Welcome to Senmon Eigo for you fine Nichi-nichi students. As you've certainly noticed by now, this course deals with artefacts, which may have something do with the header on this page. In this 5-day course, the aim is for students to develop their ability to think and talk in English about cultural artefacts such as music, art, and literature. Moreover, we will explore related issues such as artefact ownership in the digital age, movements to preserve (or not preserve) older methods of creating artefacts, and the selection of the primacy of historical narratives.
Classes will be conducted in English, with an emphasis on both speaking and writing. A large portion of class time will be used for discussion in pairs or small groups, and students should expect to then present salient points covered. Readings will be assigned on a regular basis, and students are required to come to class adequately prepared for discussion. Students will be required to create a reflection journal to allow for further consideration of the issues addressed in class; such 'journals' may be either on paper or in the form of a blog. The culmination of our class will be group presentations (3-4 students) on the final day and the submission of a short, jointly-authored research paper on a topic related to our class discussions.
The Basics ...
In case you're curious what thrills await, here is the Senmon Eigo syllabus for your enjoyment. You will notice that I have made some changes (we teachers are like that); those changes are reflected on this webpage and represent the syllabus we will follow.
For those of you that had me as an instructor in the past, you'll remember that I insist on polite email when you contact me. For those of you that are new to my classes, note that you must write to me in appropriately formal language. Lest you not know exactly what I want, please take a close look at how to write a polite e-mail.
The course requirements are detailed below.
Monday (Sept 15): Visual Media
Session 1 - Course intro; Artefacts
You might well think of something shown in the image to the right when we mention the word 'artefact'. Of course, you might well imagine something completely different, which is - given the immense number of artefacts from our collective human endeavors over the last few millenia - quite natural.
Let's embark on our week together with an exercise to activate your artefact schema. In plain words, let's consider artefacts with a worksheet.
Session 1 - From Gutenberg to YouTube
Why might I have paired Mr. Gutenberg - who lived some 500 years ago - with something as contemporary as YouTube? Well, Gentle Student, the answer comes in two parts: both mark steps along the path of disseminating information, and both also represent methods of archiving information for later access. The former, of course, had important implications for the spread of literacy as books, a rare and quite expensive commodity, became both more common and less prohibitively expensive.
The archiving function, however, is the one with which we will spend our week.
One of the more remarkable efforts at archiving material is The Internet Archive, which is, as the name suggests, an online library featuring the various media to be found on the Internet. Among the A recent development (chronicled by our BBC friends here) is the provision of millions of public domain images via flickr. While the sheer size of the archive is impressive, the fact that they are tagged and thus easily searchable is most helpful. Thus, your homework today today includes a visit to the Internet Archive book images, which number 2,619,833 as of this writing. Go ahead, folks, and search for two or three things!
As you might imagine, one challenge of any library is constraints on space. With traditional artefacts such as books, you need shelves and a book-friendly environment, of course. the Library at Alexandria For a slightly dramatized introduction to the original library at Alexandria, we'll let historian Bettany Hughes tell the story.
However, happily, the idea did not perish with the destruction of the original library.
the Library of Congress
In this inaugral day of our course, we will examine artefacts related to one aspect of visual media - namely, movies.
Session 2 - The Silver Screen
History of Movies
History of TV
Session 3 - The Digital Screen
Silver is out and pixels are in — welcome to our brave new world, people. In the final section of today's class, you will be considering the recent spread of digital forms of storage, which have largely replaced silver-based forms of storage. your final projects.
Finally, we will devote the remainder of today's class to brainstorming about your topic and beginning preparation for the presentation and report.
Tuesday (Sept 16): Music
Session 4 - Audio Artefacts
Ironically, the preservation of sound has had a much shorter history than has that of images or physical artefacts.
Session 5 - Music in the US & Japan
Totally audacious, that heading - how can we possibly cover such a broad range of music in a scant hour or two (or even 10)? Obviously, we can't, but I'd like to at least consider some of the audio material from these two countries that has been preserved.
Here we have a quick tour of some very old (and not so old) musical genres from Japan.
Music in the US is something I'm much more familiar with, of course. Among the significant contributions were blues, jazz, country and western, and a host of recent sub-genres (house, anyone?).
Session 6 - Copyright Protection & Infringement
Let's begin this session with a look through a timeline dealing with law and technology.
Wednesday (Sept 17): Literature
Session 7 - The Classics - Why?
As you remember well (happily?) from your high school days, the so-called classics were an integral part of the curriculum. Indeed, that is true in the US as well. However, I must confess that I never enjoyed most of the Shakespeare canon much, but I quite enjoyed the course I took in graduate school about classical Japanese.
Let us consider the scope of the canon, good people. What types of narratives constitute the canon of a language? For your enjoyment, here is a worksheet on the number of types of stories.
It seems to me that we've devoted a considerable amount of time to things American and things Japanese, but the world is much, much wider. Thus, minions of mine (OK, what recent cultural artefact am I referencing here?), your homework today is to dance home and find enough material to talk about a canon of cultural work from another culture (I also would be happy with a 2-page report; yes, that would be two plus the title page). Allow me to provide a thread that you might follow: take a glance at the list of recent Nobel Prize winners in literature. Where are those fine people from? What languages were used for their works?
Session 8 - History and the Truth, A Volatile Pair
"To the winner go the spoils" has long been a consequence of that ghastly enterprise we call war. That phrase, incidentally, has its origin in the image to the right, one of many by Thomas Nash, an early and very influential political cartoonist. Nash is closely and correctly associated with Harper's Weekly, and influential political magazine that unfortunately ceased publication in 1916. Just for your enlightenment, here you'll find a nice collection of the work of Thomas Nash.
