Bright future for South Asian Studies in US varsities

South Asia is becoming an increasingly important region to study in the modern, global world because of its importance in the world economy. South Asia, and specifically India, has become a front-runner in the world economically. Domestic businesses have been partnering with call centres, manufacturers and industries in South Asia to bring in profits. Big companies such as Target, Microsoft etc often travel to India for business.

Knowledge of the region’s cultural practices as well as practical language skills are incredibly useful in today’s world, especially for students. It not only makes students more culturally aware in today’s global world, but allows for career advancement as well. Every school that does not have a great South Asian Studies department is in the process of creating one out of their existing structures. In recent years, career in humanities and social sciences has increased greatly in US and elsewhere.

Harvard University is both the oldest in the country and has the largest endowment in the country. The university has the Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies within the History Department. Harvard can proudly claim that it has had a South Asian department dating back to 1872, when a professor taught courses in Sanskrit as Latin electives. Since then, the course offerings have only grown.

The programme now offers Hindi-Urdu, as well as Sanskrit. While mostly a graduate programme for PhDs, the department also has undergraduates and graduate students (for a Masters). Obviously, South Asian Studies has been an integral part to Harvard; otherwise, they would not have kept the programme for over 100 years.

Princeton University's course in South Asian Studies is an affiliate with the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies. Yale University has the South Asia Studies Council. Undergraduates can participate in the programme as a second major, as an addition to a discipline-based first major.

University of Chicago, on the other hand, is nationally renowned for its South Asian programme. It has two different but affiliated groups: the Committee on Southern Asian Studies (COSAS) and the South Asia Language and Area Studies (SALAC). The COSAS is supported through the University’s endowment while the US government funds SALAC.
Undergraduates can major or minor in South Asia Languages and Civilisations. Graduate students can pursue South Asian studies through three different schools:

Humanities, Social Sciences or Divinity. The Department of South Asian Languages and Cultures provides language courses in Bengali, Hindi, Malayalam, Marathi, Tamil, Telugu, Tibetan, Pali, Sanskrit and Urdu. The University of Chicago has an amazing South Asian studies programme for both graduate and undergraduates.

Washington University in St Louis, another prominent school, has a small but growing South Asian Studies course. The university offers minor in South Asian Languages and Cultures. Courses are also offered in South Asian history, religion, politics, anthropology and many more. As the leading school, they have a small but continuously growing South Asian Studies programme.

The University of Pennsylvania has a historic and well-rounded South Asia Studies Department. Sanskrit was studied at Penn as early as the 1890s, but it was in the 1930s that the South Asian studies department really took off. Here, an undergraduate can major or minor in South Asian Studies.

On the graduate level, Penn offers both a Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy courses. The department also offers many South Asian languages including Sanskrit, Hindi, Urdu, Bengali, Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, Panjabi, Malayalam, Marathi and Gujarati. Students also procure a language certificate in Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Sanskrit, Tamil or Urdu.

Columbia University has the South Asia Institute which covers South Asia as well as adjacent areas, such as Afghanistan, Tibet and Burma. The SAI offers a Masters of Arts course in South Asia Studies that uses faculty from fourteen different departments. Columbia offers a wide range of languages including Hindi-Urdu, Bengali, Persian, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Tamil and Tibetan. Columbia’s course definitely has room to grow, especially by offering a major or minor for undergraduates. Stanford University has the Centre for South Asia. The centre coordinates South Asian events on campus and also provides courses under many different disciplines.

Linguistic intricacies

Duke University’s programme is different because it is an inter-collegiate one with Duke, North Carolina State University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The North Carolina Consortium for South Asia Studies (NCCSAS) promotes South Asian studies amongst undergraduate and graduate students. Johns Hopkins University has a great course for graduate students in South Asian Studies.

Brown University provides a concentration in South Asian Studies. Rice University has the Chao Centre for Asian Studies which offers a Bachelor of Arts and Masters in Arts in Asian Studies. At Emory University undergraduates can major in Middle Eastern and South Asian studies with a track in South Asia.

Other schools that have great South Asia Studies courses include the University of Texas and University of California Berkeley. The University of Texas has an Asian Studies Undergraduate course with a specialisation in South Asia. It also offers courses in Indian languages. The University of California, Berkeley has a department called the South & Southeast Asian Studies department. Berkeley offers graduate programmes such as a Joint MA/PhD and MA programme.

As can be seen most of the nation’s top schools have at least South Asian Studies classes, if not whole departments. Schools such as Harvard, University of Chicago, Columbia University, University of Pennsylvania and the University of California Berkeley have outstanding programme in South Asia Studies. The linguistic intricacies of the language and the literature that it unlocks are amazing.

(The writer, a doctorate in Linguistics, teaches at Washington University in St Louis)