Work together for South Asian Studies

We write in response to your Oct. 11 article on South Asian Studies at Duke. We are glad that the Duke undergraduate student community is expressing a vigorous, focused interest in developing South Asian Studies at Duke, a call that, in principle, we fully support. We hope that this passion will translate into increased enrollment in courses already offered at Duke, and also increased participation in South Asia-related programming and volunteer opportunities, which are numerous, active and ongoing.

We would first like to point out some crucial resources that exist at Duke, but were overlooked in Duke South Asian Studies Initiative's formulation as expressed in The Chronicle.

First, is the Title VI North Carolina Center for South Asia Studies, formerly located at N.C. State but now located at Duke. This center for more than two decades has been a multi-university initiative (Duke, UNC and NCSU), with links to both NCCU and Fayetteville State University (FSU), that brings together curricular offerings, workshops and seminars and other kinds of South Asia-related programming to Duke and to the Triangle area; students enrolled at any of these institutions can take cross-university courses.

Second, South Asia courses offered at Duke, taking this Fall only as example, include Indo-Persian Sufism, Visual cultures of South Asia, Arts of Indian devotional movements, Hindi autobiography and various other broader courses that incorporate substantial South Asian material. Language offerings include Hindi-Urdu, Persian, Bengali and Nepali, again, routed through the NCCSAS. Typically, Professor Leela Prasad herself has offered three to four courses every year, exclusively on topics on South Asia and India; in the upcoming spring semester, she will be offering two courses-Ethics in South Asia and Introduction to Hinduism. We would hope that these courses are noticed and taken advantage of more fully. Especially notable is a tri-university South Asia Civilization course, to be taught in the spring from Duke by Cultural Anthropology Professor Katherine Ewing.

Third, Duke often hosts seminars and lectures on South Asia by performing artists and scholars. For instance, the Franklin Humanities Institute has currently in residence Romila Thapar, one of the world's foremost experts on ancient Indian history. There are many public talks centered around her visit; she holds office hours and welcomes conversation with students. How astonishing, and disappointing, that apart from students in Prasad's and Sandria Freitag's classes, DSASI and other Duke students were noticeably absent at her first talk on Oct 11!

Fourth, we will be glad to see DSASI's enthusiastic participation in new civic engagement programs at Duke. In this connection, we want to also draw attention to Duke's chapter of the Association for India's Development, for which Prasad is the faculty advisor. AID-Duke runs on the committed energy and vision of volunteers (mostly graduate and postdoctoral fellows at Duke) continues to need and welcome students to collaborate on social work projects in India ranging from women's empowerment to soil and water conservation.

We recognize the necessity to augment and further diversify existing resources in both languages and topics relating to South Asia, and also see a need for a South Asian Studies certificate and a Duke-based Study Abroad program (there is currently one run out of UNC that is open to Duke students). However, to be successful, this growth must build on the steps already taken; it must synthesize various efforts and energies and it must emerge from structured dialogue between students and faculty who teach about South Asia in various departments at Duke, for example, History, Religion, Anthropology, English and Asian and African Languages and Literatures. In short, there is much going on at Duke with regard to South Asia and much more needs to be done, but collectively with all concerned groups working together.

Bruce Lawrence

Srinivas Aravamudan

Director, John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute

Sandria Freitag

Associate Director, North Carolina Center for South Asia Studies