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Precisely. Brown has clung to its title of having the only Egyptology department, but that has traditionally been a fig leaf hiding an embarrassingly weak program with scant resources in Egypt and virtually none in the rest of the Near East.</p>
<p>Fortunately, Brown has recently seen that it is falling far behind other schools in this area and has recruited new faculty (recently minted PhDs, admittedly, but still an improvement). In order to maintain one of its bragging points, Brown has predictably adjusted the department title to Egyptology & Ancient Western Asian Studies instead of the traditional Near Eastern Studies.</p>