Hitotsubashi University

This seminar examines short stories by contemporary Japanese women writers in English translation. The objective is to learn how to interpret literary images and rhetorical expressions, evaluate and appreciate the texts' aesthetic, cultural, and social values. By reading these stories we will also learn to look at the problems Japanese society and culture from women's/feminist perspective. Assessment: attendance, class participation, presentations, essay.

This course is, as the name suggests, an omnibus lecture aimed at introduction to Humanity subjects focusing on humanities and war in the 18th century and after. While following the history of the wars and society since the 18 century, student will have a chance to think a little seriously about how the wars and similar conflicts between nations gave impacts to the whole society and culture. Assessment: final exam, attendance.

This course is about how the mass media presents world affairs and how they not only expedite but also limit and distort this presentation. It also examines the different forms these media take and the different functions they perform in accounting for current events. It looks, for example , at the 4th, 5th, and 6th estates; the state, corporate, and social media; and the phenomenon of the World Wide Web. A range of contemporary world affairs issues exemplify how the different media work.

This course explores the relations between development and anthropology though various perspectives. Readings present the positions of applied anthropology (trying to make use of anthropological knowledge in the field of development) and the anthropology of development (investigating development as an anthropological subject). Moreover, through the lens of development, the course examines the ethics and politics embedded in the subject of anthropology itself.

The course provides an introduction to the financial markets and financial institutions. On the financial markets side, topics include the roles of regulation and deregulation in the financial markets and the causes of financial crises. On the institutions side, topics include commercial banks and how financial institutions utilize financial instruments from financial markets to manage their risks. The course employs tools and concepts as well as classroom lectures and discussions, and live case studies to offer a hands-on learning experience.

This course provides an increased understanding of the important relationship of language to constructs of reality. A variety of topics are explored, all sharing one common theme, i.e. language as a kind of virtual reality. The provides an increased appreciation of how different languages and narratives serve as different prisms for interrogating social (and even physical) reality, having considered a wide array of examples in class and in their own reflection. The main themes of this course are the reshaping of social space-time as a result of innovations in human interaction and linguistic production, as well as the relationship between language, mind and reality. Historical, contemporary and possible future developments in communication are explored from a linguistic, physical and philosophical perspective.

The course explores strategic management and business analysis. Strategic planning can be affected by various changes in the external environment in which a business operates for example with the invention of the Internet and introduction of E-Commerce. Constant changes in the environment means continually evolving strategies, new products, and new processes to adopt. The movement from the traditional bricks-and-mortar towards an online presence is an important evolutionary process for companies today. The internet presents new sources of innovative opportunities and demands management to rethink traditional strategy formulation with new approaches.

Higher-level writing skills are taught, using pre-advanced-level grammar and vocabulary. Students learn to express their thoughts in writing and to develop writing style that demonstrates clear logic and rationality.