Science, Technology and Culture

September 24, 2013 – January 7, 2014

Lecturer

Prof. Kyoko Inoue
Department of Foreign Languages and Liberal Arts
School of Science for Open and Environmental Systems
Keio University

 

Course Summary

purpose of the course is to introduce students to the cultural bases that the development of science and technology stands on.

In the first half of each class hour, a topic from the latest Japanese news in science or technology fields will be selected for discussion. Here, the instructor will provide some materials to refer to, but students are encouraged to throw in their ideas, insights, and interpretations of the Japanese cultural context to which the topic is related.

In the second half of each class hour, students will take turns and give
presentations on the place science and technology hold in the past, present,
and future of their own home countries.

The topics will depend on students’ special fields as well as current topics,
but will probably include issues such as:
– “Kawaii” culture
– School Festival as Initiation Ceremony?
– Rites of Passage in Japan
– Visual media, movies in Japan
– Comparisons of friendship and communication in different countries/culture
– Comparison between western & eastern video games
– Comparison between Japanese foods & other countries foods
– K-POP in Japan
– Typical Japanese family
– Animation: western vs. eastern
– Food & drinks

 

Lecture Schedule

 You can join to the live sessions (You can choose the date for your presentation)
◯ Learn by the archived video

 

TYPE # DATE TOPIC / THEME
   1 Sep 24, 2013 (Tue) Introduction
   2 Oct 1, 2013 (Tue) Japanese cultural factors embedded in science and technology (1): “kawaii”-ness
  ◯  3 Oct 8, 2013 (Tue) Japanese cultural factors embedded in science and technology (2): group-oriented-ness
  4 Oct 15, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (1)
  5 Oct 22, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (2)
  6 Oct 29, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (3)
  7 Nov 5, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (4)
  8 Nov 12, 2013 (Wed) Students’ special fields and current topics (5)
  9 Nov 19, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (6)
  10 Nov 26, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (7)
  11 Dec 2, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (8)
  12 Dec 10, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (9)
  13 Dec 17, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (10)
  14 Dec 24, 2013 (Tue) Students’ special fields and current topics (11)
  15 Jan 7, 2014 (Tue) Summary