Program: History
Brilliantly colored batiks billow in sultry breezes as students follow their instructor weaving through an Asian marketplace.
But they are not required to get passports for Maria M. Ritzema's History and Culture of South Asia course. Instead, they are transported from their College of DuPage classroom to colonial Ceylon, captivated by descriptions of porcelain figures supporting ancient temple walls. They discover Lipton tea plantations, political transformations and the road to postcolonial Sri Lanka.
All are transfixed by Ritzema’s dynamic style that mixes imaginative storytelling with geographical descriptions and a sprinkling of political sidenotes. The associate professor of history at COD fills lessons with the results of her exhaustive research and full days spent in British archives, ancient libraries and Buddhist temples.
From this global immersion, Ritzema wants her students to learn the importance of knowing the past to understand the present.
“They may not remember the details of whatever subject they took with me. But they should remember, when coming across any sort of subject or idea, that they can research it, analyze it and come to understand it by using skills developed in my classes.”
India and the countries of South Asia have influenced our lives in so many ways, from fashion to food.
Maria Ritzema
How a Midwestern community college student found her way to the lush forests of Sri Lanka is the result of a recessive wanderlust gene, her own family ancestry and an inspiring professor.
“I have always been fascinated with peoples’ immigration stories,” she said. “What made people leave their homes and come to the United States? What was happening in their homes that made the U.S. seem like a place to move to?
“My paternal grandmother was born in South Africa in the late 19th century when her family moved there from the Netherlands. The Boer War started soon after, so they went back to the Netherlands. Then they tried South America when they heard land was being given away. Her father was struck by lightning while working there so back to the Netherlands. The third time they immigrated to the United States in 1911 and stayed.”
Ritzema’s father was a history buff who loved the American Civil War and read voraciously about it. He enjoyed correcting movies or TV shows if he felt they “got the history wrong,” she said.
“This exposed me to the importance of history as well as the idea that there could be many ‘histories’ of a subject.”
Ritzema credits her American history professor, who often acted out his lecture, for planting a seed that was nurtured while pursuing her master’s degree at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC).
With a background in video production and a bachelor’s degree in social science, Ritzema was searching for the one “thing” that would ignite a passion. She found it in the most unlikely area of study: urban planning.
“It wasn’t the policy that intrigued me, it was the history,” she admitted. “I studied the history of urban planning in China—the Chinese practically invented it—and I found I was hooked.”
The rest is literally history as Ritzema devoured all she could on South Asia. After exhausting materials available at UIC while writing her thesis on Ethno-nationalism and Political Policy: Marginalization of Sri Lankan Minority Natives, 1948-1977, she embarked on a journey east.
“India and the countries of South Asia have influenced our lives in so many ways, from fashion to food,” she said.
Ceylon tea, cotton fabrics, chutney and even cummerbunds, a tuxedo staple, are all exports from the region. Ritzema shares these facts with her students through a cadre of courses, from the histories of Japan and China to the history and culture of India and South Asia. She stays current with local political changes and continues to focus on Sri Lanka. In fact, a planned trip in 2022 was diverted to Spain when unrest erupted in the island nation off the coast of India.
Regardless of the nature of her trips, Ritzema always finds time to research and discover.
“My husband and I went to Morocco for our honeymoon. He is a sociology professor and I teach history. We spend a lot of time on our travels researching and learning more about the country we are visiting.”
Ritzema—who held history adjunct positions at a variety of higher education institutions, including UIC, University of Wisconsin-Parkside, Carroll University, Madison Area Technical College and Milwaukee Area Technical College, before coming to COD—sees the value in travel. But she is always happy to come back home and share her knowledge with her students.
“The beauty of history is to go where it happened,” she said. “I encourage my students to travel. There is no better way to learn about a place and its culture, and there is no better way to lear about yourself and the place where you live, than through discovery and experience.”