Seminars 2009
All events are held in the Auditorium of the Japanese Studies Centre, Building 54, Monash University Clayton campus, unless otherwise noted.
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The ‘Englishification’ of Japan: Successes and Challenges Using English as the Medium of Instruction
Friday 20 February 2009, 2:30-5:30 pm
Programme:
2:30
Introduction: Internationalisation and English Education in Japan
Dr Chris Burgess, Tsuda College, Tokyo (J.S.C visiting researcher)
3:00
Ritsumeikan University's Inter-faculty Institute for International Studies
English-medium Social Science Instruction in a Foreign Language Environment
Assoc. Prof. Mark Selzer, Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto
3:30
Methodology and Practice in the Inter-faculty Institute for International Studies
Assoc. Prof. Ian Gibson, Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto
4:00TEA BREAK
4:15
Developing Multiple Discourses in Content-medium Language InstructionAssoc. Prof. Albie Sharpe, Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto
4:45
The Globalization of Legal Education in Japan: Obstacles and ProspectAssoc. Prof. Jay Klaphake, Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto
5:15
Q&A, Discussion
One notable feature of government efforts to internationalize Japanese higher education has been the spread of courses using English as the medium of instruction. With the recently announced goal to attract 300,000 international students, more than double the current number, the need for English medium programs can only grow. This panel begins with an overview of internationalization and English teaching in Japan, before focusing on the case of Ritsumeikan University, one of the oldest private universities in Japan.
Following wide-ranging curriculum revisions in the 1990s, Ritsumeikan is today recognised as one of the more internationalized mainstream universities in Japan. Of particular interest is the Inter-Faculty Institute for International Studies, which was established in April 2000, and offers English medium content courses in areas such as law, business, politics, and international citizenship. Drawing on their own teaching methods and activities, the four Ritsumeikan panellists will provide a practical, hands-on classroom-based perspective on the challenges and possibilities of teaching different content-based courses in English to students with mixed English-language abilities. Examples will include the use of active learning, negotiation, role-play, mediation exercises, materials selection, technological support and scaffolding techniques to maintain student motivation and promote student investment and participation in the learning process.
Speaker Profiles
Chris Burgess completed his Ph.D., on the subject of ‘international marriage’ in Japan, at Monash in March 2004. Since April 2004, he has been teaching Japanese and Australian studies at Tsuda, returning to Monash for a year’s sabbatical in April 2008. His research focuses on migration, multiculturalism, and identity in contemporary Japan.
Mark Selzer is originally from Southern California. He has been teaching at the university level in Japan for twelve years and at Ritsumeikan for seven. Currently he mainly teaches courses in international politics and economics.
Ian Gibson is from the U.K. He has been teaching at Ritsumeikan University for eight years. He currently teaches courses in globalization and citizenship. His focus is on utilizing peace education methodology in the classroom.
Albie Sharpe is from Sydney and has been teaching at Ritsumeikan University since 2001. He teaches public health, social welfare and peace studies in English to Japanese and international students.
Jay Klaphake, J.D. is also an adjunct professor at Ryukoku University and Kwansei Gakuin University law schools. In his home state of Minnesota, he was an aide to a U.S. Congressman, and the executive director of a public interest advocacy group. He teaches U.S. politics and law, international law, and international negotiation.
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Labour Relations and Personnel Management Practices in Japan and the USA; a historical comparison
Date : Friday, 28th August 2009 Time : 2:00-5:00
Venue: Japanese Studies Centre, Bldg.54, Monash University, Clayton
Programme
1.
Time: 2:00-
Title: Human Resource Development and Occupation/Status linked Personnel Management Practices and Engineers in Japanese Corporations before the Second World
Presenter: Professor Hiroshi ICHIHARA, Surugadai University (J.S.C visiting researcher)
2.
Time: 3:00-
Title: Responsibility and Membership:
“SENIORITY” Versus “SEISYAIN-STATUS” in a Comparative Historical Perspective
Presenters: Professor Jong-Won WOO, Saitama University
Professor Teiichi SEKIGUCHI, Chuo University
3.
Time: 4:00-
Title: The Third Path to Industrial Democracy?:
The Experience of Employee Representation Plans in the US
Presenter: Professor Teiichi SEKIGUCHI, Chuo University
Download abstracts and profiles (PDF)
Enquiries: Hiroshi Ichihara spac8tw9@dune.ocn.ne.jp
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Friday September 11, 2:00 pm
Elise Foxworth (Monash University):
Embodied subjectivity in the literature of Kim Ha Gyong, a Korean writer in Japan
In 1966 Japan based Korean writer, Kim Ha Gyong, wrote his first Japanese novel, Kogoeru Kuchi [Frozen Mouth], a semi-autobiographical story of an isolated and angst-ridden second-generation Korean in Japan, who suffers from a stutter. In his prize winning novel Kim offers an unprecedented view of race relations for his time, which problematizes mainstream views on ethnicity and instead privileges a notion of subjectivity detached from ethnicity and politics. In this
paper I consider that Kim, via his hero, is more interested in the non-stuttering interior self that lies beneath his over-determined, disciplined and marginalized self. His hero, Sai, for example, searches for his true identity, a core self that precedes or supersedes culture-laden layers of identity, such as ethnicity or stuttering. These days contemporary thinkers argue that the idea of a core unified self is an illusory construct but Kim, doubly marginalised, seemed to need to believe in a unified – albeit buried – interior self, for perhaps it could one day prevail and enable him to finally overcome the constraints of his own personal history and the ideological belief systems of his day that he felt suffocated and silenced him.
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Tuesday October 6, 1:00 pm
Carolyn Stevens (University of Melbourne):
Caregiving and disability in Japan
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Friday October 16, 2:00 pm
Jim Breen (Monash University):
How can we identify and define Japanese neologisms which are not yet in dictionaries?
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Friday October 23, 2:00 pm
Tetsuo Mizukami (Rikkyo University):
Global Migration and Changes in Inner-Tokyo: the Ikebukuro District
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Friday October 30, 2:00 pm
Nobuaki Fujioka (Hitotsubashi University):
Motivation and Life Histories of Japanese Working Holiday Makers in Australia.
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