AmericanInstitute of IndianStudies

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                               Language Programs                                                                                News

                                                                           
                                                                                                                                        AIIS is awarded 2008 Taraknath Das Award

AIIS operates intensive language programs in India                                         AIIS announces its 2008-2009 fellowship recipients                                                   

for both the summer and the academic year. Read more..

Download language program applications and announcement

 

                                                                                       
                        Ambika Soni, Minister of Tourism and Culture                                                     AIIS Hindi students visit Pushkar

                                  visits AIIS in Gurgaon on 2 July 2008                                                                                  

About the American Institute of Indian Studies


AIIS Fellowship Competition (Application Deadline is 1 July 2008)

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American Institute of Indian Studies

American knowledge of India is shaped by the American Institute of Indian Studies, a consortium of universities and colleges in the United States at which scholars actively engage in teaching and research about India. For more than thirty years, the Institute has provided fellow ship support for senior American scholars and Ph.D. candidates. It has offered on-site training in Indian languages through the superb facilities of its Language Centers. And it has extended knowledge of Indian culture through its two research centers. More than 3,500 scholars have received AIIS support. Their work has spanned fields ranging from anthropology to zoology. The results of their work has resulted in literally hundreds of books and thousands of articles, the basis of America's knowledge about India. Collections of some 2700 books directly or indirectly resulting from AIIS-sponsored research have been given to major libraries in India, including the National Library of India in Calcutta, the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library in Delhi and the Adyar Library in Chennai. The listing of these books forms the core of a widely used and highly respected volume, India and America, published by the Institute. AIIS scholars also have come together with colleagues from India and often from other countries as well at major international conferences. These conferences have resulted in the publication of selected papers that often form the core of knowledge in many disciplines. Nearly fifty books have so far been published directly by the Institute, and others are under consideration by an active Publications Committee. Through its programs of research and documentation, the Institute has since 1961 endeavored to achieve an accurate and probing knowledge of India's cultures, history, languages, and present-day dynamics. Through  its own publications and those of its fellows, the Institute seeks to make the results of this research widely available and easily accessible to people in the United States and India, indeed throughout the world. Already the impact has been considerable. The Institute has been directly responsible for fostering several generations of new scholars, and its senior fellows have returned to classrooms where they have taught tens of thousands of American college students. 

Background: 1961 to the 1990's

The Institute was established in 1961 by a group of American scholars involved in programs of Indian studies at leading American universities. They were led by W. Norman Brown, Professor of Sanskrit at the University of Pennsylvania, who brought a long-held dream to reality with the creation of a non-governmental academic consortium to facilitate research on Indian culture and history. Funding came from various public and private sources. Under the leadership of five presidents, the Institute has flourished and is today recognized as the leading proponent of Indian studies in the United States. Its operations rely heavily on volunteer help from countless scholars in the United States and India and on a small, dedicated staff at the American headquarters in Chicago and the Indian headquarters in Delhi as well as at regional offices in important Indian cities. In the first decades of the Institute's existence, the operation has grown from the small fellowship-granting agency that initially it was. The addition of active regional offices, an internationally regarded Language Program, two major research centers, and facilities for short-term accommodation of scholars have made the Institute indispensable to American knowledge about India. Financial support for the Institute has come from a wide variety of sources. Originally, it was funded by private foundations. Prominent amount them were the Ford, Mellon, Old Dominion, Carnegie, Rockefeller Foundations and the JDR 3rd Fund. Today the Institute receives primary funding from the Smithsonian Institution, the U.S. State Department, the Council of American Overseas Research Centers, the National Science Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the U.S. Department of Education. 

Into the 21st Century

Governmental funding once freely available for the Institute has become increasingly difficult to obtain. Nevertheless, alternative sources and strategies have been developed to insure that the American Institute of Indian Studies flourishes into the foreseeable future. Activities in India have been consolidated in a building that the Institute constructed for its international headquarters. Located in Gurgaon, close to Delhi's international airport, this building has eliminated the payment of high rents for several buildings and duplication of effort by a dispersed staff. A modest endowment will insure the continuation of the Institute's basic operations forever. And an ongoing campaign to enhance that endowment seeks to insure that the Institute can continue its present level of activity. Funds are being sought from individuals and businesses, indeed from all those who have an interest in insuring that India's rich cultural heritage and the shared democratic experiences of our two countries continue to impact the awareness of Americans into the twenty-first century. 
 
 

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