Admission requirements
No admission requirements. Students who are interested in taking this course, but who are not registered in Japanese studies, are requested to contact their co-ordinator of studies.
Description
This course will explore waste and recycling in East Asia as a social and cultural phenomenon. In recent decades, waste has garnered increasing global attention primarily as an environmental problem. But waste is also closely connected to the daily lives of ordinary people and, thus, can shed light on a range of questions useful for understanding East Asian societies.
The following topics will be addressed during the course: how the state, the citizens, and the private sector interact with waste; how wasted materials live through everyday lives; how waste acquires social meanings; and how waste becomes a means to make a living. Particular attention will be paid to the managements, practices and discourses that emerge through the ways that different actors engage with waste in contemporary China, Taiwan, South Korean and Japan.
Course objectives
By the end of the course students will
Understand and reproduce key concepts and themes important for a cultural/social understanding of waste;
Understand and reproduce key concepts and themes important for understanding East Asian societies;
Connect key concepts and themes from the cultural/social understanding of waste to those of social practices in East Asian societies;
Analyze discourses and practices of disposal and recycling from a cultural and social perspective.
Timetable
See timetable
Mode of instruction
Seminar
Course Load
Total course load: 140 hours
Attending seminars (12 × 2): 24 hours
Readings (approx. 40 pages per week) and assignments (Blackboard posts, presentation): 72 hours
Assignments: 44 hours
Assessment method
Participation element (including class attendance and discussion, short assignments and/or oral presentations): 40%
Analytical element (essay proposal 500 words): 20%
Research element (research essay 2,000 words): 40%
Analytic element and reseach element must be passed to receive a passing grade for the course. The course grade will be determined based on the weighted average of course elements once all elements have been passed.
Resit
There is no ‘resit’ for the participation element and analytical element. For the essay to be submitted for the research element, two deadlines apply. Failure to submit by the second ‘resit’ deadline will result in a reduction of the grade in accordance with program regulations.
Blackboard
Yes, Blackboard
Reading list
Readings for the course will be available via Blackboard
Registration
Registration through uSis. Not registered, means no permission to attend this course. See also the ‘Registrationprocedures for classes and examinations’ for registration deadlines and more information on how to register
Registration Studeren à la carte and Contractonderwijs
Not applicable.