East Asian Studies at Harvard University

East Asian Studies at Harvard is dedicated to the study of East Asia, both as a vital part of the world today and as one of the great civilizations of human history. To study East Asia is to be exposed to a world with different forms of political activity and social relations, religious traditions of great depth and philosophical schools with enduring insights, and literatures of unusual range and power. It is also to study a world that since the 19th century has come to share in the dilemmas of modernity that we all confront. For some this inquiry provides a challenging and satisfying addition to a liberal arts education. For some it is an opportunity to restore connections to an ancestral past. For others it leads to graduate studies. And for many others it is the beginning of a professional career with an East Asian component.

During the last century East Asia established an extraordinary record of economic growth and cultural change. As the new century begins, economic crises and dramatic political realignments have both cooled simplistic boosterism of the "East Asian miracle" and at the same time reaffirmed the critical importance of developments in East Asia to all of our futures.

We can expect the countries of East Asia to play an even greater role in world-wide processes of economic, political, and cultural change in decades to come. The achievements of China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam should come as no surprise when we recognize that the sophisticated, evolving patterns of political and social organization, literary accomplishment, and economic development of East Asia grow out of a civilization with a history of at least three thousand years. The mixed record of dealing with the problems of modernity is also part of a global story, reminding us of comparable traumas of modern history in the West and around the world, but the East Asian experience may offer valuable and thought-provoking lessons.