This class takes place from 3.00 to 4.30 on Mondays. I teach it with my colleague, Ryuta Minami. Students are second years.
The course concerns issues which have brought the two countries together and issues where there have been contrasts in attitudes and views.
I am focussing on three topics:
Latest was Media in the form of TV - classes on this topic took place on 25th May and 1st June. On 1st June, students gave good clear presentations, explaining aspects of Japanese TV in English.
The previous first topic was Work - classes on this topic took place on 20th and 27th April.
We looked at employment locations where the two cultures have come into contact, including the City of London and car companies. We looked at contrasts in areas including jobhunting, part time work and trade unions and considered how Japanese
words related to jobs such as 'freeter', 'karoshi' and 'shunto'.
Materials used included:
Book: Junko Sakai, Japanese Bankers in the City of London, Routledge (1999).
Video: Nippon, BBC/Arts and Entertainment Network (1990).
As their homework assignment on 27th April, students followed the pattern of a map of Britain in 'The Observer' newspaper profiling work patterns in Britain to do the same for Japan. Here is one from Tomoyo:
Final topic in the last two classes was:
3: War and Peace
