Institute of East Asian Studies

Japanese Language Study at Berkeley

Japan Related Courses - Spring 2022

Anthropology Department

Freshman Seminar - Tourism, Heritage and Ritual

ANTHRO 24

This course focuses on anthropological approaches to the two main topics: tourism and cultural heritage. Tourism is a form of secular ritual involving travel, commonly associated with modernity; there is a close relationship between tourism and pilgrimage. Heritage includes tangible and intangible parts of culture, especially forms of art, consciously preserved from the past, often for tourism. We will discuss the topics from participants’ point of view–learning, self-fulfillment, and adventure–and the impacts of these modern movements–such as ‘over-tourism’, commoditization, and co-creativity. The class will focuses on the student’s own experiences in family heritage and social rituals, arts and travel experiences, in relation to ideas discussed in class and in the digitally distributed readings.

Arts and Humanities Division

Compass Course: What is Asia?

HUM 10

As the largest and the most populous geographical and cultural entity, Asia has played a dominant role in the world’s politics, economy, and culture. But what is Asia?

This course approaches this question from three perspectives: the construction of Asia as a cultural space by Europeans from Greek antiquity to modern times; Asia’s own exploration of its identity as a cultural and political sphere; and the imagining of Asia by Americans in the age of Asia’s global economic rise. Linking these perspectives is an investigation of Asianness itself, through which we will explore urgent cultural and political issues in today’s world: race and identity, migration and belonging, cosmopolitanism and geopolitics, and responses to environmental crisis.

We will explore these themes, and many others, through a wide variety of materials, including the first extant Greek tragedy The Persians, East Asian film, literature, and other art forms, and contemporary Asian-American writings and activist documentary, We will engage thinkers, writers, and artists ranging from Hegel and Max Weber in Europe to the novelist Tanizaki Jun’ichirô in Japan, the filmmaker Jia Zhangke in China, and the imaginative writers Amitava Kumar, Mia Alvar and Cathy Park Hong in the U.S.

Group in Buddhist Studies

Buddhism on the Silk Road

BUDDSTD C120

Also offered as: EALANG C120

This course will discuss the social, economic, and cultural aspects of Buddhism as it moved along the ancient Eurasian trading network referred to as the “Silk Road”. Instead of relying solely on textual sources, the course will focus on material culture as it offers evidence concerning the spread of Buddhism. Through an examination of the Buddhist archaeological remains of the Silk Road, the course will address specific topics, such as the symbiotic relationship between Buddhism and commerce; doctrinal divergence; ideological shifts in the iconography of the Buddha; patronage (royal, religious and lay); Buddhism and political power; and art and conversion. All readings will be in English.

Buddhism in Contemporary Society

BUDDSTD C128

Also offered as: EALANG C128

A study of the Buddhist tradition as it is found today in Asia. The course will focus on specific living traditions of East, South, and/or Southeast Asia. Themes to be addressed may include contemporary Buddhist ritual practices; funerary and mortuary customs; the relationship between Buddhism and other local religious traditions; the relationship between Buddhist institutions and the state; Buddhist monasticism and its relationship to the laity; Buddhist ethics; Buddhist "modernism," and so on.

Proseminar in Buddhist Studies

BUDDSTD 200

This seminar provides an opportunity for all students and faculty in the Group in Buddhist Studies to gather together on a regular basis to discuss recent theoretically significant works in the field of Buddhist Studies, as well as pertinent and important works in related disciplines (anthropology, art history, literature, history, philosophy, and religious studies). The content of the course will be adjusted from semester to semester so as to best accommodate the needs and interest of the students, but the focus will be on recent works representing the "state of the field." 

Seminar in Buddhism and Buddhist Texts

BUDDSTD C220

Also offered as: SSEASN C220

Content varies with student interests. The course will normally focus on classical Buddhist texts that exist in multiple recensions and languages, including Chinese, Sanskrit, and Tibetan. 

