Major Learning Outcome 3: Secondary Culture
Outcomes:
3.1. Students describe concepts of culture and use that understanding in their comparison of the target culture with the second culture.
3.2. Students will analyze and make connections among the ways of thinking and perspectives, behavioral practices and cultural products of a second culture.
Course:
Archaeology/Map to Museum:
This course taught me the basic principles of lab and field work in the field of archaeology through various class projects as well as studying "garbology." As for the class projects, I got a small, hands-on glimpse into the life of Native Americans by creating obsidian tools with nothing but rocks and pieces of wood. Studying the concept of "garbology" gave me the skills to observe and analyze a group of people with no knowledge other than what kind of trash they produced. This gives a unique skill set of being able to critically think about people even when given minimal information.
Reflective Narrative:
The third major learning outcome for the Japanese major is secondary culture. As a Japanese one studies Japanese culture in depth, but it is also important to learn about another culture to some extent to give further context to not only Japanese culture, but one’s own culture as well. This describes the first requirement of this outcome: having an understanding of what culture is and ascribing that understanding to compare the target culture (Japanese) with another culture. The second outcome is to deeply analyze the two cultures and make connections between the two.
I actually fulfilled this outcome before I declared myself as a Japanese Language and Culture major. I was an archaeology major before, and therefore studied many different cultures, such as the Aztec and Inca cultures of Mesoamerica; the Spanish colonial era of the Monterey Bay; and going as far back as ancient Rome and Greece. One course in particular that had the class do in depth analysis of other cultures was the Archaeology/Map to Museum course. This course started with teaching how to create a picture of a person’s (or peoples’) lifestyle based on an often ignored aspect: garbage. This topic was ideal for helping me to understand MLO 3.2. Garbage often tells us everything about a culture that the people will never tell, and offers a unique perspective to their lifestyle and habits. This project gave me a unique way to analyze the behavioral and cultural practices of others with minimal information (see sample 2).
This course also helped my understanding of MLO 3.1 by giving me hands-on experience with how the Native Americans lived, through learning how to flint knap, or create stone tools (see sample 1). This gave me a glimpse of how the Native Americans lived their lives before the arrival of Europeans, and gave me something to how life in America, as well as in Japan, is today.
While I was taking these courses, I was a Japanese minor, and as such was taking Japanese culture courses. Taking these courses concurrently provided me the opportunity of real-time comparison and contrast between Japanese culture and these Mesoamerica and Native American cultures. Furthermore, it provided me the chance to relate these cultures to my own culture as well, helping me to fulfill MLO 3.1.
My background as a former archaeology major who switched to the Japanese major gave me a unique advantage, I believe, by having an already-formed concept of what culture is, as well as having experience studying foreign cultures. It also provided me with fulfilling this major learning outcome in a way that kept all of what I was learning relevant to my own studies as well as my life in general.
Sample Works:
3.1. Students describe concepts of culture and use that understanding in their comparison of the target culture with the second culture.
3.2. Students will analyze and make connections among the ways of thinking and perspectives, behavioral practices and cultural products of a second culture.
Course:
Archaeology/Map to Museum:
This course taught me the basic principles of lab and field work in the field of archaeology through various class projects as well as studying "garbology." As for the class projects, I got a small, hands-on glimpse into the life of Native Americans by creating obsidian tools with nothing but rocks and pieces of wood. Studying the concept of "garbology" gave me the skills to observe and analyze a group of people with no knowledge other than what kind of trash they produced. This gives a unique skill set of being able to critically think about people even when given minimal information.
Reflective Narrative:
The third major learning outcome for the Japanese major is secondary culture. As a Japanese one studies Japanese culture in depth, but it is also important to learn about another culture to some extent to give further context to not only Japanese culture, but one’s own culture as well. This describes the first requirement of this outcome: having an understanding of what culture is and ascribing that understanding to compare the target culture (Japanese) with another culture. The second outcome is to deeply analyze the two cultures and make connections between the two.
I actually fulfilled this outcome before I declared myself as a Japanese Language and Culture major. I was an archaeology major before, and therefore studied many different cultures, such as the Aztec and Inca cultures of Mesoamerica; the Spanish colonial era of the Monterey Bay; and going as far back as ancient Rome and Greece. One course in particular that had the class do in depth analysis of other cultures was the Archaeology/Map to Museum course. This course started with teaching how to create a picture of a person’s (or peoples’) lifestyle based on an often ignored aspect: garbage. This topic was ideal for helping me to understand MLO 3.2. Garbage often tells us everything about a culture that the people will never tell, and offers a unique perspective to their lifestyle and habits. This project gave me a unique way to analyze the behavioral and cultural practices of others with minimal information (see sample 2).
This course also helped my understanding of MLO 3.1 by giving me hands-on experience with how the Native Americans lived, through learning how to flint knap, or create stone tools (see sample 1). This gave me a glimpse of how the Native Americans lived their lives before the arrival of Europeans, and gave me something to how life in America, as well as in Japan, is today.
While I was taking these courses, I was a Japanese minor, and as such was taking Japanese culture courses. Taking these courses concurrently provided me the opportunity of real-time comparison and contrast between Japanese culture and these Mesoamerica and Native American cultures. Furthermore, it provided me the chance to relate these cultures to my own culture as well, helping me to fulfill MLO 3.1.
My background as a former archaeology major who switched to the Japanese major gave me a unique advantage, I believe, by having an already-formed concept of what culture is, as well as having experience studying foreign cultures. It also provided me with fulfilling this major learning outcome in a way that kept all of what I was learning relevant to my own studies as well as my life in general.
Sample Works:
mlo_3_sample_1_flint_knapping_journal_1.pdf | |
File Size: | 12 kb |
File Type: |
mlo_3_sample_2_sbs_324l_garbology_report.pdf | |
File Size: | 54 kb |
File Type: |