01-02 LS&A Bulletin

Courses in Japanese (Division 401)

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JAPANESE 120 / ASIAN 120. Understanding Japan: A Multidisciplinary Introduction.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); (4). (Excl).; This team-taught course aims to introduce students to key terms and concepts used in the study of Japan, but to do so critically by reflecting on the history and the utilility of these concepts. It also exposes students to the various disciplines represented in Japanese studies at Michigan, exploring some of the approaches and methodologies used in the humanities and the social sciences.
JAPANESE 150 / ASIAN 152 / HISTORY 142. Introduction to Japanese Civilization.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); A knowledge of Japanese is not required. (4). (HU).; Designed primarily for freshmen and sophomores, the course focuses on a few recurrent concerns in the Japanese tradition from the earliest times to the present. Topics to be considered include man and nature, language and culture, the individual and the state, men and women, and death and transcendence. Readings in mythology and representative works of the literature and religious texts, lectures, discussions, and short papers.
JAPANESE 222 / GTBOOKS 222 / ASIAN 222. Great Books of Japan.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); A knowledge of Japanese is not required. II (in odd years). (3). (HU).; Introduction in translation to books which have influenced the Japanese people through the ages.
JAPANESE 225. Calligraphy.: (Language Courses); AsianLan 125 (or Japanese 101). (1). (Excl). Laboratory fee ($10) required. May be repeated for a total of three credits.; Students learn the art of Japanese Calligraphy at beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels.
JAPANESE 245 / ASIAN 245 / FILMVID 245. Anime.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); (4). (Excl). Laboratory fee ($35) required.; In this course, we examine the history of Japanese animation and its relationship to the social, political, and economic transformations of the nation. Anime's roots are in 1930s children's films promoting the colonization of Asia, followed by propaganda films from World War II.
JAPANESE 250 / ASIAN 252. Undergraduate Seminar in Japanese Culture.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); No knowledge of Japanese language is required. (3). (HU). May be repeated with department permission.; This undergraduate seminar offers lower division LS&A students a small group learning experience. Students explore a subject of particular interest in collaboration with a faculty member in the area of Japanese Culture.
JAPANESE 300(400) / ASIAN 300. Love and Death in Japanese Culture.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); A knowledge of Japanese is not required. (4). (HU).; This course covers issues of Love and Death in Japan, and how it is portrayed in Japanese Literature. In this course, students read a variety of premodern literature, including portions of the Tale of Genji and the Tale of Heike. All literature is read in a cultural context.
JAPANESE 301(401) / ASIAN 301 / WOMENSTD 301. Writing Japanese Women.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); (4). (HU).; This is a course on writing by and about women – women's self-representation and men's representations of women – in Japanese culture. Along with primary sources in literature and the visual arts, secondary sources include theoretical readings in the psychology of sex, love, and death by Freud, Kristeva, Lacan, and Bataille; in the field of cultural production by Bourdieu; in feminist theories of reading in the Anglo-American academy.
JAPANESE 302(402) / ASIAN 302. Rewriting Identities in Modern Japan.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); (4). (HU).; This introductory course to modern Japanese fiction examines how novels and short stories written after 1868 engage the issue of national, cultural, and social identities. The inquiry in the course simultaneously moves in two directions. We examine how fiction written in an age of national print-capitalism participates in the work of building a common understanding of a nation and its people, but we shall also see how the same fiction can spotlight divisions of gender, sexual orientation, class, generation and region.
JAPANESE 310 / ASIAN 310 / CHIN 310. The Theater of China and Japan.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); (4). (HU).; Not a survey but an integrated look at these two traditions. Selected elements of performance and consumption (including reading plays as literature) are investigated through representative plays from both traditions. A wide variety of primary and secondary materials are used.
