Academic Presentations I

December 23 note: The Spirited Back presentation group has suggested that they would like to give the presentation again, and I have been happy to comply, as I would with any other group who would like to re-present (please send e-mail if so). The re-presentation of “Spirited Back” will be either Friday January 14 or Friday January 21, date, room, and time to be announced in a note on this page.

December 17: Anonymous in-class student evaluation of the course. Many thanks to students for making this an enjoyable course.

December 10: The password-protected peer evaluation is up. Click the image to get there.

Image from hongkong.neuerordner.de.

December 8 note: The password-protected ojuken evaluation is complete. Click the image below to reach it.

December 3: Ojuken presentation. The quantitative part of the password-protected evaluation is up (Dec. 7) and may be accessed by clicking the image at the left. The qualitative part will follow tomorrow.

Image from www.rcs.ac.jp.

November 26: Sex Pistols presentation. Click the image to access the password-protected evaluation.

Image from www.rakuten.co.jp.

November 24 note: The password-protected evaluation for the Pirates presentation is up. Click the image below to go to it.

November 19: I’ll hope to have the password-protected evaluation for the Pirates presentation up by mid-week. When it is up I’ll post a note here. Students will be able to reach the evaluation by clicking on the image at the left.

Image from f.parisy.free.fr/images.

November 18 note: The qualitative part of the password-protected Beatles evaluation is up. Click the Beatles image below to reach it.

Students are reminded that the “What was most successful?” and “What could have been better?” parts of the evaluations are required, not optional. Failure to write something in response to each question results in only half credit for the evaluation sheet.

November 17 note: The quantitative part of the password-protected evaluation for the Beatles presentation may be accessed by clicking the Beatles image below. The qualitative part will follow tomorrow.

November 12: Second formal presentation. Apologies for not getting the evaluation up today (Monday November 15) after having said that I would. Shall have it up as soon as possible. It will be accessible by clicking the image at the left and entering the new user name and password announced in class. The old user name and password no longer work.

Image from CNN.com.

November 5: First formal presentation. The password-protected evaluation is here. Sorry I forgot to announce a username and password. Both are required to access the page. For “username” please type the title of the presentation with no capital letters. For “password” type guest. I’ll change these and announce to the class the new username and password November 12.

Image from mediaworkshop.org.

October 29: No class. Groups are expected to be at work preparing the final presentations. Should you need to see me please come by during my office hours (3:00~5:00) Thursday November 4.

October 22: Final class discussion before the formal presentations begin November 5. The focus was on the categories of evaluation in the presentation evaluation worksheet, a copy of which students should print and bring to class for each of the formal presentations.

Students are reminded that the October 29 class is cancelled. Anyone needing to speak with me about the presentations may do so during my regular Thursday office hours, which I shall keep both October 28 and, during the university festival, November 4.

October 15: Sentence outlines successfully completed, checked, and discussed. Discussion of the upcoming final presentations, and dates set for each. Homework: continue preparing for the presentations. Next week we’ll discuss the peer-evaluation procedures and categories.

Students are reminded of two upcoming presentations in the lecture series at Korakuen, by me, “Edward Said and the Politics of Cyberspace,” and Akitoshi Miyashita, “Reactive State Revisited: Japan Between America and Asia.” Would be good to see some of you at one or both.

October 8: Annotated bibliographies were completed successfully. Homework: prepare within each group a formal sentence outline of your project.

October 1: Informal reports on the project activities of the summer were finished. Homework for each presentation group, due at the beginning of class October 8: a classified and annotated working bibliography of sources, standard manuscript form.

September 24: Welcome back. In the first class session of the second term all but one presentation group gave an informal report on the activities of the summer. We’ll begin the October 1 class with the last of these reports.

Announcement was made of the lecture series (in English) taking place this term at the Korakuen campus, Tuesday and Saturday evenings. Homework: look at the lecture series announcement page, and consider attending one or more of the formal presentations. I would be particularly pleased to see any of you at Akira Iriye’s talk on “Cultural Globalization in East” Asia next Tuesday, October 5, 6:10 ~7:40.

