EAJ212L

MODERN JAPANESE LITERATURE IN TRANSLATION

Fall 2008 Call Number 8863

T Th 11:45 a.m.-1:05 p.m. Humanities 039

Instructor: Susanna Fessler

Office Hours: Tuesday & Thursday 1:30-2:30 and by appt.

e-mail: fessler@albany.edu

Office: Humanities 243

Phone/Voicemail: 442-4119

Fax: 442-4118

Course Description:

This course is a survey of modern Japanese prose literature. Material will be presented in a (more or less) chronological fashion, with the aim of providing the student with an overall view of literary trends. The required texts include two novels and an anthology of short stories. Class format will include lectures and discussion; preparation for class and class attendance are an important part of your grade.

General Education Information:

This course fulfills the General Education Categories of Humanities and Regions Beyond Europe.

Characteristics of all General Education Courses

General Education courses offer introductions to the central topics of disciplines and interdisciplinary fields.
General Education courses offer explicit rather than tacit understandings of the procedures, practices, methodology and fundamental assumptions of disciplines and interdisciplinary fields.
General Education courses recognize multiple perspectives on the subject matter.
General Education courses emphasize active learning in an engaged environment that enables students to be producers as well as consumers of knowledge.
General Education courses promote critical inquiry into the assumptions, goals, and methods of various fields of academic study; they aim to develop the interpretive, analytic, and evaluative competencies characteristic of critical thinking.

Learning Objectives for General Education Humanities Courses

Humanities courses teach students to analyze and interpret texts, ideas, artifacts, and discourse systems, and the human values, traditions, and beliefs that they reflect.

Humanities courses enable students to demonstrate knowledge of the assumptions, methods of study, and theories of at least one of the disciplines within the humanities.

Depending on the discipline, humanities courses will enable students to demonstrate some or all of the following:

an understanding of the objects of study as expressions of the cultural contexts of the people who created them
an understanding of the continuing relevance of the objects of study to the present and to the world outside the university
an ability to employ the terms and understand the conventions particular to the discipline
an ability to analyze and assess the strengths and weaknesses of ideas and positions along with the reasons or arguments that can be given for and against them
an understanding of the nature of the texts, artifacts, ideas, or discourse of the discipline and of the assumptions that underlie this understanding, including those relating to issues of tradition and canon

Objectives for General Education Regions Beyond Europe Courses

Approved courses engage students in considerations of the "local" as opposed to the "global." Courses focus on specific cultures (other than those of the United States) or the world's regions. Courses emphasize the features and processes whereby cultures and regions gain their specific identity, offering an explicitly historical organization (i.e., one that emphasizes the narratives whereby any given region or culture has come to gain its specific identity), and balancing topical focus and chronological breadth (i.e., considering a topic of sufficient specificity for the course to be coherent, but over a period of time long enough to ensure that the relevant historical dynamic is clearly visible).

Required Texts (all are available for purchase at the bookstore):

(O) The Oxford Book of Japanese Short Stories, Goossen, ed.

(K) Kokoro by Natsume Sōseki (this text is also available on-line at

http://web.archive.org/web/20050204104646/www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/ns/soseki.html)

(M) The Sailor Who Fell From Grace with the Sea by Mishima Yukio

Additional Course Material is on-line at http://www.albany.edu/eas/212/index.htm
There is also an extensive ERes page for this course with links to other works by the authors in both Japanese and English, along with secondary readings on authors when available. These readings are not required, but might come in handy when you are writing your papers.

Testing and Grading:

Students will be required to write one 5-page (approximately 1500 word) paper during the course of the semester. Attendance will be taken regularly; students are expected to attend class unless extenuating circumstances prevent it. There will be unannounced intermittent quizzes on the content of the required reading. These quizzes will be easy if you have done the reading but difficult if you have not--in other words, it is to your advantage to come to class prepared. The exams will include short answer and essay questions on the material covered in class.

Course grades will be based on the following criteria:

Intermittent quizzes	20%
5-page paper	20%
Midterm Exam	20%
Final Exam	20%
Class Attendance	20%

This syllabus is a contract. I agree to teach the topics listed below, and to grade you on the criteria listed above. If there is a change on the schedule (due to inclement weather, etc.) I will announce it in class and post it on the web. I consider a grade of "Incomplete" to be for emergencies (death in the family, extreme illness, etc.), not for students who fail to plan ahead. I do not curve grades. I do not give extra credit assignments. My grading scale is as follows: 93-100%=A; 90-92%=A-; 87-89%=B+; 83-86%=B; 80-82%=B-; 77-79%=C+; 73-76%=C; 70-72%=C-; 67-69%=D+; 63-66%=D; 60-62%=D-; 0-59%=E.

