Asian Studies
The Asian Studies Program (ASP) offers students an interdisciplinary approach to the study of Asia, ancient and modern, at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. This is accomplished by offering courses of its own as well as by drawing from the wide array of Asia related courses and other resources available campus-wide, allowing each student to design a program of study suited to his or her interests.
The ASP offers an MA, a certificate, major, and minor in Asian Studies focused on any of its core areas: Southeast Asia, South Asia, China, Japan, and Korea, most of whose national languages are taught at the University as well.
The ASP is also closely linked in terms of faculty, courses, fellowships, staff, and daily operations to all of the School’s (SPAS) Centers, three of which are recognized as National Resource Centers: Southeast Asia, East Asia and Pacific and Hawaiian studies, all of which offer FLAS (Foreign Language and Area Studies) fellowships annually.
Students may elect approved courses from at least the following disciplines: American Studies, anthropology, production & management, art, business, economics, geography, philosophy, history, linguistics, literature, political science, music, religion, sociology, theater and dance, women’s studies and others. Other departments in the University, including Indo-Pacific Languages, East Asian Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics, additionally provide a wide repertoire for students to construct their own program with the assistance of advisers and faculty.
Center for Pacific Islands Studies
The Center for Pacific Islands Studies, in the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa School of Pacific and Asian Studies, is both an academic department and a larger home for initiatives that bring together people and resources to promote an understanding of the Pacific Islands and issues of concern to Pacific Islanders. Its innovative instructional program is regional, comparative, and interdisciplinary in nature. The university’s Pacific Collection, one of the most comprehensive collections of Pacific materials in the world, attracts a worldwide audience, as do the center’s international conferences, its Web-based resources, its Pacific Islands Monograph Series, and its award-winning journal, The Contemporary Pacific. Working with scholars at institutions in the region and elsewhere, faculty at the center are seeking new ways to encompass a deeper understanding of a region whose boundaries are constantly expanding.