the three professional schools -- the School of Architecture and Urban Planning (1919) and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs (1930) -- have functioned as departments; and the School of Engineering and Applied Science (1921), has embraced the four departments of Aerospace and Mechanical Sciences; Chemical Engineering; Civil Engineering; and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Thus, by 1977, the total number of academic departments came to thirty-two.
Articles about these departments and schools will be found under the appropriate headings.
Another related academic resource, which the University has been developing with increasing effectiveness since the late 1930s, brings together faculty members from different departments in interdisciplinary programs of instruction???(MISSING WORDS FROM ORIGINAL COMPANION) almost as many programs as departments. A few of them are described in separate articles: Afro-American Studies, American Studies, Creative Arts, History and Philosophy of Science, Linguistics, Teacher Preparation. Other programs range from Applied Mathematics, Classical Archaeology, and Demography to Neuroscience, Political Philosophy, and Transportation, and include, for example, international and regional study of Africa, East Asia, Latin America, Modern Europe, the Near East, and Russia.
Other interdepartmental committees have functioned without the formal structure of a program, as in the case of the Women's Studies Committee, which encourages interdisciplinary consideration of the role of women in various societies and of the changing nature of social and political relationships between men and women.
Further aids to interdisciplinary study have been provided by councils that coordinate the activities of programs in their areas. The oldest and the largest is the Council of the Humanities, which is described in a separate article. Created more recently have been councils on Environmental, International and Regional, and Urban Studies, and the Council of Masters, which coordinates the educational objectives of the various undergraduate dining and residential units.
Another vital element in the academic structure of the University is the special research unit. Some of the older ones, described in separate articles, include Industrial Relations, International Finance, International Studies, and Population Research. Other fields in which special research programs have been created include Chinese Linguistics, Criminal Justice, Development Studies, Econometric Research, Financial Research, New Jersey Affairs, and Urban and Environmental Planning.
From Alexander Leitch, A Princeton Companion, copyright Princeton University Press (1978).