Association for Asian Studies

The origins of the Association for Asian Studies began with the publication of the Bulletin of Far Eastern Bibliography in 1936. The Bulletin was expanded in a more comprehensive journal in 1941 and renamed The Far Eastern Quarterly . This publication was supported by a small committee of scholars who had organized themselves as the Far Eastern Association.

Because of continued financial difficulties, a special meeting was held in 1948 and the committee, along with some invited guests, discussed the possibility of reorganizing the Association as an active membership organization. The first meeting of the reorganized Association was held in New York City on April 2, 1948. Arthur W. Hummell of the Library of Congress was elected the Association's first president.

The objectives of the Association were:

In December 1949 the board of directors decided to seek new sources of revenue to expand the organization's scope. The board prioritized the purposes of these funds as:

Initial funding was achieved by raising membership dues, however the Research Committee on Development of Far Eastern Studies was created for the purpose of exploring foundation support for these activities. By the end of 1955 the Committee's work led to substantial funding for the Association through the Ford Foundation. Ford Foundation's support was generous; subsidizing the expansion of the society's journal, the establishment of a monograph series, the publication of a newsletter, the maintenance of a secretariat, and the work of various Association committees. By 1960 outside funding had made possible an increased level of activity and stability within the Association.

In 1956 the Far Eastern Association was renamed the Association for Asian Studies (AAS), the Far Eastern Quarterly was re-titled the Journal of Asian Studies, and the constitution and bylaws were amended to incorporate south Asia into the sphere of the Association's interest and activity. To reflect this latter change the Association's board of directors was expanded from nine to twelve members, with three seats on the board reserved for south Asian specialists.

Membership growth and the expanded geographic interest of the Association led to the formation of areas study committees in the mid-1950's. The first to be well established was the Committee on South Asia, which in 1956 received a large grant from the Rockefeller Foundation, enabling it to sponsor a number of organizational meetings of South Asian specialists. Broad umbrella committees such as the Committee on South Asia were further subdivided by the development of even more specialized committees, such as the Ceylon Studies Committee, the Bengal Studies Committee, the Gandhi Centennial Committee, and the Ghalib Centenary Committee, all of which sponsored their own conferences, lectures and publications. The pattern established by the South Asian Committee was replicated in other parts of the Association. In 1962, for example, the Committee on Southeast Asia was established. It quickly developed subcommittees such as the Burma Study Group, the Language Resources Committee, and the Indonesia Studies Committee. By 1969-1970 two other broad groups, representing scholarly interest in Northeast Asia and China and Inner Asia had been formed. They, and their predecessors in the fields of Southeast Asia and South Asia, were formally recognized in 1969/70 by the designation "Regional Councils".

The link between the AAS and the University of Michigan is rooted in the strong bonds of service that grew between UM faculty members interested in Asian Studies and the Association. Beginning in 1952 a succession of UM faculty served in the AAS secretariat. In 1955 the Association's board of director's voted to establish a permanent Secretariat and locate it in Ann Arbor.