About Asian Studies
The Asian Studies Program at UF began in 1986 with seven core faculty members and has been sustained with a series of gifts from anonymous donors. Though the American south has not traditionally been a strong force in Asian Studies, the University of Florida Asian Studies has managed, with the support of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences and help from Freeman and Japan Foundation grants in 1995, 2001, and 2005, to triple in size, with 28 core faculty members in seven different departments. As the flagship university of a ten-university system, UF boasts the only full four-year program of language study in Chinese and Japanese in Florida, B.A degrees in East Asian Languages and Literatures and Asian Studies, with over 350 students in 95 majors enrolled in language study. We offer fledgling programs in Vietnamese, Indonesian, Hindi, and Korean.
In response to the rapid rise in economic, political, and cultural significance of Asia, we provide the resources to acquire the language and a rigorous, academic interdisciplinary focus on the social science and humanities issues that will be reshaping your world in the 21st century. Our graduates have won two Fulbright Fellowships in the last five years and have been placed into top graduate programs and corporate positions as well as in medical and professional schools. Our students know that a disciplined understanding of Asia is important as our economic, political, and cultural map is reshaped. The knowledge we provide our students widens our horizons, enriches us personally, and deepens our ability to engage any professional field. Come join us and see.
