Through this class I have been intrigued by many various elements of East Asian culture and language, though the element I have been most interested in is the ways in which different languages are treated, such as many of the sinitic languages being considered dialects, even though they are mutually unintelligible. I am very interested in politics, and this helped showcase an intersection of cultural identity and political action.

In general the readings were a helpful introduction to what was being specifically mentioned, and then the lecture reinforced the important parts and added emphasis. This was further helped by the class discussions, which allowed me to explain what I thought about the content, as well as recieve other’s interpretations.

Prior to the class I only viewed linguistics as the study of the language, which included things like lexical variation and structure, but this class has shown me how language affects culture, as well as non-verbal features of language that linguistics that can be focused on. This is making me consider various fields of study that I am not primarily associated with and the different areas that are encompassed within them.

Throughout the all the lectures in the term, there are serval issues that have intrigued me the most. They are basic characteristics of Chinese, Korean, and Japanese, new masculine gender identities in East Asia, different parenting styles between East Asian parents and Western parents. After the lectures for the basic characteristics of Chinese, Korean, and Japanese, I have better understanding of the fundamental differences and similarities among these three languages. Although ancient Japanese and Korean people learned, wrote and used in old Chinese characters, they are really different in terms of word order typology and morphological typology. For example, Chinese has a word order subject-verb-object while Japanese and Korean have a word order subject-object-verb. For the topic of new masculine gender identities in East Asia, I feel like it is very interesting and new topic that I never notice before. Since today is male-dominated society, how females behavior in today’s society is often more controversial than how males act. As a Chinese, I do not even know there exists a new masculine gender in China called “City Jade Men” and why this new masculine identity arises. Therefore, it is very cool to see there are some changes in masculine gender identities right now. For the topic of the parenting style between East Asian parents and Western parents, one of the important reasons that cause the differences in parenting style is the way to understand the word “successful”. Parents in East Asia trend to make the connection between being successful and having high grades and outstanding jobs. On the other hand, Western parents believe that to be happy is the most important things to educate their children. It seems like that many people in the class have hard time to understand and accept the parenting style in East Asia. However, I want to argue that East Asian parents try to express their love to their children and they care their children although it is really strict and harsh to some people. Additionally, in modern days, East Asian parents have changed this traditional way of educating their children and no longer as harsh and strict as described from the article we read for the lecture.

The way that I have studied for this class is to read the assigned articles and finish the quizzes before class. Then, I will pay attention on the class and discuss the context of the lecture with my classmates after class. I think it is very helpful by doing that. Since I read the articles and did the quizzed before class, I have a brief idea for what we are going to learn in the lecture. Then I let where I can really focus on the lecture to get my questions solved in the next day’s lecture. Additionally, since I am making more and more friends in the class, we will discuss some of the topics from the lecture with each other after class. By doing so, I feel like that I get deeper understanding on what we have learned in the class. In addition, I will take notes with the lecture slides in order to list and summary the major points for each topic. Later on, I will use these notes to study for midterm and final exams.

This class is really changing your sense of “linguistics” as a field. Before this class, I basically know nothing about linguistics. I think linguistics is only about how to speak the languages. Therefore, all that you will do for linguistics is to memorize the words and grammars to speak the languages. However, linguistics is much more interesting than that. For example, we learn how languages are gendered in many different ways. We learn that how languages use to “scare” in North Korea, how languages reflect some social, cultural, and commercial phenomena in the use of oppa in South Korea and high pitch girls in Japan. Furthermore, it is nice that we get some guest lecture on both tea and traditional Chinese medicine. It provides a really cool introduction for more people to know more about China and Chinese culture.

I really like this class and thank you for making such enjoyable class. I am very glad that I take this class as one of my last classes in the University of Oregon.

As a half Japanese, half America, I’ve always wanted to learn East Asian culture and linguistics. Even though I am part of Japanse, I don’t have any knowledge of Japanese linguistics or difference between japan and other countries.  Most of the material that Professor Idemaru taught us in the class was new to me. I never thought that there is such a difference in Korean, Japanese and Chinese writing systems. It was quite surprising that when professor Idemaru thought us Korean used to use Chinese. Because I knew Kanji is based on Chinese characters but I had no idea Korea used to use Chinese characters. But I still don’t know why was Korea able to remove kanji but japan wasn’t able to?

