CONTEMPORARY EAST ASIAN SOCIETIES

This is one of the complementary courses within the "Japan" curriculum of the master degree programme in "Lingue, economie e istituzioni dell'Asia e dell'Africa Mediterranea". The course offers lectures on contemporary East Asian societies, including Japan. The course aims to provide knowledge of East Asia in terms of cultural, economic, political, religious, and social perspectives.

Knowledge and understanding:
- to know and understand the cultural, economic, political, religious, and social aspects of contemporary Asia, including Japan

Applying knowledge and understanding:
- to use the knowledge of the contemporary Asian cultural, economic, political, religious, and social aspects in the research and job.

Making judgments:
- to exercise judgment within a global and multi-dimensional perspective.

Communication:
- to write a research essay using the knowledge of contemporary Asia and global perspectives.

I recommend that students possess an intermediate level of Japanese (Level N3 JLPT) to integrate and deepen the issues presented during the course. Moreover, students should already have a basic knowledge of contemporary Japanese society.

In this course, you will learn about the following three topics: (1) the history and present situation of East Asia, (2) the basics of social theory, and (3) the basics of research design. In (1), you will understand the history of Japan in the 20th century and contemporary Japan in the context of their connections with East Asia and other regions. In (2), you will learn how to think about social phenomena based on theory and data. In (3), you will think about your research.

The schedule of classes is as follows:

①: overview of lessons
②: from the eve of the 20th century to the First World War
③: the Second World War
④: conceptual history of states/economies/international organisations
⑤: (1) Research questions
⑥: the prevalence of nation-state systems and the Cold War
⑦: The formation of states in the Cold War
⑧: The formation of the nation and the end of the Cold War
⑨: Conceptual history of culture/nature
⑩: (2) Previous research and data
⑪: Contemporary Asia and Japan (1)
⑫: Contemporary Asia and Japan (2)
⑬: contemporary Asia and Japan (3)
⑭: Contemporary Studies Area
⑮: (3) Academic Writing.

East Asia
Gordon, Andrew, 2020, A Modern History of Japan, Fourth Edition, Oxford University Press.
Goto Kenta, Endo Tamaki, Ito Asei, 2021, The Asian Economy: Contemporary Issues and Challenges, Routledge.
Kottmann, Nora and Cornelia Reiher (eds.), 2020, Studying Japan: Handbook of Research Designs, Fieldwork and Methods, Nomos. 
Oguma Eiji (ed), 2019, Heisei-Shi, Kawade Shobo Shinsho.（『平成史　完全版』）
Pieke, Frank N. and Koichi Iwabuchi (ed.), 2021, Global East Asia: Into the Twenty-First Century, University of California Press.

Social Theory
Chang, Ha-Joon, 2014, Economics: The User's Guide, Pelican.
Conrad, Sebastian, 2016, What is Global History?, Princeton University Press.
Kiechel, Walter, 2010, The Lords of Strategy: The Secret Intellectual History of the New Corporate World, Harvard Business Review Press.
Ryan, Alan, 2013, On Politics: A History of Political Thought from Herodotus to the Present, Penguin Books.
Massey, Doreen, 2005, For Space, SAGE Publications.
Marcus, George E. E. and Michael M. J. Fischer, 1999, Anthropology as Cultural Critique: An Experimental Moment in the Human Sciences, University of Chicago Press.
Hunt, Lynn, 2014, Writing History in the Global Era, W. W. Norton & Company.
Peter Burke, 2019, What is Cultural History?, Polity.
Plummer, Ken, 2021, Sociology: The Basics, Routledge.
Graeber, David and David Wengrow, 2021, The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Research Design
Alvesson, M., & Sandberg, J., 2013, Constructing Research Questions: Doing Interesting Research, SAGE Publications.
Booth,  Wayne C., Gregory G. Colomb, Joseph M. Williams, Joseph Bizup and William T. FitzGerald, 2016, The Craft of Research, Fourth Edition, Fourth Edition, the University of Chicago Press.
Chaubey, Varanya, 2018, The little book of research writing : the structural challenge of communicating knowledge + a method to meet it, CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.
Creswell, John W., 2021, A Concise Introduction to Mixed Methods Research, ‎ SAGE Publications.
Creswell, John W., and Vicki L. Plano Clark, 2017, Designing and Conducting Mixed Methods Research, SAGE Publications.
Kottmann, Nora and Cornelia Reiher (eds.), 2020, Studying Japan: Handbook of Research Designs, Fieldwork and Methods, Nomos.
Mullaney, Thomas S., and Christopher Rea, 2022,, Where Research Begins Choosing a Research Project That Matters to You and the,World, Univ of Chicago Press.
Punch, Keith F, 2013, Introduction to Social Research: Quantitative and Qualitative Approaches, SAGE Publications Ltd. 
Silvia, Paul J., 2019, How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing, 2nd ed, American Psychological Association.
Wadsworth, Yoland, 2020, Do It Yourself Social Research: The bestselling practical guide to doing social research projects, Routledge.

To successfully finish the course, students are required to complete the following two tasks:

1) Pass the computer test on ‘East Asian History and the Present’ (18/30, 50%).

2) Submit a research plan for the Tesi magistrale (50%). Write about: 1) what topics and themes you are interested in regarding Japan; 2) preceding research you think is important; 3) what research question you want to answer; 4) what research methods you will use to collect data. The report should be written in English or Japanese. If it is in English, it should be around 1000 words, and if it is in Japanese, it should be around 2000 characters.
Non-attending: The exam program is the same as the attending students.

Frontal lessons in Japanese.

All materials of the lessons and further readings will be available on the moodle platform dedicated to the course.

All course materials will be available on the moodle platform dedicated to the course.

written

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "International cooperation" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development