College Schools, Departments & Programs

Asian American Studies

Introduction

The program in Asian American Studies (AAST) introduces students to the history, culture, arts, and life experiences of people of Asian descent in the United States, and in other parts of the world. The term Asian American applies to groups from diverse cultural heritages within the United States, including Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, Asian Indian, Pakistani, Vietnamese, Hmong, Cambodian, Burmese, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander. In attending to these populations, the undergraduate minor aims to foster awareness of Asian American experiences and contributions as part of the multicultural and multiracial history and ongoing development of the American experience, and to locate this experience in a larger global context. Its faculty members undertake a wide range of research and scholarship on issues such as Asian immigration, community development, labor market status, physical and mental health, gender and sexual politics, ethnic and diasporic identities, cultural representations, civil rights, and citizenship. Courses in Asian American Studies provide students the opportunity to deepen their understanding of these issues from an interdisciplinary perspective that includes history, sociology, literature, ethnography and media studies, political science, applied health science, and counseling psychology. Students in Asian American Studies not only learn the traditional skills in critical analysis and research, but also develop domestic and global perspectives as effective and responsible agents in a rapidly changing twenty-first century world.

Majors, Minors, and Programs
Contact Information

Asian American Studies Program
Indiana University
Ballantine Hall 543
1020 E. Kirkwood Avenue
Bloomington, IN 47405

(812) 855-3306
aasp [at] indiana [dot] edu

www.indiana.edu/~aasp/