The discussion class also helped me to understand the concepts of this class deeper. The research report achieved existing knowledge and gave me a chance to interact with other students through group discussion. Since there were a lot of Asian students in our class, it was always fun to talk to them about cultural differences and the conversations always helped me to write a good research report. I realized face to face interviews/conversations can probe for more explanations of responses compare to online research.

This class was not challenging for me. But I definitely developed some reading skills. Most of all reading assignments were quite interesting and enjoyable. Of course, class lectures were helpful but I feel like reading assignments made me think a lot and it was also good preparation for the class.

Even though I am not majoring in Asian studies or anything, I feel like I gained the skill of Asian languages cultures. The class lecture and all of the readings I’ve done in this class made me think about how diverse East Asian linguistics is. If I have a chance, I will definitely continue studying East Asia culture and linguistics.

Throughout this term, the topics that were covered in this class allowed me to learn more about the East Asian language and culture. The main issue that intrigued me the most would be the topic of gendered differences. Before I took this class, I always thought that both genders would speak the same way in Asian cultures. But when I learned that they have gendered differences in their languages, it was a cultural shock to me because I have been taking Chinese for ten years and I never thought about the differences there were. An example would be when both genders would use different ways to say “I am” in Japanese.

Another issue that was interesting to me would be the Chinese parenting styles because I am raised by Chinese parents. I feel like Chinese parents today are becoming more lenient to their children. From my experience, my parents were strict and controlled what I did but eventually, they allowed me to be more independent. They felt that if I made my own decisions and had my own freedom, I could learn from my mistakes and choose what kind of person I want to be in the future. I feel like they made the right choice to let me be independent most times because it made me work harder in everything I did, find out what I want to achieve in life and who I want to be in life.

The readings, class discussions, and lectures definitely helped with my learning process because Professor Idemaru and the GE, Hyunji, went in-depth on the topics which allowed me to learn more about East Asian culture. The readings specifically helped me a lot because it helped me prepare for the lecture and understand the discussions that were going on in class.

I approach learning in this course by taking notes on the lecture slides the night before because it helps me mentally prepare for class and I won’t have stress out about making sure I took notes on everything on the slides. Taking notes ahead of class time helps me learn more about the topics we are covering during class because I can focus on listening to the professor and process what she is saying mentally. This class is changing my sense of “linguistics” as a field because I am learning things about the three East Asian languages that I didn’t know before. I came into this class having a minimal amount of knowledge on the languages but after taking this class, I learned more about the different aspects of them and how they were created.

This class is not challenging me to change how I think because I was raised in a community where the population mainly consisted of Asians, specifically Chinese, Japanese and Koreans. Throughout my life, I have learned a lot about East Asian culture because my family and everyone in my life is from an Asian background. Thus, this led me to be open-minded about the material that I learn in class about East Asia because I am exposed to the language and culture.

What questions or issues have intrigued you? What reactions have you had about readings, class discussions, and lectures? How do you approach to learning in this course? Is the class changing your sense of “linguistics” as a field? Is the class challenging you to change how you think or how you prepare (If so, can you describe the change?)

I thought our lecture about different parenting styles was especially intriguing. As an Asian-American who was raised in the United States, the different parenting styles between Asians and White-Americans has been a significant part of my life. Especially because I’ve lived away from home since I was 15 years old, with three separate White-American host families. I’ve been able to observe the cultural differences when it comes to raising kids, and it’s significantly informed my view of the world and how I would like to raise my kids.

After thinking deeply about this topic, I have found that the lecture in class about traditional Asian parents versus White-American families are quite accurate within my life experience. My family did emphasize education and independence and less about self-esteem. This manifested in extra tutoring and an emphasis on my problem solving ability in figuring out my own problems without intervention. Whether this be homework, laundry, or social development, my parents wanted me to figure it out myself in hopes of becoming independent. With the White-American families that I have lived with, all of them were more involved with my social life and encouraged socializing. Whether that be allowing me to stay out late, hosting parties, or asking about my personal social life, these families emphasized meeting new people and finding new experiences.

With my past experiences, learning about the observations of these cultural differences from academics and my classmates significantly educates me on this matter in a relative sense. How these differences affect others in their development and their views on life has helped keep me openminded about the pros and cons of both lifestyles that I have been a part of.

I think that these observations has elevated my self-awareness and education beyond linguistics in this class, and goes deeper into cultural differences that have been developed over thousands of years. I think at the end of the day, these help me understand the nuances in language at a deeper level and why cultures communicate differently.