Text here.
The story is not unique to the US, however. Throughout history the victor (or at least the dominant class or group) had authored the primary narrative to suit its purpose(s), be those benign or more nefarious. One of the more skeptical looks at this came courtesy of George Orwell, who penned such works as Animal Farm and 1984, the trailer for which is below.
Session 9 - The Pendulum Swings (or, "History and the New Truth")
You certainly should have noticed that Nash and Orwell lived some years ago. That fact should not, however, obfuscate the reality that this struggle continues in our modern world, and it will, I'm quite sure, continue to do so in the future.
First, I'd like to examine the evolution of which history is (or, perhaps more accurately, which histories are) taught in US schools.
Second, we'll move closer to home. One country with which you are familiar is Japan, and it has certainly had its share of controversy surrounding textbooks. Just ask, for example, our neighbors in South Korea and China. Our friends at BBC have, as usual, provided well-rounded coverage of the issue with a story on the textbook controversy in Japan.
Here you will find A rather brief overview of the textbook issue by a gentleman that goes by Viet. The images alone are worth your time.
For a recent look at the textbook screening process in Japan, Reiko Koide published a very well-documented article titled "Critical new state in Japan's textbook controversy." The same article is here as a pdf.
Here we have a paper by Aaron Cooley on this whole textbook controversy.
Thursday (Sept 18): The Matrix (the Internet and its Forebears)
Session 10 - The Internet Makes Us ...
Having examined three areas over the last several days, let us then look at the matrix within which images of these artefacts dwell. I refer here, of course, to the ubiquitous Internet.
A small challenge for you, good people: how about giving up your cell phone and all of your other electronic devices for 90 days? One young man that did is Jake Reilly, featured in this interview and in the video below.
In a recent article Nancy McCormack (2010) addressed the question of whether
"Are e-books making us stupid". Specifically, she looked closely at what might become of
libraries as we move increasingly toward reading
e-books instead of paper books. The
abstract is here
Abstract
In 2008, Nicholas Carr published a provocative article titled "Is Google making us stupid?" in which he
ponders the effect of the internet and electronic sources generally on the brain. This paper discusses one
source specifically, e-books, and explores whether libraries are acting wisely by moving from print to electronic
book collections. The topic is considered from the vantage point of the library and from that of the
patron. Specifically, the prospect of an all or largely all e-book future is considered and whether that future
means an end to traditional library collections and services. The potential problems for gdeep readingh are
also considered, and, specifically, whether e-books can serve as an adequate substitute for patrons who will
no longer be able to use electronic collections in the way they once used print. In short, this paper explores
whether e-books are making us librarians and patrons stupid.
(mouseover to read it); contact me if you're interested in readng the entire
article.
Session 11 - Ye Olde Script Debate
Here, of course, we harken back to the image near the top of this page, which shows an example of one of the earliest writing systems (namely, hieroglyphs). The history of writing is long, yet handwriting may well be imperiled: who among you spends more time with a pen or pencil in hand than with a keyboard in front of you?
Just to whet your appetite, here is one of my favorite clips. As you'll see, it shows the gifted hand of Luca Barcellona at work crafting a thing of beauty.
A remarkable project undertaken by St. John's Monastery saw the creation of an
entirely handwritten Bible. Although handwriting a book might sound quite unnecessary in today's
hyper-caffeinated world, it represents a reminder that the creation of a masterpiece took far
longer than in the 21st century. Lest you need more, here is the link to the
official webpage of the St. John's Bible folks.
The Saint John's Bible http://www.youtube.com/embed/BK9oCX5lBLQ
USA Today marked the completion of the Bible with this
story, which included the video in the link to the right.
As you well know from your experience using computers, we have a wealth of fonts available.
In fact, you might argue that we have far too many, and I believe you would have a valid point.
That notwithstanding, who designs fonts? Matthew Carter is one of a small handful of people
who do exactly that.
Session 12 - Preparation for final presentation
Text here.
Friday - Final Presentations
Note, people, that you will not be just passively listening to your classmates as they present the results of their work this week. No, you will be asking questions ... which means it is required that you ask questions. Really.
Course Requirements
As you know from class, the course requirements include several facets, the details of which are here.
1. Class participation (30%): This includes attendance, participation in classroom activities, and effort to use only English in class. Students must have 70% attendance or better in order to receive credit for this course, and students that arrive late will be penalized based at the discretion of the instructor.
2. Homework and oral presentations (30%): This includes the daily mini-presentations as well as written assignments, the reflection journal, and weekly preparation for class.
3. Final presentation and report (40%): Students will make a group oral presentation in front of the class and submit a written report based on their presentation. While the presentation will be on the final day of class, the final report is due later (by October 1).
Note that there are certain specified styles for the reflection journal, the group presentation, and the written report. Failure to follow those respective styles carries several risks, including a moderately irritated professor who might (a) frown at you, and (b) lower your grade.
Writing
As you know from class, I require polite email. Recall, too, that if you send me a file, the filename has a certain form.
Here's an example of the report style that you should use.
Riddles, Mysteries, and More
For no other reasons than that this is interesting material (from a class some years ago), I've left it here on our webpage.
As you'll know from our class discussion, riddles at times give rise to conspiracy theories, some of which have remarkable longevity. Click here for quite a list of conspiracies (with photos), courtesy of the good people at The Telegraph.
Immediately below is a video clip of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (with his dog, Paddy) speaking about both Sherlock Holmes and his belief in spiritualism.