Comparative Literature

English Composition in Connection with the Reading of World Literature
War and Its Aftermath

COMLIT R1B 012

In this course, we will explore works depicting war and its aftermath in literature, film, poetry, and drama. Major texts are likely to include Japan’s medieval war epic The Tale of the Heike, Hadji Murat by Leo Tolstoy, Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, and Father Comes Home from The Wars (Parts 1, 2, & 3) by Suzan-Lori Parks. Through these and a selection of other short works, we will discuss topics including social upheaval, religion, warrior culture, cross-cultural encounters, trauma, memory, and slavery.

Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures

Elementary Japanese

JAPAN 1A

Japanese 1A is designed to develop basic Japanese language skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing. Students will learn the Japanese writing system: hiragana, katakana and approximately 150 kanji. At the end of the course, students should be able to greet, invite, compare, and describe persons and things, activities, intensions, ability, experience, purposes, reasons, and wishes. Grades will be determined on the basis of attendance, quiz scores, homework and class participation.

JAPAN 1B

Japanese 1B is designed to develop basic skills acquired in Japanese 1A further. Students will learn approximately 150 new kanji. At the end of the course students should be able to express regret, positive and negative requirements, chronological order of events, conditions, giving and receiving of objects and favors, and to ask and give advice. Grades will be determined on the basis of attendance, quiz scores, homework and class participation.

Introduction to Modern Japanese Literature and Culture

JAPAN 7B

An introduction to Japanese literature in translation in a two-semester sequence. 7B provides a survey of important works of 19th- and 20th-century Japanese fiction, poetry, and cultural criticism. The course will explore the manner in which writers responded to the challenges of industrialization, internationalization, and war. Topics include the shifting notions of tradition and modernity, the impact of Westernization on the constructions of the self and gender, writers and the wartime state, literature of the atomic bomb, and postmodern fantasies and aesthetics. All readings are in English translation. Techniques of critical reading and writing will be introduced as an integral part of the course.

Intermediate Japanese

JAPAN 10A

The goal of this course is for the students to understand the language and culture required to communicate effectively in Japanese. Some of the cultural aspects covered are; geography, speech style, technology, sports, food, and religion. Through the final project, students will learn how to discuss social issues and their potential solutions. In order to achieve these goals, students will learn how to integrate the basic linguistics knowledge they acquired in J1, as well as study new structures and vocabulary. An increasing amount of reading and writing, including approximately 200 new kanji, will also be required.

JAPAN 10B

The goal of this course is for the students to understand the more advanced language and culture required to communicate effectively in Japanese. Some of the cultural aspects covered are; pop-culture, traditional arts, education, convenient stores, haiku, and history. Through the final project, students will learn how to introduce their own cultures and their influences. In order to achieve these goals, students will learn how to integrate the basic structures and vocabulary they acquired in the previous semesters, as well as study new linguistic expressions. An increasing amount of more advanced reading and writing, including approximately 200 new kanji, will also be required.

Japanese Culture

JAPAN 80 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

Introduction to Japanese culture from its origins to the present: premodern historical, literary, artistic, and religious developments, modern economic growth, and the nature of contemporary society, education, and business. Class conducted in English.

Advanced Japanese

JAPAN 100B offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

This course aims to develop further context-specific skills in speaking, listening, reading and writing. It concentrates on students using acquired grammar and vocabulary with more confidence in order to express functional meanings, while increasing overall linguistic competence. Students will learn approximately 200 new Kanji. There will be a group or individual project. Course materials include the textbook supplemented by newspapers, magazine articles, short stories, essays, and video clips which will provide insight into Japanese culture and society.

Japanese for Sinologists

JAPAN 100S offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

Students will be trained to read, analyze, and translate modern Japanese scholarship on Chinese subjects. A major purpose of the course is to prepare students to take reading examinations in Japanese. The areas of scholarship to be covered are: politics, popular culture, religion, sociology and history as well as areas suggested by students who are actively engaged in research projects. Two readings in selected areas will be assigned, one by the instructor and the second by a student participant. 

Fourth-Year Readings: Japanese Culture

JAPAN 102 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

This course provides students an opportunity to develop their reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills in order to express their opinions in argumentative discourse. Students read and discuss a variety of Japanese texts to deepen their understanding of Japanese society and people and to improve their intercultural communicative competence.

