The American Institute for Sri Lankan Studies (AISLS) was established in 1996. Its central objectives are to promote US research and teaching on Sri Lanka and to build links between US and Sri Lankan scholars and institutions. It has 24 institutional members and over 110 individual members. AISLS awards fellowships for two to nine months research in Sri Lanka for US scholars who hold a doctoral degree. It also offers smaller grants for pre-dissertation study, for language instruction in Tamil and Sinhala, and for graduate student participation at selected conferences.