Election of New Board Members, President
Three new members of the Board and a new President of the Association will be elected this spring. Ballots and election information were mailed to each member of ATJ in early January; you should have received this mailing by the middle of January.
You are asked to return your ballot by February 20 to the ATJ office, using the postpaid envelope included with the ballot. (Please note that you MUST vote by mail; you will not be able to bring ballots to the ATJ General Membership meeting in March.)
The results of the election will be announced at the General Membership meeting on March 6, at which time the new Board members will assume their duties. As stipulated in the Bylaws, the newly elected President will serve for an initial year as President-elect, working with President Seiichi Makino and Past President Patricia Wetzel as an Executive Committee to govern the Association.
Invitation to the 2004 ATJ Seminar and General Membership Meeting and the Association for Asian Studies (AAS) Annual Conference
ATJ’s annual Thursday Seminar provides a chance for all ATJ members to gather, meet and talk with colleagues, participate in the business of the Association, and hear the latest research on language, linguistics, pedagogy, and literature. This year’s Seminar will be held Thursday, March 4, 2004, in San Diego, in conjunction with the annual conference of the Association for Asian Studies (AAS), at the Town and Country Resort and Convention Center. The Seminar features a full day of concurrent panel sessions—twelve in all—on literature, language pedagogy, linguistics, and second language acquisition. The official conference website can be found at http://www.japaneseteaching.org/ATJseminar/2004/.
The Seminar’s keynote speaker, from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m., will be Susumu Kuno, of Harvard University. Professor Kuno will speak on "Revisiting the ‘Typological Characteristics of Japanese’ (Kuno 1973)."
The Seminar schedule is printed in full in the centerfold to this newsletter. The Seminar is open to all ATJ members and their guests: advance registration is not required. However, a fee of $35 will be payable on-site by non-members of ATJ or NCJLT. (Non-members will of course have the option of joining ATJ at the Seminar.)
If you wish to also attend sessions of the AAS conference, which will be held at the same venue March 4-7, it is necessary to register either in advance or on-site. On-line early registration can be conducted at the AAS web site: www.aasianst.org.
We cordially invite all ATJ members to attend the annual General Membership Meeting, which will be held Saturday, March 6, 2004, from 1:00 to 2:30 p.m. The membership meeting is your chance to meet ATJ’s officers and Board members and to participate in making decisions that affect the Association. As usual, there will be door prizes donated by publishers who specialize in books on Japanese language pedagogy and Japanese studies.
The larger AAS conference is an opportunity to attend panel sessions on a variety of subjects, find out what is happening in the fields of Japan and Asian Studies, see the latest books and instructional materials in the exhibit hall, and meet colleagues and friends. Of particular interest to ATJ members at this year’s conference will be two sessions sponsored or endorsed by ATJ: "The Role of Grammar in Language Instruction: New Perspectives on Teaching Japanese," which will take place Saturday (March 6) from 10:45 a.m.-12:45 p.m.; and "Borders and Transgression in the Work of Ito Hiromi: A Discussion with the Writer," which will be held Saturday (March 6) from 2:45-4:45 p.m.
Other sessions at the AAS conference will focus on a variety of aspects of Japanese literature, history, and culture. Sessions of potential interest to ATJ members include "Space and Corporeality in 20th-Century Japanese Literature"; "Topics in Japanese Functional Linguistics"; "Education and Politics in Japan"; "Fallout from the Kafu Boom: Critique and Resistance in Modern Japanese Literature"; "The Tale of Genji as Cultural, Political and Critical Commodity"; "How Do Learners Engage Japanese Culture?: ‘Performance’ in the Contexts of Language Learning, Teacher Training, and Study Abroad"; and others. As always, the exhibit hall will feature the latest publications in Asian studies from a large number of university presses and other publishers. ATJ will have a booth in the exhibit hall: please visit us at booth #194.