If you want to check on your performance at any point in the semester, feel free to come to my office and we'll run through the numbers, as often as you like. If there are extenuating circumstances which you anticipate will unduly affect your grade, it is your responsibility to speak with me IN ADVANCE.

			Topic	Reading
August	26	T	Course Intro	None
	28	Th	Japanese Lit. in the Meiji Era	None
Sept.	2	T	Mori Ōgai & Natsume Sōseki	O: 1-30
	4	Th	The Japanese Soul: Natsume Sōseki	K: Parts 1 & 2
	9	T	The Japanese Soul: Natsume Sōseki	K: Part 3
	11	Th	Kunikida Doppo and Higuchi Ichiyō	O: 31-44
	16	T	Nagai Kafū and Shiga Naoya	O: 45-61
	18	Th	Tanizaki Jun'ichirō and Satomi Ton	O: 62-78
	23	T	Okamoto Kanoko and Akutagawa Ryūnosuke	O: 79-102
	25	Th	Miyazawa Kenji and Yokomitsu Riichi	O: 103-123
	30	T	NO CLASS – Rosh Hashanah	None
Oct.	2	Th	Ibuse Masuji and Kajii Motojirō	O: 124-128; 149-153
	7	T	Kawabata Yasunari	O:129-148
	9	Th	NO CLASS – Yom Kippur	None
	14	T	MIDTERM EXAM	None
	16	Th	How to Write About Literature	None
	21	T	Hirabayashi Taiko and Hayashi Fumiko	O: 154-171; 182-186
	23	Th	Enchi Fumiko and Sakaguchi Ango	O: 172-181; 187-205
	28	T	Dazai Osamu and Inoue Yasushi	O: 206-231
	30	Th	Nakajima Atsushi and Kojima Nobuo	O: 232-251; First Draft Due
Nov.	4	T	Endō Shūsaku and Abe Kōbō	O: 252-287
	6	Th	Yoshiyuki Junnosuke and Kaikō Takeshi	O: 288-292; 344-350
	11	T	Mishima Yukio	O: 293-312
	13	Th	Mishima Yukio	M: “Summer”
	18	T	Mishima Yukio	M: “Winter”
	20	Th	Kono Taeko and Mukoda Kuniko	O: 313-343
	25	T	Ōe Kenzaburō	O: 351-390
	27	Th	NO CLASS – Thanksgiving	None
	2	Th	Tsushima Yuko and Murakami Haruki	O: 391-416; Final Draft Due
	4	T	Shimada Masahiko and Yoshimoto Banana	O: 417-443

The final exam will be held according to the official university schedule (see below).

FALL 2008 FINAL EXAMINATION SCHEDULE

Morning Classes			Afternoon Classes
If your	Beginning at	Your Exam	If your	Beginning at	Your exam
class	one of these	Time and	class	one of these	Time and
meets	hours	Date is	meets	hours	Date is
MWF	8:15am	Thursday, Dec 11 3:30pm-5:30pm	MWF	12:35pm	Tuesday, Dec 16 3:30pm-5:30pm
TTH	8:45am	Wednesday, Dec 17 10:30am – 12:30pm	TTH	1:15pm	Friday, Dec 12 10:30am – 12:30pm
MWF	9:20am	Tuesday, Dec 16 8:00am-10:00am	MWF	1:40pm	Wednesday, Dec 10 10:30am-12:30pm
TTH	10:15am	Wednesday, Dec 17 8:00am – 10:00am	TTH	2:45pm	Monday, Dec 15 10:30am – 12:30pm
MWF	10:25am	Tuesday, Dec 16 10:30am-12:30pm	MW	2:45pm	Wednesday, Dec 10 3:30pm-5:30pm
TTH	11:45am	Tuesday, Dec 16 1:00pm-3:00pm	TTH	4:15pm	Wednesday, Dec 17 1:00pm – 3:00pm
MWF	11:30am	Friday, Dec 12 3:30pm – 5:30pm	MW	4:15pm	Thursday, Dec 11 10:30am-12:30pm