Classical Japanese Poetry

JAPAN 130

An introduction to the critical analysis and translation of traditional Japanese poetry, a genre that reaches from early declarative work redolent of an even earlier oral tradition to medieval and Early Modern verses evoking exquisitely differentiated emotional states via complex rhetoric and literary allusion. Topics may include examples of Japan's earliest poetry in Man'yoshu, Heian courtly verse in Kokinshu, lines from Shinkokinshu with its medieval mystery and depth, linked verse (renga), and the haikai of Basho and his circle.

Contemporary Japanese Literature

JAPAN 159 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

This course examines the historical production and reception of key Japanese literary and film texts; how issues of gender, ethnicity, social roles, and national identity specific to each text address changing economic and social conditions in postwar Japan. 

Introduction to Japanese Linguistics: Grammar

JAPAN 160 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

This course deals with issues of the structure of the Japanese language and how they have been treated in the field of linguistics. It focuses on phonetics/phonology, morphology, writing systems, dialects, lexicon, and syntax/semantics, historical changes, and genetic origins. Students are required to have intermediate knowledge of Japanese. No previous linguistics training is required. 

Translation: Theory and Practice

JAPAN 163 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

An overview of the concepts of theoretical, contrastive, and practical linguistics which form the basis for work in translation between Japanese and English through hands-on experience. Topics include translatability, various kinds of meaning, analysis of the text, process of translating, translation techniques, and theoretical background.

Murakami Haruki and Miyazaki Hayao: The Politics of Japanese culture from the Bubble to the Present

JAPAN 178 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

This course will examine the works of the novelist Murakami Haruki and the animator Miyazaki Hayao within the context of contemporary Japanese aesthetics and history. Both Murakami and Miyazaki debuted in 1979 and their work has very much defined Japan’s cultural experience from the tail end of the Era of High Growth Economics through the Bubble Era, the Lost Decade, and into the twenty-first century. Students will explore the works of these two figures in the context of the history of Japanese literature and film and its relation to larger political, social, and cultural trends of Japan from the 1980s to the present.

Readings in Japanese Buddhist Texts

JAPAN C225 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

This seminar serves as an introduction to a broad range of Japanese Buddhist literature belonging to different historical periods and genres, including liturgical texts; monastic records, rules, and ritual manuals; doctrinal treatises; biographies of monks; and histories of Buddhism in Japan. Students are required to do all the readings in the original languages, which are classical Chinese (Kanbun) and classical Japanese. It will also serve as a tools and methods course, covering basic reference works and secondary scholarship in the field of Japanese Buddhism. The content of the course will be adjusted from semester to semester to accommodate the needs and interests of the students.

Seminar in Classical Japanese Texts

JAPAN 240 offered through East Asian Languages and Cultures

Topics may include works of Heian fiction such as The Tale of Genji (Genji monogatari) and memoirs such as The Pillow Book (Makura no soshi). 

Reading and Composition on Topics in East Asian Humanities

EALANG R1B.1

Reading and Composition on Topics in East Asian Humanities: “Bodily Trajectories:” Exploring Asian-Futurism through Asian and AAPI Speculative fiction

EALANG R1B.2

In this class we will be exploring Asian and AAPI Speculative fiction through how Asian-Futurism engages time and the body in particular ways. Inspired by the artists and scholars who forwarded notions of Afro-Futurism, we will try to understand the unique dynamics of AsianFuturism. Ideas of futurism have always had its tendrils extending into the present and the past, so we will contextualize the other worlds and realities put forth in course texts through the real world histories and living realities of Asian and AAPI communities. Like Afro-Futurism, Asian-Futurism engages ideas of post-humanism, race, gender, sexuality and labor and highlights the ways in which bodies are marked as “other,” categorized, placed in hierarchies and understood as human. Through mapping the way bodies are presented across time and space in Asian speculative fiction, we will explore the way Asian bodies are understood in a world quickly changing from the forces of globalization and new technologies. More than anything, this course is devoted to your writing, so there will be a strong emphasis on learning to identify essay topics that interest you. You will spend a great deal of time reading and revising student work, as well as considerable attention to the mechanics of argumentative prose. To this end, you will learn how to analyze cultural texts with care and precision as well as critically read non-fiction articles as a tool to contextualize creative work. This class is intended to be a safe space where students can engage deeply with complex topics through thoughtful, critical, and respectful dialogue with each other. Hopefully our work together throughout the semester will not only help you hone your writing skills, but also lead you to think more broadly about the histories, positionalities and futures of Asian and AAPI communities globally. 

