Department of East Asian Languages & Cultures - Georgetown College

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A Special Course Announcement from the Department of East Asian Languages & Cultures

Dr. Antoni Ucerler, a visiting professor from Oxford University, will be teaching An Introduction to Classical and Literary Japanese (JAPN-363). This course is being offered at Georgetown for the first time in many years. Its aim is to introduce students who have studied modern Japanese to the riches of the classical and literary forms of the language — which were used throughout most of Japan’s history. Classical Japanese was written in various forms from the seventh century until as recently as 1945. In order to understand Japanese culture, history, and traditions at a deeper level, it is thus essential to have some knowledge of how the language evolved over the past 1400 years.

The classical language also provides a privileged gateway to the treasures of Japanese literature, both prose and poetry. The course will take an inductive approach; namely, rather than concentrating on the memorization and mastery of grammar alone, it will examine passages from famous texts (e.g. the Taketori monogatari, the Hōjoki, the Ise monogatari, and haiku from Bashō, etc.) and help students to learn how to decipher them. The course will also illustrate some of the close connections between texts of classical literature and well known Japanese works of art that were inspired by those works.

Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures

Chinese and Japanese language major programs were established at Georgetown University in 1949. The East Asian Languages and Cultures program today offers some of the most rigorous Chinese, Japanese, and Korean language training in the country. In addition to three-year sequences of structured intensive instruction, the department has a large number of electives taught in the language. Chinese and Japanese majors generally spend a semester or a year abroad at one of our partner institutions in Japan, China, or Taiwan, where they receive further intensive language instruction and benefit from immersion in the culture.

The East Asian Department is more than a language program. It aims to give students comprehensive exposure to the cultures of East Asia. The introductory course “East Asia: Texts and Contexts” introduces students to topics in the classical and contemporary literary traditions of East Asia through works in English translation. Other courses offered in English range across themes from classical Chinese prose to contemporary Japanese animated film. Chinese and Japanese majors cap their four years of study with a senior thesis, which provides the opportunity to apply their language skills and explore a topic of their choice in depth.

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