Introduction to the modern standard Japanese language. Emphasis on developing proficiency in listening, speaking, reading, and writing, using basic expressions and sentence patterns. Four 75-minute classes plus one blended learning session.
Introduction to the modern standard Japanese language. Emphasis on developing proficiency in listening, speaking, reading, and writing, using basic expressions and sentence patterns. Four 75-minute classes plus one blended learning session.
This innovative, intensive Beginning Japanese course is designed for students with some familiarity with Hiragana, who wish to make rapid progress in acquiring elementary-level Japanese language proficiency. Equivalent to JPN101 and JPN102, this course prepares students for JPN201. Through daily practice and reinforcement of all language skills, students gain essential vocabulary, grammar, and communicative expressions with appropriate cultural knowledge while developing a foundation of understanding contemporary Japanese culture and society. In addition to interactive in-class learning activities, students have access to online materials.
Continuation of JPN 101-JPN 102. The first semester will emphasize further development of listening and speaking skills with more complex language structures as well as proficiency in reading and writing. The second semester will emphasize reading and writing skills. Four 75-minute classes plus one blended learning session.
Continuation of JPN 101-JPN 102. The first semester will emphasize further development of listening and speaking skills with more complex language structures as well as proficiency in reading and writing. The second semester will emphasize reading and writing skills. Four 75-minute classes plus one blended learning session.
This course is designed for the students who have completed the second year of Japanese (JPN 201-JPN 202). Each lesson introduces you to practical vocabulary items, grammatical structures, and cultural orientations that give you the ability to discuss such topics in a more advanced and culturally appropriate manner. Throughout the course, the development of more fluent speech and stronger literacy will be emphasized by studying more complex and idiomatic expressions. Acquisition of an additional few hundred kanji characters will be part of the course. The class will be conducted entirely in Japanese. Three classes per week.
A continuation of JPN 231, this course further develops literacy in Japanese. Students focus on intensive reading of various styles of written Japanese, writing on different topics, and development of fluent oral skills. Japanese movies will be used for reinforcement of grammar and for discussion. Class discussion will be conducted entirely in Japanese. Three classes per week.
This course explores Japanese literature from the seventh to the nineteenth centuries––including myths, poetry, narrative romances, diaries, essays, military tales, Noh drama, haiku, puppet plays, kabuki, and ghost stories––then traces its modern afterlife to film, television, and manga. Students will develop a critical and historically grounded appreciation of Japan's rich and varied literary tradition by analyzing it in light of such topics as religious practice, aesthetic ideals, dreams, desire, subjectivity, Chinese influence, the supernatural, war, gender, and sexuality.
In 1776, the Japanese writer Ueda Akinari set down a famous collection of ghost stories entitled Tales of Moonlight and Rain. Beginning with this collection, we will explore how representations of the supernatural were both embedded in and transformed by discourses of modernity. Throughout the twentieth century, writers such as Tanizaki Jun'ichiro, Akutagawa Ryunosuke, Izumi Kyoka, and Enchi Fumiko kept the supernatural strand alive. In tales of the fantastic and the strange, they also made trenchant commentary on the state of their society. We read (and contrast) literary and visual texts to explore alternative visions of Japan's rush to modernize.
A critical exploration of popular culture in Japan from its isolation in the 1600s to its globalization today. Topics include advertising, anime, architecture, art, fashion, film, food, games, literature, magazines, manga, music, performance, sports, television, and travel. Students engage directly with these topics by analyzing cultural phenomena, from geisha to baseball, in light of historical and theoretical perspectives drawn from the disciplines of literary criticism, cultural studies, film studies, and anthropology—all in an effort to understand Japan through patterns of consumption, cultural memory, gender, media, national identity, race, and sexuality. The course demonstrates the complexity and appeal of what is arguably the major alternative to American popular culture. No prior background in Japanese is required; all readings are in English translation.
Japanese manga (comics) practice metamorphosis to address real-world concerns. A girl acquires magical powers to save the earth. Animals, plants and spirits advocate for non-violence. An art form that combines text and image and fashions its own unique grammar, Japan’s manga perform a trenchant critique of society, warning against gendered oppression and environmental disaster, and proposing new ways of being in the world. We move from Nakazawa Kei’s haunting evocations of nuclear war to Miyazaki Hayao’s environmental activism; from the revolutionary works of the female manga artists of the 1970s to the wildly popular genre of boys’ love today. Students will be able to choose the works that we read in the final weeks of class. Assignments include both creative prompts and literary analysis.
Japan enjoyed tremendous political stability under samurai rule for 265 years before opening up to the West in the late 19th century. Far from static, however, this era, known as the Edo period (1603-1868), was one of dynamic economic growth, social change, intellectual ferment, and artistic experimentation, when a vibrant urban culture emerged and spread to cities and villages across the Japanese archipelago. Many of the things we associate with traditional Japanese culture today, including haiku, kabuki, sumo, geisha, sushi, manga, and the samurai ethos, emerged or developed into maturity at this time. This course introduces students to Edo Japan by way of its rich visual and literary cultures, with particular emphasis on the representation of sexuality, gender, violence, honor, and otherworldly phenomena. No knowledge of Japan or Japanese required.
In this course, students will read original works of short fiction and essays in Japanese by well-known contemporary authors. We will explore various genres and popular themes in Japanese literature and look at authors' styles and voice. The course will be completely in Japanese except when translation into English takes center stage. In either case, the major emphasis will be on discussion of the works in class. Through these works, students will also be introduced to advanced Japanese grammar, expressions, patterns, kanji, and vocabulary.
Students read and discuss contemporary fiction by women in Japanese as they improve reading and speaking skills, and learn how to translate fiction from Japanese to English. Weekly translation exercises and periodic translation workshops build confidence as students develop their own translation style. For the final project, students choose a contemporary short story and translate it in collaboration with the instructor. Class conducted in English. Two weekly meetings plus individual meetings with instructor.
Beginning with the end of the Second World War, we will explore literature, film, and manga that foregrounds questions of identity and difference in Japan. Beginning with a manga set in New Guinea in 1944, a memoir of an American soldier who fought in the Pacific War, and a film about a Japanese veteran returning to the site of battle after the war, we map out Japanese views of self and other. Additionally, the course highlights fiction and film from Japan’ minoritized identity groups, including Japanese Koreans, burakumin (outcastes), Okinawans, atomic bomb survivors (Barefoot Gen), and even members of religious cults (Haruki Murakami’s Underground). The course concludes with a unit on gender discrimination, reading works by Japanese women writers who have transformed contemporary Japan. No Japanese required.
The fiction of the Japanese writer Haruki Murakami has often been described as being closer to “American literature” than to the modern Japanese literary canon. His official website even names Raymond Chandler, Kurt Vonnegut and Richard Brautigan as “influences.” In this course, we will test that assumption, holding Murakami’s work up against the mirror of Japanese short fictions from 1900-2022. Moving chronologically, we read broadly, covering half of Murakami’s major novels, as well as a dozen short fictional and non-fictional works. Given that Murakami’s work has been translated into 50 languages, we also explore how translation practices shape reception. From Japanese to Polish to Chinese, we explore the multiple worlds—and world-making practices-- of Haruki Murakami. We also study two films that are based on his work. Taught in English, no knowledge of Japanese is necessary.