East Asian Sixties

EALANG 112

“The evils of capitalism are as real as the evils of militarism and evils of racism,” said the soon-to-be assassinated Martin Luther King in 1967. This course will survey these various “evils” through the tumultuous conditions of the so-called radical '60s from the standpoint of East Asia. Drawing from works of literature, film, art, music, and engaged scholarship, we will endeavor to both appreciate and critically reflect on the unique East Asian experience of communization, US imperialism, third world revolution, women’s liberation, the environmental movement, and Afro-Asian solidarity. Was the utopian energy of this decade misplaced? Did the 1960s fail to enact lasting change? Or do the documents from this era still communicate with our present in prescient and instructive ways? Addressing these and related questions, we will delve unflinchingly into this era, never to return the same.

Knowing Others, and Being Known: The Art of Writing People

EALANG 115

What does it mean to “know” a person in writing, and how does one make oneself—or someone else— “known” through writing? Beginning with both ancient and modern philosophical and literary treatments of the topic, this seminar guides students in reading and writing about people, skills they will need long after this course has ended. Prerequisites: None.

Buddhism on the Silk Road

BUDDSTD C120

Also offered as: EALANG C120

This course will discuss the social, economic, and cultural aspects of Buddhism as it moved along the ancient Eurasian trading network referred to as the “Silk Road”. Instead of relying solely on textual sources, the course will focus on material culture as it offers evidence concerning the spread of Buddhism. Through an examination of the Buddhist archaeological remains of the Silk Road, the course will address specific topics, such as the symbiotic relationship between Buddhism and commerce; doctrinal divergence; ideological shifts in the iconography of the Buddha; patronage (royal, religious and lay); Buddhism and political power; and art and conversion. All readings will be in English.

Buddhism in Contemporary Society

EALANG C128

Also offered as: BUDDSTD C128

A study of the Buddhist tradition as it is found today in Asia. The course will focus on specific living traditions of East, South, and/or Southeast Asia. Themes to be addressed may include contemporary Buddhist ritual practices; funerary and mortuary customs; the relationship between Buddhism and other local religious traditions; the relationship between Buddhist institutions and the state; Buddhist monasticism and its relationship to the laity; Buddhist ethics; Buddhist "modernism," and so on.

East Asian Film: Special Topics in Genre

EALANG 181

In this course, we will engage with a range of works in East Asian horror cinema (Japan and South Korea) and explore their power to provoke and disturb, in light of issues such as spectatorship, the uncanny, and the staging of gender and sexuality as modes of critique. We will also discuss the ways in which these films theorize cultural memory and the transmission of traumatic knowledge in the context of their adaptation into other Asian sites (Hong Kong, Singapore and Thailand). The aim of the course is to generate a critical understanding of horror cinema, its stock figures and conventions, as well as its inventive potential.

Tools and Methods in the Study of East Asian Philosophy and Religion

EALANG 191

This course is a capstone experience that centers on the philosophies and religions of East Asia examined from multiple theoretical perspectives. It comprises several thematic units within which a short set of readings about theory are followed by chronologically arranged readings about East Asia. Themes will alternate from year to year but may include: ritual and performance studies; religion and evolution; definitions of religion and theories of its origins; and the role of sacrifice.

