Area Studies

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PDF generated at: Mon, 05 Dec 2011 03:43:59 UTC Contents Articles Main article 1 Area studies 1 African studies 5 African studies 5 Egyptology 7 American studies 11 American studies 11 American Studies in Britain 14 African American studies 21 Appalachian studies 26 Asian American studies 28 Canadian studies 31 Native American studies 32 Latin American studies 34 Chicana/o Studies 38 Asian studies 42 Asian studies 42 Central Asian studies 43 Middle Eastern studies 44 Assyriology 45 Iranian studies 47 Islamic studies 53 Jewish studies 58 East Asian studies 68 Sinology 72 Japanese studies 75 Korean studies 76 Indology 78 Dravidian studies 83 Southeast Asian studies 84 Burma studies 85 Thai studies 86 European studies 88 European studies 88 Byzantine studies 89 Classics 93 Celtic studies 101 Dutch studies 107 German studies 115 Hungarian studies 120 Romance studies 121 Scandinavian studies 122 Slavic studies 123 Pacific studies 127 Pacific studies 127 Australian studies 128 New Zealand studies 129 Others 131 Deaf studies 131 References Article Sources and Contributors 133 Image Sources, Licenses and Contributors 136 Article Licenses License 137 1 Main article Area studies Area studies are interdisciplinary fields of research and scholarship pertaining to particular geographical, national/federal, or cultural regions. The term exists primarily as a general description for what are, in the practice of scholarship, many heterogeneous fields of research, encompassing both the social sciences and the humanities. Typical area studies programs involve history, political science, sociology, cultural studies, languages, geography, literature, and related disciplines. In contrast to cultural studies, area studies often include diaspora and emigration from the area studied. History Interdisciplinary area studies became increasingly popular in the United States and in Western scholarship after World War II. Before the war, American universities had just a few faculty who taught or conducted research on the non-Western world. Foreign area studies were virtually nonexistent. After the war, liberals and conservatives alike were concerned about the U.S. ability to respond effectively to perceived external threats from the Soviet Union and China and the emerging Cold War, as well as to the fall-out from the decolonization of Africa and Asia. In this context, the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Carnegie Corporation of New York convened a series of meetings producing a broad consensus that to address this knowledge deficit, the U.S. must invest in international studies. Therefore, the foundations of the field are strongly rooted in America. Participants argued that a large brain trust of internationally-oriented political scientists and economists was an urgent national priority. There was a central tension, however, between those who felt strongly that, instead of applying Western models, social scientists should develop culturally and historically contextualized knowledge of various parts of the world by working closely with humanists, and those who thought social scientists should seek to develop overarching macrohistorial theories that could draw connections between patterns of change and development across different geographies. The former became area studies advocates, the latter proponents of modernization theory. The Ford Foundation would eventually become the dominant player in shaping the area studies program in the United States.[1] In 1950, the foundation established the prestigious Foreign Area Fellowship Program (FAFP), the first large-scale national competition in support of area studies training in the United States. From 1953 to 1966, it contributed $270 million to 34 universities for area and language studies. Also during this period, it poured millions of dollars into the committees run jointly by the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies for field development workshops, conferences, and publication programs.[2] Eventually, the SSRC-ACLS joint committees would take over the administration of FAFP. Other large and important programs followed Ford's—most notably, the National Defense Education Act of 1957, renamed the Higher Education Act in 1965, which allocated funding for some 125 university-based area studies units known as National Resource Center programs at U.S. universities, as well as for Foreign Language and Area Studies fellowships for graduate students. Area studies 2 Controversy within the field Since their inception, area studies have been subject to critiques—including by area specialists themselves. Many of them alleged that because area studies were connected to the Cold War agendas of the CIA, the FBI, and other intelligence and military agencies, participating in such programs was tantamount to serving as an agent of the state.[3] Some argue, that there is the notion that U.S concerns and research priorities will define the intellectual terrain of area studies.[4] Others insisted, however, that once they were established on university campuses, area studies began to encompass a much broader and deeper intellectual agenda than the one foreseen by government agencies, thus not American centric.[5] Arguably, one of the greatest threats to the area studies project was the rise of rational choice theory in political science and economics.[6] To paraphrase one of the most outspoken rational choice theory critics, Japan scholar Chalmers Johnson: Why do you need to know Japanese or anything about Japan's history and culture if the methods of rational choice will explain why Japanese politicians and bureaucrats do the things they do?[7] Following the demise of the Soviet Union, philanthropic foundations and scientific bureaucracies moved to attenuate their support for area studies, emphasizing instead interregional themes like "development and democracy." When the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies, which had long served as the national nexus for raising and administering funds for area studies, underwent their first major restructuring in thirty years, closing down their area committees, scholars interpreted this as a massive signal about the changing research environment.[8] Area studies fields Fields are defined differently from university to university, and from department to department, but common area-studies fields include: • African studies • Egyptology • American studies (in the United States this has traditionally referred primarily to North America and especially the U.S.) • American Studies in Britain • African American studies • Appalachian studies • Asian American studies • Canadian studies • Native American studies • Latin American studies • Chicano studies • Asian studies • Central Asian studies • Middle Eastern studies (or Near Eastern studies) • Assyriology • Iranian studies • Islamic studies • Judaic studies • East Asian studies • Sinology • Japanology Area studies 3 • Korean studies • Okinawan studies • South Asian studies • Indian studies • Dravidology • Southeast Asian studies • Burma studies • Indonesian studies • Javanology • Khmer studies • Lao studies • Philippine studies • Thai studies • Vietnamese studies • European studies • Byzantine studies • Classical studies • Celtic studies (includes Irish, Scottish & Welsh studies) • Dutch studies • German studies • Hispanism • Romance studies • Scandinavian studies • Slavic studies • Russian studies • Pacific studies • Australian studies • New Zealand studies Other interdisciplinary research fields such as women's studies (also known as gender studies), and ethnic studies (including African American studies, Asian American studies, Latino/a studies, and Native American studies) are not part of area studies but are sometimes included in discussion along with it. Area studies institutions Some entire institutions of higher education (tertiary education) are devoted solely to area studies such as School of Oriental and African Studies, part of the University of London, or the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies in Japan. At the University of Oxford, St Antony's College specialises in area studies, and hosts a number of research centres covering various regions of the world. Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, is the only institution with immense contribution towards popularising area studies in India. Area studies 4 References Notes [1] Ellen Condliffe Lagemann, The Politics of Knowledge: The Carnegie Corporation, Philanthropy, and Public Policy (University of Chicago Press, 1992), p. 178. [2] David L. Szanton, "The Origin, Nature and Challenges of Area Studies in the United States," in The Politics of Knowledge: Area Studies and the Disciplines, ed. David L. Szanton (University of California Press, 2004), pp. 10-11. [3] See Bruce Cumings, "Boundary Displacement: Area Studies and International Studies during and after the Cold War," in Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars 29 (1997). http:/ / www. mtholyoke. edu/ acad/ intrel/ cumings2. htm. Retrieved 2009-04-23. [4] See Patrick O'Meara, "Changing perspectives on international education", (Indiana University Press 2010), pp. 81. [5] Moseley, W.G. 2009. “Area Studies in a Global Context.” Chronicle of Higher Education. Nov 29. http:/ / chronicle. com/ article/ Area-Studies-in-a-Global-Co/ 49284/ [6] See "Rational Choice Theory," by John Scott, in Understanding Contemporary Society:

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