Internationally Taught Project

Full course description

The proposed course has as its overarching goal to offer students an educational experience that resembles as much as possible a foreign immersion without actually traveling abroad. It will enable UCM to offer courses about countries or regions not covered by the expertise of UCM/UM staff members. Courses can be offered on themes, topics and concerns that are of special interest to various regions and in which partnering universities have expert knowledge. This Project will enable students to combine knowledge gained in previous courses about internationally relevant historical developments, socio-cultural patterns, economic trends, political systems, etc., with analytical and communicative competencies gained in previous skills modules, around a theme proposed and introduced by the foreign-based co-coordinator of the course. The Project is designed as a shell (comparable to Think Tank), thus allowing for easy adaption to different international contexts.

Regarding the project on offer in January 2023: It will be on the topic of contemporary Japanese politics, the co- coordinator is Dr. Anoma van der Veere, Osaka University. Participating students will be invited to examine whether it is possible to obtain a rich and reliable understanding the contemporary state of Japanese politics through the lens of popular culture. The traditional approach to exploring and communicating information about a nation’s political system is through historical, legal and policy documents. But popular culture -- including animation (anime), comic books (manga), movies, television dramas, and music -- is itself inherently political. This can range from representing the extended family as the ‘ideal Japanese home’, to conspicuously straightforward anti-foreign sentiments (most frequently, foreign security threats). Student will be expected to examine a variety of different media and deconstruct imbedded narratives in an attempt to ‘read’ the political messages imbued in popular culture products and next compare and contrast these with traditional modes of examining Japanese politics.

Note: For an authentic experience, the tutor is based at Osaka University. This implies that he will attend sessions online. Students are nonetheless expected to be present in Maastricht during the project, since in person collaboration amongst students may be required.

Course objectives

This project will enable students to:

Expand their knowledge base about a foreign country or region by effectively combining information available from public sources with insights gained from experts residing in that country or region;
Translate knowledge gained about a particular aspect of a foreign country’s identity into a practically relevant application (such as a policy, educational intervention, exhibition, etc.);
Effectively cooperate with other members of an interdisciplinary team in a scholarly project;
Reflect constructively on their experience of studying another country and appreciating its culture.

Prerequisites

This project is available for second and third year students. As it there will only be a limited number of places available, you need to apply for enrollment in this project it by filling in the application form on the intranet (UCM Students). Part of this form asks you to elaborate on your motivation to follow the project. This should cover an explanation as to how participating in the project adds to your curriculum, why you think you are well prepared to follow the project and an overview of the relevant courses that you took. The application needs to be submitted in advance of the course registration deadline. The course coordinator reserves the right to only select the students that are deemed most suitable. It will be communicated in a timely manner, but no later than 6 weeks before the start of the project, whether the application for the project was successful. If access to the project is denied, then you will be allocated to a backup project. Please indicate the backup project on your course registration form.

Internationally Taught Project