Japanese

This advanced Japanese course is designed to improve reading skills. A theme concerning Japanese culture and society is chosen for each course and students are split into groups to engage in activities, discussion, and group work concerning the selected topic. The goal of the class is for students to widen their perspectives and deepen their knowledge regarding various issues related to Japan and Japanese society. The program offers various theme courses and students may take multiple sections. 

This course teaches various algorithms and data structures. As the basis of computer science, it is one of the problems in the Fundamental Information Technology Engineer Examination and is a topic that frequently appears in recruitment (coding interviews) for software engineers.  

Students will be able to master computational concepts such as computational complexity and be able to implement algorithms. In addition, students will be able to design algorithms.

This course builds upon the basis of Japanese 1 and aims to develop basic linguistic and socio-cultural skills and expand the repertoire of the daily topics and situations with simple structures. While more emphasis is placed on the development of oral communication skills, students also learn how to read short passages and write short compositions. Approximately 100 new kanji characters are introduced.

This course provides students with the opportunity to examine the cultural aspects of human movement, as well as how to express human emotion through movement. The class includes activities such as rhythm and dance, social dance, Nihon-minzoku buyo (“Japanese folk dance''), and creative Wadaiko (`Japanese style drumming'').

The so-called creative Japanese drum style was born after the war and spread throughout Japan during a period of rapid economic growth. On the other hand, Japanese drums have lived on in traditional rituals and performing arts that have existed since ancient times. This course teaches the "Hachijo Taiko," exploring its connection to modern times.

This course deals with the new trend of Japanese modern literature after the Great Kanto Earthquake (September 1920), which had a major impact on Japanese modern culture.  The devastating blow to the Tokyo metropolitan area and its subsequent rapid recovery was influential on Japanese literature and arts. 

Modernization occurred after the Meiji era (1868-1912) and achieved a certain degree of success during the Taisho era (1912-1926); however, after the earthquake these achievements were destroyed, and new experimentation developed. It is a common practice in literary history to distinguish the period of “modern times” based on the year of the earthquake. 

As a neighbor, China is geographically close but politically distant. At a glance, Chinese society seems similar to Japanese society; however, China has a large territory and various ethnic groups and thus cannot be understood easily as a “nation of the same race and same script.”

This course offers lectures on the Historical Change of Chinese society in the 17-19th centuries, in South China (Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi provinces and Taiwan). It focuses on migration, ethnic minorities, unification of society, and secret sects.  The course explores the following three problems: the migration that kept the population explosion in China; the relationships and conflicts between ethnic minorities and Han Chinese as the result of exploitation in the frontier area, and the unification of society that resulted as a process of migrant settlement.

This is a Japanese language course for non-JLP students. It is designed for students who have completed elementary-level courses and aims to facilitate a mastery of the oral communication and listening skills that are necessary in daily conversation. Students learn expressions used in various daily situations and practice speaking and listening skills to communicate smoothly in Japanese. 

This is a Japanese language course for non-JLP students focused on advanced grammar corresponding to Level N1 of the Japanese Language Proficiency Test. It is offered in the Spring and Fall Semesters with different course content. The course aims to understand the basic meaning and usage of N1 level sentence patterns and grammar to create example sentences. 

This is a Japanese language course for non-JLP students. It is designed for students who have some experience learning Japanese, focusing on grammar and comprehensive practice of the four skills.  Instruction of grammar acquisition and sentence patterns is based on the textbook Elementary Japanese for Academic Purposes Vol.1 (Lesson 7 to 12).

This course provides an overview of the basic themes essential to properly interpret Japanese classical literature. Understanding Japanese classical literature requires multiple perspectives, including various aspects of society, politics, religion, environment, education, architecture, lifestyle, fine arts, and performing arts. The course instructs on literary works (both poetry and prose) dating from the Nara period to the Kamakura period, but the focus is on the Heian period. This course expects to enable students to rediscover the pleasure of reading classical literary works.