International Study Programs Expanding

Emory's explosive growth in study abroad options includes new programs in Cape Town, South Africa; Dharamsala, India, a partnership with the Dalai Lama's exiled Tibetan government; and Havana, Cuba. The newest program is an academic exchange with the University of Cape Town (UCT), the oldest university in South Africa, that is Emory College's first formal linkage with an African university. The program provides for five Emory undergraduates to study for the spring semester each year at UCT and one UCT postgraduate student to study up to a year at Emory. The focus of study is South African history, culture and politics. Emory students will explore the European conquest and colonization of South Africa; the transformation of the economy, society and culture; the rise and fall of apartheid; the formation of new social and political movements and the transition to democratic rule; and race and racial identities. In addition, UCT has received a Mellon Foundation grant to send a postgraduate student for a year of study to a select cohort of U.S. universities, so Emory could have two postgraduate students at a time from UCT. The other cohort schools are Brown University, the University of Michigan, Penn State, Stanford and the University of California-Berkeley.

The semester abroad Dharamsala program is a partnership in Tibetan Buddhist studies with the Dalai Lama's Drepung Loseling Monastery, and has been in development for several years. The monastery and the respected Institute of Buddhist Dialectics (IBD) in Dharamsala will provide outstanding English-speaking teachers of Tibetan philosophy, language, meditation and culture.

Emory students will study at the IBD (Sarah campus) for three weeks of intensive language instruction, lectures on Tibetan culture, and excursions to nearby sites. This campus is in a river valley 10 miles below Dharamsala, and houses a large community of Tibetan monks and laypersons engaged in traditional and contemporary study. Students will live in the institute's dormitory, giving them an unusual opportunity to interact on a daily basis with Tibetan classmates their own age. Students will then move to a Tibetan guesthouse in the middle of McLeod Ganj ("upper Dharamsala") for two months of language and coursework at the main campus of the IBD. Participants may witness the Tibetan New Year's festival, Great Prayer festival, and a week of teachings by His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

Another exciting option is a summer study for Spanish language and culture May 23 - July 1 that combines intensive study at Havana's Instituto del Librowith, field trips to La azotea, Casa de las Americas, the Museo de le Revolucion, the Museo de Arte Colonial, the Museo de la Ciudad de la Habana, the Museo del Historiador, Casa Marti, the Fundacion Alejo Carpentier, the Museo del Grabado, and the Casa de Africa. The five-week intensive course of study combines three hours a day of class Monday-Friday mornings with afternoon lectures, tertualias, seminars and discussions lead by local scholars that will focus on exhibits, performances, or social and economic events they will have attended.

In the last four years, semester abroad programs at Emory have grown from four programs in four countries, to more than 40 programs in 23 countries. Summer study programs have grown from nine programs in six countries, to 16 programs in 12 countries. Overall student participation has risen nearly 23 percent during that time with semester abroad participation soaring 740 percent.

Related Releases:

Study Abroad Numbers Soar

Big Growth in Study Abroad Includes New Programs in Cuba, Cape Town, Dharamsala

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