Notes on the new term.
Jan. 14th, 2010 06:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sechan19I suppose its early days to be making observations about the new classes at this point. After all, I still have yet to sample my final required course (academic speaking), and none of the non-required electives (calligraphy, classical calligraphy, classical Japanese, kanbun) start until next week. But I did want to note a few of my impressions nevertheless.
First off, while I continue to hope that it's going to get a little easier, I suspect that the chill zone is still a semester away. Once we begin project work, things should subside. Until then, eesh.
The morning grammar class now meets twice a week, on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, to go over ever subtler intricacies in the language. We're expected to each give a ten-minute speech at some point in the course, possibly twice, and in lieu of essay-writing we now have daily matome renshû (consolidation practice). It involves less writing but tends to be uninteresting for the most part as the topic pattern is pre-set. Everyone hates matome renshû, although some of us are aware of its beneficial properties.
Actually, at the end of the last term I went to bat for the matome renshû. In my final evaluation with Aoki-sensei I told him that everyone (myself included) hates and bitterly laments the exercise, but that in spite of that I thought it was an excellent tool for committing grammar patterns to memory, and that I hoped it continued. If that ever gets out, I imagine I'll be shot. ;>
Matome renshû are the least of our worries, though, I think. There are nearly-confirmed rumors of another happyôkai at the end of the third term. The general consensus is that it must be better organized than the last one or there might be riots among the student body. Heh.
The afternoon classes, which meet every day except Wednesday, have been split into business society, popular culture, and twentieth-century Japanese history courses. I enrolled in the history course out of a sense of duty to my field, even though I suspected the pop culture class would be more interesting. My first day of class hasn't exactly altered that initial opinion. The biggest problem at this point is that these afternoon classes are designed to encourage students in discussing things (a good and worthy goal), but no one in my section has actually studied twentieth-century history. Consequently, we have nothing to talk about.
My friend T., on the other hand, is a modern history scholar - so he's loving it already and crowing about how cool it is. Heh. I'd give a lot to be in his section, but it was not to be. Anyway, I plan to do some brainstorming tonight, and I hope my compatriots do the same. We're each expected to do daily five minute presentations on related topics; that should spice things up. Otherwise, it's going to be a long semester.
The art history class (Monday and Thursday mornings) is, for me, top priority at this point. (Grammar and speaking confidence are tied for second.) I'm very excited about the opportunity to study the subject in Japanese and therefore get exposed to useful texts - a number of which have already surfaced. (I can only imagine how many books I'm going to have to ship home in the summer. I already went nuts at the Tokyo National Museum once so far.) Everyone is pretty well spaced out from the end of the Heian period to the modern era, so I expect we'll all be able to enrich each others' knowledge.
However, I did get jumped on today (during a discussion on the origins of the concept of "art history") for suggesting that beauty was not likely to be the primary function of most pre-modern "art" objects, which surprised me. I was leading up to a statement about the moment in history when "art" becomes "self-aware," and what that may mean in terms of methodological discourse and its development, but I never got there. My intrinsic belief that works should be considered function-first didn't seem to go over that well with some of my colleagues, and that was rather... interesting. But perhaps it was just a communication issue.
I allowed myself to go as far as stating that just because I said beauty was not the most important function of a pre-modern work DID NOT mean that I denied the importance of beauty in a pre-modern work. Of course it's significant that pre-modern peoples (much like modern peoples) like pretty things more than they like ugly things, but seriously - that stylistic emphasis stuff is so nineteenth century. ;-P
Fighting over the value of a context-oriented view to history aside, I look forward to this class very, very much. Each student will be selecting articles and leading class discussion on specific days. For the present, I selected two methodological essays: one on the relationship of handscrolls to historical discourse and one on the issue of perspectival grammar in narrations and narrative handscrolls. I would eventually like to tackle some essays on the iconography of ghosts and monsters, but at the outset I felt that it was better to do something that has a wide application. I want my peers to get as much out of my articles as I do, so...
Anyway, that's how things are going over here. I'll try to update you all on my additional courses (all five of them) next week.
First off, while I continue to hope that it's going to get a little easier, I suspect that the chill zone is still a semester away. Once we begin project work, things should subside. Until then, eesh.
