In Asia, the Japanese language is one of the important languages in business, education, technological development, environmental technology, arts, welfare, etc. The Japanese culture is a comprehensive, inclusive, and unique culture harmonized with old traditions and new. The Japanese program at the University of St. Thomas supports students' language acquisition and cultural understanding of Japan and its people.
*Students wishing to major or minor in Japanese may do so by special arrangement with Macalester College and approval of the St. Thomas Department of Modern and Classical Languages.
- Learn basic and intermediate levels of modern standard Japanese by speaking, listening, writing and reading activities.
- Develop an understanding of diverse and similar cultural aspects by reading Japanese essays and short stories, and reflect why and how they formed.
- Prepare for the Japanese study abroad program affiliated with Sophia (Tokyo), IES (Tokyo and Nagoya) and Osaka-Gakuin (Osaka) Universities.
- Prepare for an internship, the Japanese Teaching Program such as JET and the Japanese proficiency tests when students desire.
- Enjoy learning Japanese language and cultures to fulfill goals for communication, culture learning, comparisons and connections with other studies and preparation in multilingual/multi-cultural communities.
Courses in Japanese are offered with the assumption that many of the students will be visiting Japan in the near future. Thus, the Japanese program strives to:
- Lay a solid foundation in the areas of speaking, listening, reading, and writing. All three writing systems (hiragana, katakana, and kanji) are covered.
- Give students basic language skills sufficient to manage day-to-day life in Japan.
- Promote interest in Japan, Japanese people, and their culture.
- Help students fulfill professional and personal endeavors at an international level.
- Eliminate fear of speaking Japanese in front of people.
- To provide the foundation for earning a major or minor in the language.
- Japan's four main islands are Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu which stretch over the same latitudes as Maine to Florida.
- Japanese is spoken by more than 130 million people.
- Japanese uses a combination of two native phonetic alphabets, Hiragana and Katakana, and Kanji, adopted Chinese originated characters.