Furman to host
ASIANetwork in April
By Jim Leavell
On April
10-12, Furman will host the spring conference of ASIANetwork, a consortium
of some 150 liberal arts schools supporting the study of Asia at the undergraduate
level.
This conference will feature addresses by noted Asian scholars and panels largely aimed at improving various aspects of Asian studies pedagogy, such as managing undergraduate student field research, leading study abroad programs, using technology in classrooms, and exploring new areas of student-faculty interest in Asia from multi-disciplinary perspectives.
The conference will draw scholar-teachers from all regions of the United States and Canada. This is the first meeting of this group in the American Southeast.
Furman historians Steve O'Neill and Lloyd Benson will lead a pre-conference tour of historic Greenville. Sam Britt, chair of Furman's Asian Studies Department, will host the tour group with an Indian lunch at the Vedic Center in Mauldin, where he will discuss the importance of our local Hindu-Jain community in upstate South Carolina. Britt and Claude Stulting are the primary South Carolina researchers for the Harvard-based "Pluralism Project," which examines contemporary religious diversity in America.
Conference keynote speakers will be Eliot Deutsch, current dean of Asian philosophers in America who now teaches at the University of Hawaii, and Carol Gluck, one of America's most engaging Japanese historians and an influential supporter of undergraduate education through Columbia University's various Asian Studies programs.
Furman's Kate Kaup, Kailash Khandke, David Shaner, Jan Kiely, Karni Bhati and Bill Lavery will have program responsibilities during the meeting. The group will enjoy a reception at White Oaks and a banquet at the University Center. Most of the panel presentations will be made at Greenville's Westin Poinsett.
For a liberal arts institution, Furman has an unusually strong Asian Studies program with a large, diverse and impressive faculty. Bringing the ASIANetwork annual conference to our campus will give us the opportunity to demonstrate the multiple aspects of our outstanding program.
It will also give Furman national visibility among our peer institutions and among graduate programs that have been receiving our Asian Studies students over the last decade.
(Jim Leavell is professor of history and Asian Studies and serves as the chairman of the executive board for ASIANetwork.)
Inside Furman is published monthly during the school year by the Furman University Department of Marketing and Public Relations. For story ideas, e-mail John Roberts, editor.
