Obituaries

George McTurnan Kahin, a specialist on Southeast Asia and the Aaron L. Binenkorb Professor of International Studies Emeritus at Cornell, died Jan. 29 at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, N.Y. He was 82.

Kahin was a seminal force in the creation of Southeast Asian studies in the United States, in general, and at Cornell, in particular. Cornell's George McT. Kahin Center for Advanced Research on Southeast Asia was named after him and dedicated in his honor in 1992.

"He is a giant in the field of Southeast Asian studies, and his commitment to the field is legendary," said Thak Chaloem-tiarana, Cornell's Southeast Asia Program director. "George attracted the very best students from all over the world, and they in turn became scholars in Southeast Asian studies and started programs worldwide."

Born in Baltimore in 1918, he earned a B.S. in history from Harvard University in 1940, an M.A. from Stanford University in 1946 and a Ph.D. in political science from Johns Hopkins University in 1951.

Kahin came to Cornell in 1951 as an assistant professor of government and executive director of the newly formed Southeast Asia Program. He threw his energies into developing the program throughout the 1950s and served as its director from 1961 to 1970. He also founded the Cornell Modern Indonesia Project in 1954 and directed it until his retirement in 1988. He became associate professor of government in 1954 and full professor in 1959 and was appointed the Aaron L. Binenkorb Professor in International Studies in 1968.

He was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and an honorary fellow of the School of Oriental and African Studies at London University.

Kahin's interest in Southeast Asia developed during World War II, when he was trained as one of a group of 60 GIs who were to be parachuted into Japanese-occupied Indonesia in advance of Allied forces. The plan did not materialize because it was decided at the Potsdam Conference that U.S. forces would bypass the Indies, so he and his fellow soldiers were sent to the European theater.

After the war, he pursued his academic interest in Southeast Asia and carried out graduate research in Indonesia in 1948-49 during the country's independence revolution against the Dutch. When he returned to the United States, he completed his doctoral dissertation, Nationalism and Revolution in Indonesia, published in 1951 by Cornell University Press and now considered a classic.

In 1991, Kahin received the Bintan Jasa Pratama (Medal of Merit, First Class) from then-Indonesian Foreign Minister Ali Alatas for his work as a "pioneer and precursor of Indonesian studies in the U.S."

Kahin was strongly opposed to U.S. policy during the Vietnam War and lectured in numerous forums throughout the country. In April 1965, he was the major speaker against the war at the first National Teach-in held in Washington, D.C. Kahin published a number of articles and monographs on the war as well as two books: The United States in Vietnam (Dial Press, 1967, second edition 1969), which he wrote with John W. Lewis, and Intervention: How America Became Involved in Vietnam (Knopf, 1986).

He was a pioneer in making the academic study of Southeast Asia an acknowledged part of the university curriculum in the United States and edited the first two important scholarly textbooks focusing on the governments of the area: Major Governments of Asia (1958, 1963) (for which he wrote the substantial section on Indonesia) and Governments and Politics of Southeast Asia (1959, 1964), both published by Cornell University Press.

Kahin is survived by his wife, Audrey; a son, Brian; a daughter, Sharon; a daughter-in-law, Julia Royall; two grandchildren; and a sister, Peggy Webb.

A public memorial is being planned for the spring. Arrangements will be announced.

Arthur G. Schultz, professor at Rens-selaer Polytechnic Institute and a former faculty member at Cornell, died Jan. 27 at Samaritan Hospital in Troy, N.Y. He was 57.

Born in Chicago, he earned a bachelor of science degree in chemistry at the Illinois Institute of Technology in 1966 and his Ph.D. in organic chemistry in 1970 from the University of Rochester.

Following a postdoctoral appointment at Columbia University, Schultz held the position of assistant professor of chemistry at Cornell from 1972 to 1978. He joined the faculty at RPI in 1978, and in 1988 he was appointed the William Weightinan Walker Professor of Chemistry.

Schultz served on numerous public-service committees dedicated to the advancement of chemistry and was selected for the prestigious Merit award from the National Institute of Health.

In addition to his mother, Ruth Kveck Schultz, and his wife, Marcia Diaz Schultz, he survived by a son, Daniel A. Schultz; a daughter, Rebecca L. Schultz; and a brother, Corrie Schultz