Asian Studies Minor

Asian Studies Overview

Asian Studies is an interdisciplinary program that straddles the social sciences, humanities, arts, and business. At Clark, students who major in Asian Studies develop not only their analytical skills; they also gain in-depth knowledge concerning the history, politics, and culture of different Asian countries. Students are required to develop linguistic proficiency in an Asian language, usually either Chinese or Japanese. Our core program faculty includes experts on China, Japan, mainland Southeast Asia, and South Asia. The program reflects the growing importance of Asia, rising public interest in Asia, and the undeniably central role of Asia in the world economy and in world affairs today.

For more information, please visit the Asian Studies Department’s website.

Minor Requirements

Asian Studies is an interdisciplinary minor that can be taken as a complement to any major. The minor requires six Asian studies courses. Of these six courses, three may be selected from language courses; the other three must be selected from non-language courses. The minor further requires that two of the non-language courses must be 200-level courses and one course must include a significant research component. Students minoring in Asian Studies are encouraged, though not required, to take at least one year of Chinese or Japanese language, and to study one year abroad in Asia. 

Asian Studies Faculty

Asian Studies Courses

Courses offered within the last 2 Academic Years

• CHIN 101 - Elementary Chinese I
• CHIN 102 - Elementary Chinese II
• CHIN 103 - Intermediate Chinese I
• CHIN 104 - Intermediate Chinese II
• ENG 275 - Fictions of Empire: Studies in Global English Literature
• ENG 279 - Fictions of Asian America
• GEOG 107 - Miracles of Asia: Economic Growth in Global Contexts
• HIST 080 - Introduction to Modern East Asia
• HIST 181 - Chinese Civilization
• HIST 182 - Modern China
• HIST 233 - Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism: Intellectual History of China
• HIST 240 - Love, Memory, and Violence: The Cultural Revolution
• HIST 253 - Beauty, Gender, and Power around the World, 1800 to the Present
• HIST 281 - China since 1949: State, Economy and Family in the People’s Republic
• HIST 286 - The Vietnam War
• ID 235 - Trafficking: Globalization and Its Illicit Commodities
• ID 243 - Seeing Like a Humanitarian Agency
• IDND 200 - Advanced Topics in Gender, Race, and Area Studies
• JAPN 101 - Elementary Japanese I
• JAPN 102 - Elementary Japanese II
• JAPN 103 - Intermediate Japanese
• JAPN 104 - Intermediate Japanese II
• JAPN 110 - Japanese Pop Culture: Narratives of National Identity
• JAPN 190 - Japanese Women Writers
• JAPN 275 - The Japanese Warrior Tradition
• JAPN 280 - Memory and National Identity in Post-War Japanese Fiction and Film
• PHIL 165 - Asian Philosophy
• PSCI 179 - Asian Politics
• PSCI 232 - Chinese Politics
• SOC 160 - Global Cultures and Identities