This course emphasizes speaking, listening, reading, and writing modern Japanese. Includes approximately 250 kanji. Supplements class work with audio and video.

Yue Opera, an all-female art that flourished in Shanghai in 1923, resulted from China's social changes and the women's movement. Combining traditional with modern forms and Chinese with Western cultures, Yue Opera today attracts loyal and enthusiastic audiences despite pop arts crazes. We will focus on how audiences, particularly women, are fascinated by gender renegotiations as well as by the all-female cast. The class will read and watch classics of this theater, including Romance of the Western Bower, Peony Pavilion, and Butterfly Lovers.

An introduction to Chinese thought during the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (roughly 770-256 BCE), a time of remarkable philosophical growth and controversy. We read the works of this era's most influential philosophers, including: Kongzi (Confucius), Mozi, Laozi, Mengzi (Mencius), Zhuangzi, Xunzi, and Han Feizi. Topics discussed include: What makes for a just ruler? What kind of life should we live? What is our relationship to nature? We work to understand each philosopher's responses to these questions, but we also learn to develop our own answers.

Asian 212 is the first semester of the second-year Chinese course. This is an intensive course to consolidate and expand students' competencies in the four fundamental areas of language learning--speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Students will improve their oral fluency, study more complex grammatical structures, and enlarge their vocabulary. Emphasis on facilitating daily-life interactions will be supplemented and expanded by increasing discussion of broader issues in society. Students will develop a deeper and broader understanding of relevant aspects of Chinese culture.

First Year Korean I is the first half of elementary Korean. It is designed to provide students who have little or no knowledge of Korean with basic proficiency in Korean speaking, listening, reading, writing, and culture. The course will cover the foundations of Korean vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation and how these can be used in context.

First Year Korean I is the first half of elementary Korean. It is designed to provide students who have little or no knowledge of Korean with basic proficiency in Korean speaking, listening, reading, writing, and culture. The course will cover the foundations of Korean vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation and how these can be used in context.

This course introduces the basics of Modern Standard Arabic and one dialect. It begins with a study of the Arabic script and sounds using the Alif Baa textbook, and then students will use Al-Kitaab I, 3rd edition (chapters 1-5). Students will acquire vocabulary and usage for everyday interactions in Arabic. In addition to the traditional textbook exercises, students will write short paragraphs, and participate in role plays and conversations.