US area-studies programs grew to meet the state’s knowledge needs during decolonization.

Evidence

Three foundations played a significant role in this process: the Carnegie Corporation, the Rockefeller Center, and the Ford Foundation. International relations scholar Inderjeet Parmar suggests that these “Big 3” foundations helped mobilize knowledge production within universities to “consolidate U.S. hegemony around the globe.” With large grants, US universities set out to create departments, centers, and programs instrumental to serving the needs of empire. Two approaches guided the study of the Middle East: Orientalism (which was still dominated by philologists) and social scientific research, from which a new model known as “modernization” would be developed. This latter model, while it claimed to be objective social science, was in fact imbued with notions of “exceptionalism and empire,” as historian Osamah Khalil argues in his comprehensive book on knowledge production on the Middle East, America’s Dream Palace. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 240 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: US area-studies programs grew from government knowledge needs during decolonization; Three US foundations funded university area studies to consolidate global hegemony — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 240

Broader Connections

• US area-studies programs grew from government knowledge needs during decolonization #corroborates (0.95)
• Three US foundations funded university area studies to consolidate global hegemony #corroborates (0.85) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 240