By Howard Cincotta, Special
Correspondent,
America.gov
This is the third article in a three-part series
on Persian studies in the United States.
Academic programs demonstrate different ways to explore the field
Royce Hall, completed in 1929, is one of the four original
buildings on UCLA's Westwood campus. |
Washington - Once relegated to ancient languages and
civilizations, the field of Persian and Iranian studies has evolved rapidly in
recent decades toward teaching Persian as a living, modern - and international -
language and culture.
PERSIAN STUDIES LANDSCAPE
The diversity and range of Persian programs in
the United States today reflect a variety of factors, including the 1979 Islamic
Revolution, the end of the Cold War and the impact of a large and active
Iranian-American community.
Although most Persian studies programs,
especially at state universities, offer the same basic curriculum of language,
history and literature courses, many institutions have areas of particular
academic focus or strength.
Harvard University offers two Persian-Iranian
programs of study, according to a survey conducted by the California-based PARSA
Community Foundation. One covers the New Persian language and literature and
Islamic studies spanning Central Asia, the Indian subcontinent and the Ottoman
Empire from the 10th century to the present. The second encompasses pre-Islamic
languages and literature, ancient religions and comparative linguistics.
Stanford University and the University of
California at Irvine emphasize interdisciplinary studies in which students of
Iranian and Persian culture take courses in different departments, such as
comparative literature, classics, history, archeology and even music.
A distinctive strength of the University of
California at Los Angeles (UCLA), according to the PARSA foundation, "is the
focus on medieval and Arabic philosophy." Professor Hossein Ziai, director of
Iranian studies at UCLA, points to courses that allow students to read classical
Persian texts dealing not only with literature, but also history and science.
"For example, pre-med students can study the
corpus of medical writings and pharmacopeia, and see how people dealt with the
same medical issues 1,000 years ago," Ziai said.
The Persian studies program at the University of
Texas offers courses on classical Persia, but it focuses on the 19th and 20th
centuries, and especially on the post-World War II era.
The Association for the Study of Persianate
Societies, founded in 1998 at the University of Minnesota and now based at the
University of Chicago's Oriental Institute, regularly brings visitors from Iran
and Central Asia to conferences and conventions in the United States. It
publishes a newsletter and has launched an annual publication of scholarly
articles in the Journal of Persianate Studies.
The association has branch offices located at
international institutions and academic centers in Iran, Tajikistan, India,
Pakistan, Armenia, Georgia and Austria.
Professor Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak, director of
Persian studies at the University of Maryland, sees a shift in Middle Eastern
studies away from treating the region as a single entity and toward the study of
individual nation-states. "There is no monolithic Islam today," he said,
"especially at a time when every country is forging its own fate with Islam. The
examples of Turkey, Iran and Egypt point to the divergences in their responses."
The end of the Cold War has brought wider
recognition that Persian language, literature and culture - past and present -
extend far beyond the boundaries of Iran. Much of Persian literature was not
written in what is now Iran but in Central Asia, Karimi-Hakkak said. Persian
language and culture flourished on the Indian subcontinent for five centuries.
Karimi-Hakkak also said the eastward advance of
Islam through Asia followed a Persian model, not an Arabic model, a fact not
widely understood in the West.
"Persian is an international language spoken in
at least four different sites," he said. "Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and the
very sizeable Iranian and Afghan diaspora."
For Karimi-Hakkak, diaspora studies may well be
one of the future directions for Persian studies at a time of large-scale
national diasporas, whether Korean, South Asian or Latin American.
"In an age where almost no one dies where they
were born, there is a need to study diaspora communities - and what better place
to study them than in the United States, which has made a community of such
groups?" he said.
ENDOWMENTS AND IRANIAN AMERICANS
The most pronounced feature of contemporary
Persian studies today may be the role of the Iranian-American community at a
time of shrinking budgets for most universities in the United States.
Among large donors, the nonprofit Roshan Cultural
Heritage Institute has provided grants totaling $3 million to the University of
Maryland to endow what is now called the Roshan Institute Center for Persian
Studies. The endowment supports a chair in Persian language and linguistics
along with graduate and undergraduate fellowships.
The Roshan Institute has also provided grants and
fellowships to the University of Washington, the University of Arizona,
Pennsylvania State University, UCLA, and California State University at Fresno.
UCLA now has two endowed chairs in Iranian
studies along with several named graduate fellowships, according to Ziai,
director of Iranian studies there. "And we are continuing to look for support to
keep our program growing," he added.
In 2005, technology entrepreneur Fariborz Maseeh
pledged $2 million from his foundation to establish an interdisciplinary center
for Persian studies and culture at the University of California at Irvine.
Large numbers of Iranian Americans continue to
support conferences and lecture series, fund undergraduate and graduate
scholarships, and endow professorial chairs for Persian programs at universities
across the country.
Even the Encyclopaedia Iranica is now largely
supported by private individual and institutional donors.
This community support may help ensure that
Persian and Iranian studies - from the archaeology and cultures of ancient
Persia to the cultural and political dynamics of contemporary Iran - will
continue to flourish and grow in the United States.
For more information, see the following Web
sites:
Part one: "Persian
Studies in United States Reflects Dynamism and Growth"
Part three: "Iranian-American
Community Vital to Advance of Persian Studies"
Read more on
Americ.gov
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... Payvand News - 07/30/09 ... --
