Japan

Japan: Course Information - Contemporary Japanese Culture Program

Core Course: Contemporary Japan from Ramuné to Animé

Syllabus

How did the sociable pop and fizz of the ’50s popular summer street drink Ramuné give way to the introspective, sometimes violent, and always vibrant arts of animé and manga? In the decades since 1945, fundamental changes have been taking place in Japan: immigration, the falling birth-rate, a globalizing youth culture, multiculturalism, and differing opinions about the place of Japan in world affairs and the Asian region. These changes, and the geopolitical, socioeconomic, artistic, and media traditions to which they connect, are richly represented in animé and manga. These two genres provide windows on Japanese society but are often only partially appreciated by their increasingly international audiences.

The core course includes a program-long experiential dimension as groups of ICU and UC students form bilingual teams and fan out across Tokyo to explore neighborhoods and landmarks that have played significant roles in making of today’s Japanese cultural scene. The more traditional texts that provide background and coherence include academic articles, literary pieces, and personal essays by key political and cultural figures, recorded radio and television broadcasts, as well as important films, animé, and manga. In the process of studying these texts, the core course raises questions about the transnational dimensions of Japanese culture as it meets other Asian and Western cultural phenomena to produce a dynamic and ever-changing kaleidoscope of 21st century color, commentary, and commotion.

Introduction to Language and Culture in Japan

Syllabus

Lectures and class discussions in English on linguistic and cultural aspects of the Japanese language are intended to enable students who are new to Japan to quickly and effectively engage with speakers of Japanese on the ICU campus and beyond. While aimed primarily at students with little or no prior experience with Japanese, the course may also be of interest to those more advanced speakers of Japanese (including native speakers) who are interested in teaching Japanese as a foreign language. Where possible, students with less knowledge of Japanese will be paired with more fluent speakers of Japanese to allow maximum sharing of knowledge about language and culture in Japan. The course will provide linguistic and cultural information addressing the needs of students who are new to Japan as they encounter the Japanese language in its living, evolving complexities. The course is designed specifically for UC students by ICU and UC faculty members. This course is required of students with no prior Japanese language background.

Elective Courses

This is a sample of proposed elective courses for the ICU-UC Contemporary Japanese Culture Program as of August 2006. These sample courses on aspects of Japanese history, literature, culture, and society give an indication of the kinds of courses that will be offered. The final selection of courses and their descriptions will be posted to this website when they become available and will be distributed to students upon their arrival at ICU.

Japan Studies: Society, Religion, Education, and Communications

This course gives an overview of Japanese society while exploring various issues, such as social stratification, gender, ethnicity, education, and culture. The course analyzes these issues with historical and sociological perspective. After reviewing historical backgrounds of these issues, the class discusses what would be the major causes of these phenomena and what would be the problems in contemporary Japan and also speculate what direction the society will go in the future. Students are expected to bring their own interests and materials in class discussions and presentations.

Introduction to Japanese Society

This course analyzes various aspects of Japanese society mainly from a sociological perspective. It provides students with a basic understanding of traditional and contemporary social issues in Japan, for example, gender and society, family, immigration, and aging. The class reviews relevant literature and discusses it in great detail while integrating some emerging trends. Through literature reviews, research, and discussions, this course helps students critically examine Japanese society.

Media and Cultural Studies

This class undertakes a critical examination of the power of media culture, which forms our everyday consciousness and which exerts influence over individual and collective social apparatuses; in particular, the class focuses on instances when this power becomes a form of violence. It reviews recent scholarship in such fields as sociology, media theory, and cultural studies. Students carry out collaborative research projects in groups and present their findings to the class. Through group discussions, as well as discussions involving the entire class, students also acquire techniques for critical reflection on their own approaches to research and to their own modes of written expression. Keywords in the course include state authority, nationalism, gender, historical memory, spatiality, embodiment, and surveillance.

Religion and Philosophy in Japan

This course is a survey of Japan's major religious and philosophical traditions. It focuses on selected influential movements, texts, ideas, and people to give students a sense of the overall trajectory and unique characteristics of Japanese religion. Some familiarity with Japanese history is helpful, but is not required.

History of Eastern Art

This course covers the arts of China, Korea and Japan from the Neolithic period to the present. It roughly follows a chronological order. There are two major goals for the course: one is to introduce the so-called "major monuments" or key works of Eastern art and archaeology; the other is to understand objects as “texts” that reveal the values of the peoples that made and used them. The focus is on four themes: Ceramic and Bronze-age art and cosmology, Buddhist art and iconography, Chinese poetry and painting, and representation of women in popular culture.

History of Contemporary Japan

Theme varies each year; theme for 2005 was War in Contemporary Japan

According to Benedetto Croce, all history is contemporary history. This year, 2005, marks the 60th anniversary of the end of the Pacific War. This course shows how events of the past are very much alive in the present. The war is constantly in the news. We explore the ways in which the events and experiences of wartime Japan have been remembered and used and re-used over the past 60 years in shaping domestic politics, international relations, and national identity.

Advanced Seminar in Japanese History

In 2005, the course focused on western Japan during the Muromachi period, or from the 1330s to the late sixteenth century. It was especially concerned with Kyushu, western Honshu, and nearby islands, and examinee that area through connections with the central government in Kyoto and connections with foreign countries south, west, and north. Topics included the structure of the Muromachi bakufu, elite politics in Kyushu, pirates, foreign relations with Korea and with Ryukyu, the western presence from the mid-sixteenth century, views from abroad, and others.

Students gave an in-class presentation of their research and later submit a 12-page, double-spaced paper with footnotes. The research papers expanded upon the presentation. Research may, of course, include Japanese-language scholarly articles and books. Visual images produced during between the 1330s and the late sixteenth century may also be used for research.

Economic Development of Modern Japan

This course aims to give a long-term perspective of the economic development of Japan from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 to present. The analytical framework adopted for this course is Macroeconomics with quantitative analyses based on National Income Accounts. The conceptual framework of Modern Economic Growth (MEG) by Kuznets is introduced and applied to the Japanese economy. The role of agriculture in early industrialization of Japan is the next topic. The development of manufacturing industry is the engine of the economic development. Shift of the importance in terms of output and labor force within manufacturing industry is taken as the third topic both in prewar and postwar periods. The relation between foreign trade and industrialization is the fourth topic, introducing the Wild-Geese Flying Pattern Hypothesis Demographic factors determine the supply of labor in terms of number of labor force on one hand and industrial development with lagged development in the tertiary sector increases the demand of labor. These two factors determine the basic character of labor market. The concept of unlimited supply of labor and the role of primary education can give clearer insights in analyzing the labor market both in prewar and postwar Japan. The last topic of this course is the government sector and the financial sector. The structural changes in government revenues and expenditures are examined in order to realize the government fiscal policies. The development of modern financial institutions centered by the Bank of Japan and their performance are discussed in depth. At the last lecture we would like to take up some current economic issues of Japan such as ecological assets and audiovisual intangible assets.

Knowledge of macroeconomics and quantitative analysis is expected but not required. Regular attendance with preparatory reading and active participation of class discussion is expected for this course.

Modern Japanese Literature in English Translation

This course is designed for students who have not yet become familiar with Japanese literature. We are going to read as many short stories as possible and try to catch a glimpse of their literary richness. Also we consider them in the context of modern Japanese society.