India has started on the path to becoming an economic giant much like China. Indonesia is increasingly important on the world stage, in part because of its struggle with radical Islam. Southeast Asian nations are building their global profiles. And many of these countries are sending larger numbers of students to BU.

In an effort to meet those changes head-on, the College of Arts & Sciences recently introduced a new Asian studies major that will include South and Southeast Asia, replacing the current East Asian studies major.

It is “based on the new landscape,” says Min Ye, a CAS and Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies assistant professor of international relations and academic coordinator of the Asian Studies Program. “Asia is a very important force in globalization.”

The interdisciplinary major offers course work on Asian cultures, economy, politics, development, languages, literature, art, history, religions, and society. It also provides an opportunity to attain proficiency in an Asian language and strongly promotes study abroad in the region. The major is designed to be flexible, allowing students to tailor it to their specific interests, whether they be a particular region or country or broader transnational issues like economic development.

CAS has had an East Asian studies major since the 1990s, primarily dealing with China and Japan, but Korea and Taiwan as well. “It was time to revise the curriculum and expand the old major into something reflecting what is happening at Boston University and also reflecting what is happening in the world,” says Eugenio Menegon, a CAS and Pardee School associate professor of history and director of the Center for the Study of Asia at the Pardee School.

Min Ye, a CAS and Pardee School assistant professor of international relations, is one of the architects of the new Asian studies major.

There were two main reasons for the new major, according to Ye. “One was the change in the world, in foreign policy, NGO work, and business and development work, within Asia. There is increasing connectedness in the world,” she says. “Second, our Asian education at BU has improved so much: adding new courses, methodologies, and opportunities. We thought this was a chance to systematically enhance the major. We made it much stronger.”

BU now offers more than 110 undergraduate courses focused on Asia, among them language courses in Chinese, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, and Urdu, and study abroad programs in Beijing, Shanghai, Tokyo, Kyoto, Bhutan, Nepal, India, and Singapore.

The new major also reflects changes in the student body, Menegon says. In 2004, there were 230 international students in the freshman class (5.3 percent); of these 9 were from China, 23 from India, and 41 from Korea. Of the 898 international students (22.9 percent) in the fall 2014 freshman class, 489 were from China (12.5 percent of the class), 57 from India, 56 from Korea, and 11 from Indonesia.

“We think about the category of Asia in a very different way than we used to,” says Sunil Sharma, CAS associate professor of Persianate and comparative literature and chair of the modern languages and comparative literature department, who worked with Ye to create the new major. “We realized that there’s so much interest in intra-Asian affairs and cultural exchange.”

More business, social, and diplomatic ties mean students are more and more interested in learning about Asian countries other than their own, Ye says. But those students “may not want to become a mathematician in the future or a software engineer down the road. They may want to do something combining technical training and an understanding of the politics of the society, the government, the economy. They want to use their tech background to do something more managerial, more related to policy, and this is an opportunity to do that.”

Southeast Asia is increasingly important, Menegon says, because the region’s economy has been picking up, and “it is also a region that is crucial because of religious issues and a lot of tension.”

Aldea Zhang (CAS’16), who is pursuing a joint major in Asian studies and international relations, says she was drawn to the program because it encompasses both the humanities and the social sciences.

“One day you could be learning about the political economy of China, taking music classes on Japanese Kabuki theater, learning about Korean religions, and also learning about the food and customs of Chinese practice,” Zhang says. “There’s so much depth in the major for everyone and anyone to explore.”

Her own story is an example of the cross-border realities that helped to shape the new major. “By nationality I am Singaporean, but my parents are Indonesian Chinese with Dutch and Spanish ancestry, and I have grown up in Hong Kong—these changing environments have always made me want to explore my cultural beginnings and identity,” she says. “My main interest now is exploring how Asian communities and societies and our enduring traditional practices will keep up with today’s world.”

Zhang is one of five students who have already declared the new major, which requires a total of 11 core and principal courses (four-credit courses), proficiency in an Asian language (Chinese, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, or Urdu), and a mini-seminar (one credit). There is also an honors program for students who want to pursue a semester-long research project, culminating in a lengthy research paper. Students have the option of minoring in Asian studies as well. Both are open to students from any college.

After the economic fallout of 2008, says Menegon, students tended to gravitate toward courses of study like engineering, where jobs were plentiful. Changing the scope of the Asian studies major should “make it more attractive, more connected to their career needs,” he says.

But students shouldn’t lose sight of avenues of learning that don’t have an immediate practical application, Menegon says, but instead can give them a greater understanding of the country or region where they want to work. “If you do not know anything about the place, its culture, its language,” he says, “what are you going to produce?”