June 11: Correction of working bibliographies. Students from whom I did not receive a bibliography are reminded that a certain way to fail the course is to fail to submit written work as assigned. I call your attention to the course description: “the minimum requirements for passing will be attentive presence at class meetings and timely completion of assignments.”

Students are reminded that the June 18 class is cancelled.

Homework: prepare for the first round of formal presentations, to be given in the June 25, July 2, and July 9 class meetings. These may be thought of as “progress reports.” They should address the following questions:

1. What is your one-sentence proposal (see notes at May 7 below) at this stage? If it has changed, why?

2. Have you been successful in identifying and collecting relevant sources? What are your major primary sources? What are you major secondary sources? What difficulties have you had in locating or collecting sources?

3. What other difficulties have you encountered in any part of the research process?

4. What have you learned so far?

5. What are your plans concerning the project during the summer holiday?

Presentations should be between 20 and 30 minutes and must include a full working bibliography, perfectly prepared, of all sources you have consulted to date.

We shall not meet again as a class before the first of the presentations, and so should you have questions in advance of the first presentations please ask them by e-mail or during my regular office hours, Thursdays from 1:00 to 3:00.

June 4: Completion of the (first-round of) discussion of the one-sentence research proposals and the data sets they predict. Completion of the assigned bibliography exercises.

Homework: Prepare a working bibliography of at least ten sources, at least five of them primary, for your research project. These should be done individually, not in the presentation groups. You may follow any bibliographical style as long as you remain consistent in its application. You will probably find Hacker pp. 135~48 (on MLA style), 170~76 (APA style), or 195~202 (Chicago style) to be of use, and perhaps also the online databases we have discussed, the NACSIS WebCat and the LoC Online Catalogue.

May 28: Introduction to bibliography.

Homework: complete the bibliography worksheet.

May 21: Continued work in refining the one-sentence research proposals so that they predict a manageable data set. Discussion of the primary materials predicted by each of the one-sentence proposals. Introduction to the largest public databases of English-language and Japanese-language texts, the Library of Congress Online Catalogue and the NACSIS WebCat.

Homework:

1. To get an idea of the kinds of materials available about your topic in English and Japanese, try some key-word searches related to the topic in the LoC Catalogue and the NACSIS WebCat.

2. Read through this on my links page to get an idea of other electronic databases that might help with your research.

3. Bring the Diana Hacker Pocket Style Manual 4th edition to class next week, in preparation for an introduction to the concept and practice of bibliography.

May 14: Discussion of the degree to which research is a systematic procedure, and of data and data sets, primary and secondary sources, and the need for specificity in the selection of a topic. Workshop in identifying primary sources for the topics proposed.

Homework: Rethink and rewrite your one-sentence proposal in light of today’s discussion.

May 7: First (informal) presentations completed. Brief discussion of the meaning of the “academic” in “academic presentation,” with emphasis on the point that “academic” has to do with the approach to a topic rather than with the topic itself.

Workshop in deciding topics of interest in the class, and in forming groups of three to five students who will engage with these for the remainder of the course.

Homework: turn in at the beginning of the May 14 class a typed page identifying the members of your group, the topic, and a one-sentence proposal that begins with either

We want to explain that . . . or

We want to discover whether . . . .

Announcement, in the interest of keeping the course coherent, that grades of A will be reserved for students who are absent from the course no more than twice.

April 23: First (informal) presentations begin: self-introduction that includes information about academic background and academic interests. These will conclude next week.

Homework: before the May 30 class meeting send me e-mail, subject header AcPres I, and include a photograph of yourself, this to ensure that I may reach all of you by e-mail and to facilitate my matching of names to faces.

April 16: Introduction to the course. Discussion of linguistic diversity and the role of English in the world. Homework: be prepared to offer to the class a five-minute self introduction.