Using English as an International Language (E.I.L.),Thursday 2.h, room 15B 

Course Goal: Improving your skills at international communication in English, through background knowledge of various countries and international organizations. Also Research of information in the Internet and presentations skills will be developed in this seminar.

Course Outline: For Japan, English is not used inside the country like countries such as Singapore, India, Jamaica or Nigeria. For Japanese, English is used mainly as an international language. To be able to communicate with people from many countries, you must have a good “educated” command of English to express yourself clearly. But to avoid misunderstandings, you also need to know other cultures and how people think about various things. How is the way they “look at the world” different from Japanese? We must be careful not to stereotype, but there are large differences between cultures. For ‘Expanding Circle’ users of English such as Japanese, EIL and a new research area called “English as a Lingua Franca” (ELF) are helping us learn what really happens in such meetings, and how people successfully communicate.

 In this seminar we will study a different country and international organization every two weeks, focusing on attitudes of people about a range of fundamental areas of life. Each student will do a short 5-minute ミニ発表 every other week (隔週). In the second week for each country, we will discuss one of the topics from the previous week more deeply. 

Countries and Organizations　

Spring Term: Asia and Europe: Japan, China, Belgium, Switzerland, Ireland,  Turkey, European Organizations (esp. European Union and European Council)

Fall Term: Asia and the World: India, South Korea, Egypt, New Zealand, USA, South-Africa, International Organizations (esp. UNO)  

Mini-Presentation Topics: (Depending on number of students)

Background Study (“Facts”)：Geography, Historical Background (overview and Early Modern Era 1850-1945), Politics Leaders (1946-present), Economy and Trade. Language Policy

Thinking and Attitudes (“Culture”)： Food and Drink, Sports, Fashion/Style, Work & Business, relations of Men and Women, Music/Entertainment, Ceremonies/Religion, Diversity of people

office hour: room 517 in the kenkyuu-to, office hour: Tuesday 17.00-18.00 > see also this link about the office hour, Mail adress: imigalexander (at) hotmail.com   

LINKS 

• Moodle-page (Login required)
• World Survey Values (Cultural Map of the world), Asian Value Revisited (text review, Ger) 
• English varities (BBC) 
• OECD better life index 

additional Links: 

China: historicial Maps of China (Chinafolio)