About
Our History
Before the school, 1820 to 2012
For nearly two centuries Indiana University built the pieces separately: a French class, a law curriculum, an army language program, and then one area studies center after another. By 2012 there were more of them here than at almost any university in the country, and no single place to put them.
1820
Indiana University begins
The State Seminary opens in Bloomington. It is renamed Indiana University in 1838.
1836
The first French class
Modern language instruction begins. Six years later, international law is written into the original law curriculum. Everything this school does grows out of those two decisions.
1943
The Army needs Eurasian languages
The US Army Specialized Training Program is set up at Indiana to teach the languages of Eurasia. It is the ancestor of the Department of Central Eurasian Studies, formally established in 1993.
1951
The Summer Language Workshop opens
Intensive summer language teaching begins in Bloomington. It still runs every year.
1958
Indiana’s first National Resource Center
The Russian and East European Institute is established, the university’s first Title VI National Resource Center, now the Byrnes Institute. The Program in Uralic and Altaic Studies had opened two years earlier, and becomes the Inner Asian and Uralic National Resource Center.
1961 to 1977
The area studies centers arrive
East Asian Languages and Literatures and the African Studies Program in 1961. Latin American Area Studies in 1963. Near Eastern Languages and Literatures in 1965. Western European Studies in 1966. East Asian Studies in 1970. Polish Studies in 1977. In under twenty years Indiana assembles one of the deepest collections of regional expertise in the country.
1989 to 2003
From global change to international studies
The Indiana Center on Global Change and World Peace opens in 1989, later the Center for the Study of Global Change. The National African Language Resource Center follows in 1999, CeLCAR in 2002, and in 2003 the Program in International Studies, which becomes the Department of International Studies.
2008 to 2011
Four flagship languages
The Chinese Language Flagship starts in 2008 and Swahili in 2010. The Center for the Study of the Middle East opens in 2011, the same year Indiana is chosen to host the first Turkish Flagship.
2012
The trustees approve a school
The Board of Trustees approves the School of Global and International Studies, to bring the departments, the centers and the language programs under one roof.
January 2013
Hamilton and Lugar come home to teach
Hamilton and Lugar come home to teach Lee Hamilton had spent thirty-four years representing Indiana’s ninth district in the US House, chairing Foreign Affairs and Intelligence, then serving as vice chair of the 9/11 Commission. Richard Lugar had spent thirty-six years in the Senate, twice chairing Foreign Relations, and had written with Sam Nunn the law that took Soviet warheads apart after the Cold War. Both joined the faculty in the same month.
April 2013
Ground is broken
Construction begins on a building designed to put every part of the school in one place.
December 2013
Lee Feinstein is named founding dean
A former US ambassador to Poland, Feinstein takes up the post in July 2014 and leads the school through its first decade.
2014
The first diplomas
The first graduates cross the stage in May, having started their degrees before the school existed. Southeast Asian and ASEAN Studies is established the same year.
2015
The building opens
The Global and International Studies Building opens for the fall semester and is dedicated with Secretary of State John Kerry present. The Institute for Korean Studies is established the same year.
2016
America’s Role in the World begins
The first ARW conference is held, and it has run every year since. The Arabic Language Flagship is established as the Swahili Flagship closes.
2017
The Tobias Center opens
A five million dollar gift from Randall and Deborah Tobias establishes the Tobias Center for International Development.
2018
A record award, and a new name
April brings the 21st Century Japan Politics and Society Initiative. In August the Russian Language Flagship arrives, making Indiana the only university with four language flagships, and the school is awarded $18.8 million in Title VI funding from the Department of Education. On October 3 it is named for Lee Hamilton and Richard Lugar.
April 28, 2019
Richard Lugar dies
He was 87. A monument on campus marks his connection to the university, and his papers are held in the Lugar collection at the Wells Library.
2020
The Turkish Flagship concludes
The program closes on June 30, nine years after Indiana was chosen to host the first one in the country.
2022
A change of deans
Lee Feinstein steps down on January 31 to become president of McLarty Associates, and Nick Cullather is named interim dean the next day. The Global Indigenous Studies Network launches that fall.
2024
A dean, a student government and a new symposium
John Ciorciari begins as dean on March 1. Students hold the first Hamilton Lugar student government elections in October, and the first Global and Area Perspectives Symposium runs in November.
January 2025
The first student government leaders are inducted
The students elected in October take office, ten years after the building opened.
Today
Where things stand
Eight hundred students, a hundred faculty, and more languages than any other university in the country. David Bosco is interim dean while John Ciorciari serves as interim provost of IU Bloomington.