Information on registering and attending the AAS conference is available from the AAS office (1021 East Huron St., Ann Arbor, MI 48104); by email at annmtg@aasianst.org; or on the Web at www.aasianst.org. The ATJ office can also supply information on conference registration.
All of the conference events will take place at the Town and Country Resort and Convention Center, 500 Hotel Circle North, San Diego, CA 92108-3091. If you wish to stay at the Town and Country in order to attend the ATJ Seminar and/or the AAS conference, please phone the hotel at 800-772-8527 or fax 619-291-3584; when registering, mention the Asian Studies conference to receive a special discounted room rate.
ATJ SIGs To Meet at Seminar
All five of ATJ’s Special Interest Groups (SIGs) have scheduled meetings in conjunction with the ATJ Seminar and the AAS Conference. The Professional Development SIG will meet Friday, March 5, from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., in Garden Salon 2. The Classical SIG will meet Friday, March 5, from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., in the Clarendon Room. The Study Abroad for Advanced Skills (SAFAS) SIG will meet Friday, March 5, from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. in the Eaton Room. The Heritage SIG will meet for dinner in Trellises restaurant on Thursday, March 4, beginning at 7:30 p.m. Please contact Masako Douglas (masakoucla @earthlink.net) if you plan to attend the Heritage SIG meeting. The Community College SIG will gather in Trellises restaurant on Thursday, March 4, at 7:30 p.m. and continue there or at another location in the hotel. Please contact Hiroko Furuyama (elacjapan@ hotmail.com) if you are interested in attending the Community College SIG meeting. For further information on any of the SIG meetings, contact the ATJ office.
Professional Development SIG News
The ATJ Professional Development SIG Meeting will be held at the Annual Conference of the Association for Asian Studies in San Diego, California on Friday, March 5th from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m in the San Diego Town & Country Hotel, Garden Salon 2 (same building as ATJ seminar). The meeting does not require AAS registration and is open to all SIG members and those who are interested in professional development. Non-SIG members are encouraged to become SIG members. To join the Professional Development SIG, please send e-mail to Y.-H. Tohsaku at ytohsaku@ucsd.edu with your name, affiliation, email address, and membership (ATJ, NCJLT, or both). The detailed agenda of the meeting will be sent through the JPD-L list and posted on the SIG webpage at www.colorado.edu/ealld/atj/SIG/prodev. If you are interested in attending this meeting, please send email to Y.-H. Tohsaku at ytohsaku@ucsd.edu.
ATJ Exhibit at AAS—Booth 194
ATJ will have a booth in the Exhibit Hall again this year at the AAS conference. The booth number is 194. We will have membership information, copies of the journal Japanese Language and Literature, information on professional development projects and the Bridging Project for Study Abroad in Japan, and small gifts for visitors. Please stop by!
Japanese Enrollments Increasing: MLA
The Modern Language Association (MLA) recently released the results of its most recent survey of foreign language enrollments in U.S. colleges and universities and reported significant increases in the number of students studying all languages, including Japanese. The survey was conducted in fall of 2002. Compared with the results of the previous survey, conducted in 1998, the number of students studying Japanese increased 21.1%, from 43,141 to 52,238. Japanese is the fifth most commonly studied foreign language, after Spanish, French, German, Italian, and American Sign Language (ASL). A draft copy of the report on the survey can be requested by email from adfl@mla.org. The complete results of the survey will be published in the Winter 2004 issue of the ADFL Bulletin and will be posted on the ADFL section of the MLA's web site after publication.
ATJ Endowment Is Growing
ATJ has joined the ranks of other non-profit organizations in establishing an endowment fund. Contributions of any amount to this fund, which are tax-deductible, will help to ensure that the Association can continue to provide services to members in the future. Contributions have recently been made to the Endowment by Kimiko Abramoff, Yukie Aida, Marilyn Bolles, Charlotte Eubanks, Shigemitsu Matsui, Michiko Nakagawa, and Patricia Thornton. Please consider donating when you next renew your membership, or by mail at any time. For more information, contact the ATJ office.