Japanese Language Classes

Here are Mei, Satsuki, and Totoro waiting at the bus stop in Miyazaki Hayao's Tonari no Totoro (となりのトトロ)

The Art of "Playing" Japanese

Of the many haiku poems that I have learned, the following poem by Issa (1762-1826) remains one of my favorites. In his poem, Issa remembers a village festival when all the other children received new clothes. In his worn and tattered clothes, Issa stood alone watching the other children who excluded him from their play. As he watched them from a distance, he noticed a small sparrow looking lost and forsaken, as if it had just fallen from its nest. He turned to the sparrow and said:

Come! With each other
Let's play, little sparrow
Without any mother.

我と来てあそべよおやのない雀

(ware to kite / asobe yo / oya no nai suzume )

Learning a language requires a lot of individual grunt work. No one can learn a language for you. But it helps to have friends with whom to converse and practice. And since we all have more to learn and since we all feel that we cannot speak or read or express ourselves fluently, we need friends with whom we can share our failures and our mistakes. Humbled but undaunted, we can come together and "play" with Japanese and see how this language can transform the way we think and feel about the world around us.

As Johan Huizinga notes in Homo Ludens, the classic text about play and culture, and more recently, as Diane Ackerman writes in her book Deep Play and as Wayne Booth comments in his book For the Love of It, Amateuring and Its Rivals, learning a language is all about our willingness to "play." We need to learn how to "play" Japanese in much the same way as we learn how to play an instrument or learn how to play tennis. In Japanese, the word for play is asobu . And while the word "play" in English seems to indicate frivolity and a lack of seriousness, the Japanese verb "asobu" celebrates "play" as an essential and important activity. Indeed, while the English words "earnest" and "serious" tend to exclude the idea of play, asobu includes serious and earnest effort.

As you can see from my syllabi for first and second year Japanese, I encourage "genuine play"; that is, I urge you not to participate in Japanese language learning in a "half-playful" way; in what the Japanese call "asobi-hanbun" (遊び半分) manner. In English, we often tell people not to be "half serious"; in Japanese, we tell people not to be "half-playful." You must be willing to learn and play "wholeheartedly"; to play just for the fun of it. Come join me, then; and together we will "play" in the garden of Japanese and discover the joys of seeing and sensing the world with new words.

J105 Syllabus | J205 Syllabus | Freeman Brochure

I have included the syllabi for first and second year Japanese. Please contact me if you have any questions about the Japanese language program at Whitman College.