Topics in East Asian Studies: "How to Publish an Article"

EALANG 204

Did you ever wonder how other people get their work done? Or where they get their ideas? Are you curious about the best strategies and habits for clear, forceful, and engaging writing? Do you want the inside story on the joys of the process of submitting your work to a journal? Over the course of the semester each of you will revise for submission to a journal a seminar paper you have already written. At the conclusion of the semester you will send your revised essay for review at a journal. (You are not required to have it accepted!) Over the course of the term, we will read and discuss the written work of the seminar members, as well as model examples of writing, including that of Berkeley faculty. Time will also be set aside each session for work on professionalization: publication cover letters, job applications and interviews, mock talks

English Department

Freshman Seminars: World Art Cinema: Some Parables of Repetition

ENG 24

We will watch and discuss three masterworks of world art cinema:  Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon (Japan,1950), Pier-Paolo Pasolini’s Teorema (Italy 1968), and Abbas Kiarostami’s Taste of Cherry (Iran, 1997).  Each is a kind of parable of repetition, involving the serial recurrence, over and over again, of a key plot-event.  In Rashomon, a crime is recounted separately by each of the participants; in Teorema, a mysterious visitor proceeds to have sex with one after another member of a bourgeois family; and in Taste of Cherry, a man persists in asking a succession of men to bury him after his suicide.  We will reflect on the different meanings of seriality and repetition in the three films.  No background but your interest is required.

Department of Ethnic Studies

Japanese American History

ASAMST 122

This course will be presented as a proseminar with selected topics in order to give students an opportunity to participate in the dynamics of the study of Japanese American history. Topics include immigration, anti-Japanese racism, labor, concentration camps, agriculture, art and literature, and personality and culture.

Department of History

Introduction to the History of Japan

HISTORY 14

A brisk introduction to the nearly two millennia of recorded Japanese history. As a survey, the course gives attention to broad themes and problems in Japan's political, social, and cultural/intellectual history. Topics include the dialectic of national and local identities in shaping Japanese politics, Japan's interaction with the Asian continent and the Western world, and the relation of past to present in modern times. 

Proseminar: Problems in Interpretation in the Several Fields of History: Comparative History
Japan, Germany, and the Modern World, 1850-1950

HISTORY 103U

This seminar is an introduction to some dimension of the history of a nation, region, people, culture, institution, or historical phenomenon selected by the respective instructor. Students will come to understand, and develop an appreciation for: the origins and evolution of the people, cultures, and/or political, economic, and/or social institutions of a particular region(s) of the world. They may explore how human encounters shaped individual and collective identities and the political, economic, and social orders of the region/nation/communities under study. Instructors prioritize critical reading, engaged participation, and focused writing assignments.

War and Peace: International Relations since 1914

HISTORY 162B

This course analyzes the turbulent transitions from the classical European balance of power system to the global multipolar system of today. The course explores the political, economic, ideological, and technological roots of international affairs. Among topics discussed are the two world wars, inter-war collective security,the Cold War, European integration, imperialism and de-colonization, the collapse of Communism, the Middle East conflict, the rise of China and Japan, and the post-1990 international order.

Graduate School of Journalism

International Reporting

JOURN 234

This course is designed for students who are interested in foreign reporting. Course will include a broad overview of the issues that need to be researched when reporting on the politics, economics, and social issues of a foreign country. Past classes have traveled to Mexico, China, Cuba, Hungary, Ghana, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Peru.

Department of Political Science

Special Topics in International Relations: Reconciliation After Atrocities

POLSCI 123A

It is increasingly recognized that for societies to move on after widespread human rights and humanitarian abuses some kind of reconciliation process is necessary. What does reconciliation mean at the national vs. the personal level? What institutions and processes work best to encourage reconciliation? What role do truth commissions and trials play in this process? Are these processes best dealt with nationally or should they be led by an international body? This course will start by examining the concept of reconciliation and then look at case studies including Germany and Japan after WWII, Cambodia after the Khmer Rouge, Argentina and the Dirty War, Chile after Pinochet, South Africa and Apartheid, the Rwandan genocide, and the war in Yugoslavia. Students will complete a research project on a case study of their choice.

Undergraduate Interdisciplinary Studies

Directed Group Study

ISF 98

This course re-examines the famous Japanese animation Attack on Titan from four different areas, thereby challenging students to think both creatively and critically about the contemporary world. Through utilizing models and theories drawn from political science, philosophy, game theory, and leadership, the course aims to strengthen students’ intellectual understanding of Attack on Titan and their ability to apply the knowledge to real-life issues related to the distribution of power, domination, free will vs. determinism, the game of warfare, and strategic thinking.