The American Oriental Society was chartered under the laws of Massachusetts on September 7, 1842. It is one of the oldest learned societies in America, and is the oldest devoted to a particular field of scholarship.
It is closely associated with Yale University, which is the site of its library. The society publishes a journal quarterly, The Journal of the American Oriental Society, the most important American serial publication in the historical languages of Asia. Former presidents include Theodore Dwight Woolsey, James Hadley, W. D. Whitney, Daniel C. Gilman, William H. Ward, Crawford H. Toy, and M. Jastrow, Jr..
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“... though it is by no means requisite that the American women should emulate the men in the pursuit of the whale, the felling of the forest, or the shooting of wild turkeys, they might, with advantage, be taught in early youth to excel in the race, to hit a mark, to swim, and in short to use every exercise which could impart vigor to their frames and independence to their minds.”
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