Area studies, also known as regional studies, is an interdisciplinary field of research and scholarship pertaining to particular geographical, national/federal, or cultural regions. The term exists primarily as a general description for what are, in the practice of scholarship, many heterogeneous fields of research, encompassing both the social sciences and the humanities. Typical area study programs involve international relations, strategic studies, history, anthropology, political science, political economy, cultural studies, languages, geography, literature, and other related disciplines. In contrast to cultural studies, area studies often include diaspora and emigration from the area.
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👉 Area studies in the context of Asian studies
Asian studies is the term used usually in North America and Australia for what in Europe is known as Oriental studies. The field is concerned with the Asian people, their cultures, languages, history and politics. Within the Asian sphere, Asian studies combines aspects of sociology, history, cultural anthropology, cultural studies, and many other disciplines to study political, cultural and economic phenomena in Asian traditional and contemporary societies. Asian studies form a field of post-graduate study in many universities.
It is a branch of area studies, and many Western universities combine Asian and African studies in a single faculty or institute, like SOAS in London. It is often combined with Islamic studies in a similar way. The history of the discipline in the West is covered under Oriental studies.
In this Dossier
- ⭐ Core Definition: Area studies
- 👉 Area studies in the context of Asian studies
- Area studies in the context of Geopolitics
- Area studies in the context of Sinology
- Area studies in the context of St Antony's College, Oxford
- Area studies in the context of Icelandic studies
- Area studies in the context of Jewish studies
Area studies in the context of Geopolitics
Geopolitics (from Ancient Greek γῆ gê 'earth, land' and πολιτική politikḗ 'politics') is the study of the effects of Earth's geography on politics and international relations. Geopolitics usually refers to countries and relations between them. According to multiple researchers, the term is currently being used to describe a broad spectrum of concepts, in a general sense used as "a synonym for international political relations", but more specifically "to imply the global structure of such relations"; this usage builds on an "early-twentieth-century term for a pseudoscience of political geography" and other pseudoscientific theories of historical and geographic determinism.
At the level of international relations, geopolitics is a method of studying foreign policy to understand, explain, and predict international political behavior through geographical variables. These include area studies, climate, topography, demography, natural resources, and applied science of the region being evaluated.
Area studies in the context of Sinology
Sinology, also referred to as China studies, is a subfield of area studies or East Asian studies involved in social sciences and humanities research on China. It is an academic discipline that focuses on the study of the Chinese civilization primarily through Chinese language, history, culture, literature, philosophy, art, music, cinema, and science. Its origin "may be traced to the examination which Chinese scholars made of their own civilization."
The academic field of sinology often refers to Western scholarship. Until the 20th century, it was historically seen as equivalent to philology concerning the Chinese classics and other literature written in the Chinese language. Since then, the scope of sinology has expanded to include Chinese history and palaeography, among other subjects.
Area studies in the context of St Antony's College, Oxford
St Antony's College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1950 as the result of the gift of French merchant Sir Antonin Besse of Aden, St Antony's specialises in international relations, economics, politics, and area studies relative to Europe, Russia, former Soviet states, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, Japan, China, and South and South East Asia.
The college is located in North Oxford, with Woodstock Road to the west, Bevington Road to the south and Winchester Road to the east. St Antony's had a financial endowment of £55.1 million as of 2021. Formerly a men's college, it has been co-educational since 1962.
Area studies in the context of Icelandic studies
Scandinavian studies or Scandinavistics is an interdisciplinary academic field of area studies, mainly in the United States and Germany, that primarily focuses on the Scandinavian languages (also known as North Germanic languages) and cultural studies pertaining to Scandinavia and Scandinavian language and culture in the other Nordic countries. While Scandinavia is defined as Denmark, Norway and Sweden, the term Scandinavian in an ethnic, cultural and linguistic sense is often used synonymously with North Germanic and also refers to the peoples and languages of the Faroe Islands and Iceland; furthermore a minority in Finland are ethnically Scandinavian and speak Swedish natively.
Scandinavian studies does not exist as a separate field within Scandinavia or the Nordic countries themselves, as its scope would be considered far too broad to be treated meaningfully within a single discipline. The closest related field in Scandinavia would be the more narrow discipline of Nordic linguistics, which covers North Germanic languages. A major focus of Scandinavian studies is the teaching of Scandinavian languages, especially the three large languages Danish, Norwegian and Swedish.
Area studies in the context of Jewish studies
Jewish studies (or Judaic studies; Hebrew: מדעי היהדות, romanized: madey ha-yahadut, lit. 'sciences of Judaism') is an academic discipline centered on the study of Jews and Judaism. Jewish studies is interdisciplinary and combines aspects of history (especially Jewish history), Middle Eastern studies, Asian studies, Oriental studies, religious studies, archeology, sociology, languages (Jewish languages), political science, area studies, women's studies, and ethnic studies. Jewish studies as a distinct field is mainly present at colleges and universities in North America.
Related fields include Holocaust research and Israel studies, and in Israel, Jewish thought.Bar-Ilan University has the world's largest school of Jewish studies; while Harvard was the first American university, and perhaps the first in the world, to appoint a full-time scholar of Judaica to its faculty.