JAPANESE 375 / ASIAN 375. Japanese Popular Music.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); (3). (HU).; This course deals with both historical and contemporary forms of popular music in Japan. Amateur and professional music-making, as well as vernacular discourse about music (in translation) are treated as resources for thinking about the culture and experience of the populace, and ways in which they have been distinct from the 'high' culture of Japan's elites.
JAPANESE 391. Honors Course in Japanese.: (Language Courses); Permission of the department. (2). (Excl). (INDEPENDENT).; Directed readings aimed at the writing of analytical papers and/or the honors thesis.
JAPANESE 392. Honors Course in Japanese.: (Language Courses); Permission of the department. (2). (Excl). (INDEPENDENT).; Directed readings aimed at the writing of analytical papers and/or the honors thesis.
JAPANESE 393. Honors Course in Japanese.: (Language Courses); Permission of the department. (2). (Excl). (INDEPENDENT).; Directed readings aimed at the writing of analytical papers and/or the honors thesis.
JAPANESE 394. Honors Course in Japanese.: (Language Courses); Permission of the department. (2). (Excl). (INDEPENDENT).; Directed readings aimed at the writing of analytical papers and/or the honors thesis.
JAPANESE 399. Directed Reading.: (Language Courses); Permission of the department. (1-3). (Excl). (INDEPENDENT). May be repeated for credit with permission of instructor.; Individual work and directed reading for undergraduate concentrators. Must be arranged with an instructor.
JAPANESE 412 / ASIAN 412. Topics in Japanese Culture.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); (1-4). (Excl). May be elected 3 times for credit.; Variable topics, depending on the interest of our current and visiting faculty.
JAPANESE 450. Undergraduate Seminar in Japanese Literature.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); Japanese 401 or 402. Knowledge of Japanese is not required. (3). (Excl). May be repeated for a total of six credits with permission of the instructor.; This course enables students to read and discuss Japanese literature in a seminar setting. Readings (in translation) vary from year to year, but the focus is primarily on fiction.
JAPANESE 475. Japanese Cinema.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); A knowledge of Japanese is not required. (3). (Excl). Laboratory fee ($50) required.; An examination through selected films of the aesthetic, cultural, and thematic elements that have contributed to the significant and unique form of artistic expression that is Japanese cinema.
JAPANESE 490. Introduction to Japanese Linguistics.: (Language Courses); AsianLan 226 (or Japanese 202). (3). (Excl).; An introduction to the analysis and description of the sounds and grammatical structures of Japanese and to the study of Japanese dialects and the history of the language. Special emphasis is given to the application of the content of this course to the teaching of Japanese as a second language. Opportunities for some practice teaching may be arranged.
JAPANESE 493. Theory and Practice of Second Language Teaching.: (Language Courses); AsianLan 326 (or Japanese 406). (3). (Excl).; Overview of theories and issues in teaching Japanese. Includes the history and theory of teaching methods, although the focus is mainly placed on the most current teaching approaches and their theoretical implications.
JAPANESE 552. Medieval Japanese Prose.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses in Japanese); AsianLan 434 (or Japanese 542). (3). (Excl). May be repeated for credit with permission of instructor.; Readings in selected texts (normally Heike monogatari.
JAPANESE 554. Modern Japanese Literature.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses in Japanese); AsianLan 326 and 428 (or Japanese 406 and 408). (3). (Excl). May be repeated for credit with permission of instructor.; Readings in selected Japanese texts.
JAPANESE 556. Japanese Drama and Narrative Performance.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses); Permission of instructor. (3). (Excl). May be repeated three times for a total of nine credits. May not be elected more than once in the same term.; This topics course focuses on the traditions of Japanese drama in historical and cultural context.
JAPANESE 557. Seminar in Japanese Image Culture.: (Culture Courses/Literature Courses in Japanese); Japanese 406. (3). (Excl). Laboratory fee ($50) required.; This is a topics course for Japanese graduate students, CJS MA students, or advanced undergraduates. Course topics vary depending on the faculty teaching the course.

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