Teaching a civ on “Western Civ” has never seemed particularly useful to me. I took one such course as an undergrad and found it to be a waste. 15 weeks to study over 4,000 years of history is a disservice to the teaching of history IMO.
As for being diverse, reading from a Spanish author 400 years ago would certainly count as diverse among the students I know. They just are tired of reading books by white anglo-saxon men and only them.
For what it’s worth, I went into US history despite finding US history incredibly boring. Even if I were forced to teach early US history, I’d be 1- useless and 2- bored and therefore so would my students. So, in my courses, we teach a small subset of history and we dive in deep to that period. THAT is what got me hooked into history… not the way K-12 teaches it where were skim over huge swaths of time and are expected to know exact dates like they’re relevant at all.
I’m in the camp of a diatribe by an angry old man. I think his version of what history is is falling by the wayside and I, for one, have no problem with that. Sure, these courses should still be offered for those who want them but I don’t find them useful.
I’m also in the camp of “he’s exaggerating” about the students, but hey- it makes for a “good” rant.