The morning grammar class now meets twice a week, on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, to go over ever subtler intricacies in the language. We're expected to each give a ten-minute speech at some point in the course, possibly twice, and in lieu of essay-writing we now have daily matome renshû (consolidation practice). It involves less writing but tends to be uninteresting for the most part as the topic pattern is pre-set. Everyone hates matome renshû, although some of us are aware of its beneficial properties.
Actually, at the end of the last term I went to bat for the matome renshû. In my final evaluation with Aoki-sensei I told him that everyone (myself included) hates and bitterly laments the exercise, but that in spite of that I thought it was an excellent tool for committing grammar patterns to memory, and that I hoped it continued. If that ever gets out, I imagine I'll be shot. ;>
Matome renshû are the least of our worries, though, I think. There are nearly-confirmed rumors of another happyôkai at the end of the third term. The general consensus is that it must be better organized than the last one or there might be riots among the student body. Heh.
The afternoon classes, which meet every day except Wednesday, have been split into business society, popular culture, and twentieth-century Japanese history courses. I enrolled in the history course out of a sense of duty to my field, even though I suspected the pop culture class would be more interesting. My first day of class hasn't exactly altered that initial opinion. The biggest problem at this point is that these afternoon classes are designed to encourage students in discussing things (a good and worthy goal), but no one in my section has actually studied twentieth-century history. Consequently, we have nothing to talk about.
My friend T., on the other hand, is a modern history scholar - so he's loving it already and crowing about how cool it is. Heh. I'd give a lot to be in his section, but it was not to be. Anyway, I plan to do some brainstorming tonight, and I hope my compatriots do the same. We're each expected to do daily five minute presentations on related topics; that should spice things up. Otherwise, it's going to be a long semester.
The art history class (Monday and Thursday mornings) is, for me, top priority at this point. (Grammar and speaking confidence are tied for second.) I'm very excited about the opportunity to study the subject in Japanese and therefore get exposed to useful texts - a number of which have already surfaced. (I can only imagine how many books I'm going to have to ship home in the summer. I already went nuts at the Tokyo National Museum once so far.) Everyone is pretty well spaced out from the end of the Heian period to the modern era, so I expect we'll all be able to enrich each others' knowledge.
However, I did get jumped on today (during a discussion on the origins of the concept of "art history") for suggesting that beauty was not likely to be the primary function of most pre-modern "art" objects, which surprised me. I was leading up to a statement about the moment in history when "art" becomes "self-aware," and what that may mean in terms of methodological discourse and its development, but I never got there. My intrinsic belief that works should be considered function-first didn't seem to go over that well with some of my colleagues, and that was rather... interesting. But perhaps it was just a communication issue.
I allowed myself to go as far as stating that just because I said beauty was not the most important function of a pre-modern work DID NOT mean that I denied the importance of beauty in a pre-modern work. Of course it's significant that pre-modern peoples (much like modern peoples) like pretty things more than they like ugly things, but seriously - that stylistic emphasis stuff is so nineteenth century. ;-P
Fighting over the value of a context-oriented view to history aside, I look forward to this class very, very much. Each student will be selecting articles and leading class discussion on specific days. For the present, I selected two methodological essays: one on the relationship of handscrolls to historical discourse and one on the issue of perspectival grammar in narrations and narrative handscrolls. I would eventually like to tackle some essays on the iconography of ghosts and monsters, but at the outset I felt that it was better to do something that has a wide application. I want my peers to get as much out of my articles as I do, so...
Anyway, that's how things are going over here. I'll try to update you all on my additional courses (all five of them) next week.
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no subject
Date: 2010-01-14 04:53 pm (UTC)Exciting that you get to have a kanbun class - it wasn't offered when I was there, and my friend B went and found herself a private tutor for it.
My roommate here in HI is now taking a 古典文法／古筆 class, and I'm really missing my time studying those at IUC and wishing I were taking this class with him. Have you met the 書道／古筆 sensei yet? She's awesome.
no subject
Date: 2010-01-16 02:00 am (UTC)As for the kanbun... well, my adviser told me to find a way to take it this year, so I launched a campaign to have it added at the Center. Fortunately, the campaign was a success. =)
no subject
Date: 2010-01-16 04:17 am (UTC)Kobayashi-sensei is great. I miss having class with her. I feel bad, though, I can never remember her name.