Thomas Paine Podcast

Thomas Paine was a political writer who had a great impact on the American Revolution. His work played a significant role in the American independence. The Common Sense and Crisis Papers were highly influential and if not for Thomas Paine it is possible that the American troops would have given up their fight against the British

The Reinterpretation and Transformation of the American Liberal Arts Model in the Indian Context

The rise of liberal arts institutions in India has been a recent development that has taken shape over the past two decades. In this senior thesis, I discuss the ways in which the liberal arts model implemented at FLAME University, India, resonates with and diverges from the prototypical liberal arts model in the United States. I also elicit the determinants that influence the institutional structure and practices of FLAME and study these institutional manifestations in relation to larger social phenomenon. I prepare the groundwork for my project by first reviewing the values and organizational structures of the liberal arts model in the U.S., and conceptualizing the forces that may lead to its transformation in the Indian higher education context. My case study of FLAME is based on interviews and participant observation on campus, along with analysis of collected documents such as program brochures and handbooks. My findings show that FLAME exhibits a hybrid model: it mirrors the American liberal arts education in aspects such as pedagogical methods, classroom environment, and social class positioning of the student body, yet differs in aspects such as program duration, courses offered, and approaches to gender and ethnic diversity. I reflect on the cultural, political and bureaucratic forces that shape this hybrid model and suggest additional lines of study in the field of organizational sociology and educatio