Japan

This course goes beyond the classroom to explore Tokyo, both past and present. Engaging in a variety of field experiences that deepen understanding of smaller communities and neighborhoods within the city, the course explores local customs and traditions, food culture, social institutions of daily life, environment and architecture, and more! The course aims to promote language and culture skills through field observations and task-based encounters with Japanese people. Important note: This course features several out-of-class field experiences during the semester.

This course focuses on the modern socioeconomic history of agriculture in China and the relationships between rural and urban; farm and industry; traditional and modern, and communism and capitalism.

The course aims to:

1. Understand the political economy of a non-industrial and non-western social system.
2. Learn how to distinguish between historical facts and present values.
3. Learn how to make meaningful comparisons between different societies and economies.

This course covers topics that are ethically questioned in business and consumption. It consists of lectures and exercises where all participants are expected to engage in discussion.

Students discuss ethical issues in business and consumption. The course aims to:
-Understand principles and rules that determine ‘right’ and ‘wrong;'
-Understand the decision-making process and influencing factors in the context of business and consumption practices; and  
-Consider implications to oneself as a practitioner and an individual consumer. 

Topics covered in the course include:
• Introduction to ethics in business and consumption – What is ethics in marketplace? What is the ‘responsibility’ of marketers and consumers, and to whom?  
• Ethical theories and principles – What makes it ‘right’?
• Ethical decision-making – How do we make decisions?
• Ethical and sustainability issues in business and consumption
• Notions of 'social responsibility' and ‘sustainability’

This course aims to highlight the importance of communication with stakeholders and an understanding of public relations methods. The course utilizes various media to acquire basic knowledge of effective public relations.

Communication is the key to any organization’s success. With the diversification of societal needs and business environment, it is crucial for companies to implement an effective public relations strategy as part of their management strategy and to build a trust-based relationship with stakeholders. For effective public relations/corporate communications, companies need to understand mass media and social media, with the latter receiving considerable attention from the business world as a direct and fast-acting communication channel with their high-priority stakeholders.

 

This is an introductory course tracing the genealogy of Western masters who established sociology over the past 100 years or so, from Durkheim, Weber to Baudrillard, Goffman, and Bourdieu. It oversees their research, theory and thoughts, providing students to gain a three-dimensional understanding of the constant interrelationships between society and sociology throughout history.

<Level V>
Target Students: Those who have partially completed intermediate level studies.
Course Goals: To develop understanding and command of the 200 important intermediate sentence patterns for further improvement of the four skills of reading, listening, speaking, and writing. To master the 6,000 basic words and 1,000 to 1,200 basic Chinese characters.

<General 1-5>
Goal: To develop balanced, intermediate-level proficiency in reading, listening, speaking, and writing.
Contents: Learning the 100 important intermediate sentence patterns and vocabulary and improving reading comprehension with an upper intermediate level textbook. Developing command of intermediate Japanese through short sentence composition exercises. Mastering the points learnt at the intermediate level to proceed to the advanced level smoothly. Increasing vocabulary by learning both the words introduced in the textbook as well as additional related words.
Improving the four skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing by understanding the textbook and exchanging opinions on it.

The purpose of this course is to provide students with a basic understanding of the transformation of the Japanese economy in the late early-modern and modern times, while at the same time acquiring a multifaceted view of historical facts. The course introduces the characteristics of the transformation process of the Japanese economy in the late early modern period and the modern period (19th century to 20th century). In addition to macroscopic perspectives such as industry, distribution, and trade structures, the course also focuses on microscopic perspectives such as the way people worked and lived at the time and the transformation of society.

The purpose of this course is to introduce students to a basic knowledge of the nature and workings of modern capitalist economies (welfare states), particularly in the West European and Anglo-Saxon countries.  The course focuses on government policy and its effects on countries’ economic performance, as measured by economic efficiency and growth; employment (or unemployment); income inequality, and poverty. The course seeks to answer the questions: What kind of policies do governments employ to promote economic performance? Are government policies effective in achieving positive economic outcomes? Is it possible to achieve economic growth and income equality simultaneously? If the answer is yes, what policy mix is instrumental? If the answer is no, why?

This course analyzes a selection of works by Western writers and film directors from 1990s to the present, with the exception of Ishiguro’s short story) which are set in East Asia and/or contain characters from East Asia. It explores the answers to the following central questions: Is the portrayal of East Asian people and cultures in each of these works fairly accurate, or is it conforming to biased existing discourses? Are there correct and incorrect ways to present East Asia in literary and cinematic works?

The course aims to apply logical reasoning to our examinations of racial and cultural issues and to learn to think for ourselves, instead of allowing existing discourses to think for us.

This course teaches students to write their own personal history on a theme of their choice. Students evaluate and provide feedback to each other, encouraging further self-reflection and understanding of each other's values and ways of thinking. Upon completion of the course, students are expected not only to improve their writing and communication skills, but also to acquire the skills to work collaboratively with others; find problems, and solve problems.