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It is a pleasure for me to welcome you to APSI’s website and of course to our programs. While APSI has been around since 1981, I joined as APSI Director in January of 2023.
APSI has served its core mission very successfully in the past, particularly supporting faculty research, faculty led conferences, funding students and, not least, conducting one of the finest Masters Programs in East Asian Studies.
My goal is to bring these successes to the attention of the wider university. I think of this as a two-pronged approach. The first is to become more involved in university-wide Duke projects, such as the Climate Commitment, which has been given the highest priority by the university. APSI has already set up a webpage outlining APSI and the Environment. The Global Asia Initiative is now a focused program within APSI devoted to Asian connections with the wider world, especially in relation to the environment and climate change.
The second is not only to publicize our events more widely to potentially interested students and faculty in areas such as Law, Public Policy, Environmental Studies and from Duke Kunshan among others, but to engage scholars from those areas in our projects and programs as well.
Lastly, let me extend a special and warm welcome to incoming students and faculty in all the areas covered by APSI, but especially to the cohort of APSI MA students who constitute our most immediate family.
Prasenjit Duara
Oscar Tang Professor of East Asian Studies, Department of History
Director, Asian/Pacific Studies Institute (APSI)
Duke University
President, Association for Asian Studies (2019-20)