Record Funding for African Language Study at Pardee School
The African Studies Center at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies announced record offers of tuition and stipend awards to 17 graduate and undergraduate students studying African languages totaling over $360,000.
The ASC makes Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) fellowships awards under a Department of Education Title VI grant for both graduate and undergraduate students for the study of African languages and African area studies for summer and academic year work. FLAS award nominees plan to study isiXhosa, Kiswahili, Ewe, Wolof, Igbo, Amharic, isiZulu, and Arabic.
Most award nominees plan to study during AY 2024-2025 at the ASC. Several students will travel to the continent to pursue summer language study there as well.
Graduate student award nominee Caden Browne said,
“I’ve been fortunate to get FLAS for Kiswahili and isiZulu, which has greatly improved my cultural and linguistic understanding of the regionsI study for my PhD!”
ASC Director Storella thanks the FLAS selection committee for their review of the many applicants, a sign of the increasing popularity of African language study at BU where African language enrollments continue to climb. The ASC offers small language classes and even individual study to help ensure a deeper leaning of languages and cultures.
“It is heartening to see the growth of interest in Africa and African languages in the ASC’s 70th year.” Professor Storella said.
This year, the ASC continued its tradition of groundbreaking scholarship, a record number of national educational outreach programs, a leading African studies library, and a prestigious academic journal.
This scholarship was attested by the recent recognition of our advanced isiXhosa and Linguistics PhD student, Andre Batchelder-Schwab, by the national African Language Teachers Association (ALTA). On April 13, Andre was granted an award “In Recognition of your academic excellence and commitment to advancing African Language Education and fostering cross-cultural understanding at the ALTA conference.” This emanates from the research he has co-presented and submitted for journal publication with his language professor times regionally and nationally. He, too, is a continuing recipient of FLAS funding. His research has been accepted for a World Congress of African Linguistics (WOCAL) conference of August 2024.