1. Area study in Crisis? Theories of Area Studies Nasim

2. Localizing knowledge in a Global World One day while devouring the pages of Hindu custom and ritual, a newly published anthropological monograph by an earnest American researcher, Anaya's eyes alight on a photograph taken by its author during fieldwork. He recognizes in the photograph the faces of his family; it is the cremation of his own father, news of whose death had not reached him in the library stacks of Chicago. It is an uncanny moment of loss and recognition., like realizing one is looking at light from a long- dead star. (Khilani 1997) What could this mean?

3. The story of Anya might be read as the story of Area Studies; a body of knowledge produced mostly by Western scholars for Western Audiences about non-Western societies, cultures and histories. Like Anaya who learns his family history in the stacks of the university of Chicago library. Form this perspective: Areas Studies is the organization of teaching and research along the lines of geographical and cultural and regionals that function as the intellectual arm of a larger orientalist enterprise in which Western intellectuals seek to represent the non-West in ways that are convenient, self congratulatory and ultimately distorting. Area Studies

4. So why Area studies? After 13 years, Afghanistan is still a weak state. Although International community spent billions dollars on aids to help build a strong state in Afghanistan. What went Wrong in Afghanistan? Did U.S.A have valid and reliable knowledge about Afghanistan?

5. Area Studies in Crisis? Area studies have always been sensitive to the change of political and intellectual conditions. Western powers brought area studies into being in the aftermath of World War 2 in an effort to understand and influence geopolitical alignments. Area studies is in crisis! Why? The major foundations have withdrawn the support for area studies programs and the major research universities are reorienting graduate students away from area studies training. The Mellon foundation stopped funding Advanced funding in 1993 SSRC and ACLS dissolved their joint area studies committees The ford foundation similarly engaged in an reorganization that was partially designed to rethink the area studies model

6. Demise of Area Studies Two phenomenon can be considered: 1.End of Cold 2.Globalization End of cold: with the demise of the soviet union and with the unchallenged global dominance of the united states, policymakers became less committed to acquiring area based expertise Globalization: the past decade has witnessed increased economic and cultural flows and heightened awareness of these flows across national and regional borders. The growing mobility of capital, commodities, images and cultural forms and people- tourist, migrants, and refugees- among different world areas has had important implication for areas studies.

7. More focus on Globalization Several of the major foundation including Ford, Mellon, MacArthur, and SSRC, have formed new research programs to study globalization. In the past much of the focus were on Area studies. In other words Areas Studies meant knowledge and understanding of Local. There has been a shift of focus: From area studies to globalization process From Local to Global