Tutor: Norm Boniface
This class will continue its historical and cultural treatment of Japan since Jomon times up to today's modern society/economy/environment with occasional comparison with developments in western societies. The course leader and guest speakers will cover some significant events and personalities that influenced the course of Japanese history. During formal presentations and discussions, we will touch on texts, literature, arts (fine, performing and martial), and crafts of the evolving cultures through the various eras, of which there are many. Students will be encouraged to participate in free and open discussions in English.
Venue: 232 Adelaide St
Monday 11.30am - 1.00pm. Classes start 14 July, finish 15 September.
Cost: $50 (prepaid), 10 weeks
Current Enrolments: 30 (full capacity)
There are no prerequisites for a knowledge of Japanese language, either written or oral. A general knowledge of history would be useful - there were world wars, WW1 and WW2; Japan participated in both and big bombs were dropped on occasions! Wars will be discussed but the focus will not be on those with external neighbours (maybe we know a lot about them), more on those within Japan - the civil wars - that guided the evolution of the society!
The year-long course will be broadly divided into four segments dealing with:
* An Introduction to Medieval and Feudal Japan
* Imperial Japan
* Cultural Japan
* Industry, Technology and the Future.
About the Tutor:
The course leader is a retired Australian who has a civil engineering background with transport planning and policy experience. He has travelled to/from and around Japan frequently over the last 20 years, without a basic fluency in the Japanese language, while tutoring in English with occasional presentations to Japanese, on Australiana. He is commonly known among his friends jokingly as a ‘Japanophile, perhaps a Jomon in a previous life’. So his opinions may be a little biased. But he and guest speakers from the Australia Japan Society network will welcome discussion and try to answer all those questions you really wanted to ask but never had the forum to do so.Unfortunately enrolments in this class have exceeded room capacity and no new enrolments can be accepted at this time. You may contact the tutor to express your interest should a vacancy arise.
If you wish to obtain further information about this class before enrolling, you may send a message to the tutor using the Send Enquiry Message button below.