ABSTRACT
The South Asian region was under Muslim rule at the time that colonialism began, other scholars learned Persian, which was the language of the Mughal courts. But very quickly the need to understand vernacular languages became apparent, leading to the formation of Fort William College in Kolkata in 1800. In 1958, the National Defense Education Act funded language study for graduate students coming from a variety of disciplines. World War II spurred many academics in the United States to learn about other civilizations. The late 1950s, in the midst of the Cold War, the US government also realized the need for study of neglected parts of the world. The immediate effect was seen in name changes, such as the shift at Harvard University from the Department of Indic Philology to the Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies in 1951. There was also a shift to teaching languages other than Sanskrit, as well as other disciplines.
