East Asian Languages

Harvard offers instruction in a variety of East Asian languages, including classical and modern Chinese, classical and modern Japanese, Korean, Manchu, Mongolian, Vietnamese, and literary Tibetan. Speakers of these languages make up approximately one quarter of the world's population, and the increasing political and economic prominence of the countries they represent have made their study of critical importance in recent years, not only for practical career goals, but also for an understanding of the comprehensive range of human experience on this planet. They are offered within the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations, which also houses three fully-staffed subprograms in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean language.

Harvard's reputation as a prominent center for the study of East Asia, combined with opportunities to pursue advanced language training, offers our students diverse avenues to explore these languages and cultures. Department courses attract a wide range of students—most, in fact, from concentrations other than East Asian Studies. Many intend to integrate language training with a concentration in the humanities or social sciences. Others are motivated by personal interests such as family history, an attraction to the modes of artistic expression, or career design.

Classes are small, with ten to twelve students per section. We strive for a fast-paced tempo, stimulating material, and a congenial, fun atmosphere that retains a respect for individual learning styles. A palpable sense of camaraderie builds among classmates from a shared sense of accomplishment in the language. This draws both students and teachers into new perspectives on language, learning, and culture.

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Chinese

The Chinese Language Program offers one of the most extensive curricula in Mandarin Chinese to be found at any American university. Mandarin is the official language of government administration, broadcast media, and international commerce in the People's Republic of China and Taiwan. It also shares official status with English in Singapore. Modern Standard Mandarin—a term that describes the language as taught to non-natives— is based on the Mandarin of northeast China, of which Beijing is the political and cultural center. Mandarin speakers comprise approximately 70% of the nation's population.

We offer classes for those who have never heard a word of Chinese, as well as for those who come with some previous experience. Our intermediate and advanced courses improve conversation and reading and writing skills so our students can discuss issues and events, do research, and/or prepare for careers requiring international experience. In addition to the four sequential, year-long courses of instruction, we offer classes designed for targeted audiences, including a formal writing course: Mandarin for Cantonese speakers, advanced conversational Mandarin, and Literary Chinese, consisting of two year-long courses which cover two thousand years of written Chinese history, literature and thought. We also offer several courses tailored for students with some level of bilingual ability in Mandarin and English.

Each year, a handful of Harvard students spend one or two semesters in residence at language schools in China—typically at the best known universities in China and Taiwan. Students report that their time abroad contributes not only to language enrichment but also to a rare and lasting view of Chinese society and culture.

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Japanese

Japanese is the language spoken by 125 million natives of the Japanese islands and by an additional 2 million people outside of Japan, primarily in Brazil and the United States. Parallel to the emergence of Japan as the world's second greatest economic power in the latter part of the twentieth century, its language has become a medium of communication on the international business scene, not only in Asia, but across the globe, including the United States. Japan is also the home of one of the world's oldest continuously existing civilizations. The study of Japanese is thus rewarding not only for its practical benefits, but also for the introduction it offers to a rich cultural and literary tradition still largely unknown to the majority of Westerners.

Harvard offers a full course of study in standard Japanese, the dialect of Japanese spoken in Tokyo and the areas surrounding it. The elementary course (Japanese Ba, b) assumes no background in the language and has as its goal the development of basic survival-level linguistic skills, including the ability to read and write hiragana, katakana, and approximately 200 Chinese characters. Additional characters are introduced successively throughout the second and third years. At the end of the third year, students will have been exposed to the majority of the 1,945 characters established as "common use" characters (jooyoo kanji) by the Ministry of Education in Japan. Advanced students with an interest in literature may take courses in classical Japanese and kanbun offered by the literature faculty in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations.

To respond to the diverse needs of our students and to equip them with the practical language skills needed to function in an increasingly internationalized and competitive marketplace, the Harvard Japanese Program commits itself to a proficiency-based teaching philosophy and its implementation at all levels of instruction. This means a commitment to accuracy and creativity in the use of language and to a parallel mastery of all four skills of speaking, listening, reading, and writing—even at the advanced levels, where increasingly complex reading tasks traditionally dominate class time.

The integration of in-class learning with the extra-curricular life of students is an essential part of successful language learning, and the Japanese Language Program actively encourages such integration. For example, the program sponsors a host-family program through which on-campus students are put in contact with volunteer expatriate Japanese families in the Boston area for language and cultural exchange. The program also provides numerous opportunities for short-term and long-term study abroad in Japan, and sponsors summer work internships at corporations in Japan or intermediate and advanced students of Japanese.

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Korean

The Korean Language Program, one of America's oldest and most compre-hensive, is central to a vibrant and growing Korean Studies community at Harvard. The recent establishment of an endowed professorship in Korean literature and expanding activities of the Korea Institute have complemented Harvard's longstanding leadership in the field of Korean history. The rise of The Republic of Korea as an important trading nation in the global economy has fueled a growing interest in acquiring language skills useful for academic, cultural and commercial interaction with this dynamic land of 45 million. Issues and problems related to the eventual reunification of the ROK with the Democratic People's Republic in the North also make mastery of the Korean language an asset for students pursuing professional careers in international security affairs or government service.

Instruction in Korean is offered at all levels of proficiency: There are courses at the beginning, intermediate and advanced levels, as well as reading courses for advanced students cultivating skills for textual research in history and the social sciences or for studies of literature, art or religion. Coursework at all levels focuses on speaking proficiency as well as on reading and writing. From the elementary level students gradually acquire a repertoire of the Chinese characters (hanja) necessary for full reading proficiency.

Beginning classes assume no background in Korean. A considerable number of students at the beginning and intermediate levels are Americans of Korean ancestry; however, these classes also include men and women of diverse backgrounds with a broad spectrum of personal and professional interests in studying Korean. Undergraduates and graduate students concentrating on other East Asian countries often find that a knowledge of Korean language is useful for their scholarly endeavors. Professionals in such fields as law and business increasingly undertake the study of Korean for career opportunities or for the access it provides to a society commonly regarded as a model for other industrializing countries.

The Korean Language Program encourages students to explore oppor-tunities to study in Korea, including for credit, at language institutes affiliated with leading Korean universities. In some cases summer programs of overseas language study may qualify for financial support from such sources as the Korea Foundation. Language study by graduate students may also be supported by sources which are monitored by Harvard's Korea Institute. The Korean Language Program further encourages students to participate in extra-curricular activities ranging from "language tables" in the undergraduate houses to dramatic events and presentations by visitors from Korea. The large number of native speakers of Korean living in the Boston area represent another valuable resource from which students in the Program benefit. Opportunities also exist in Korea for summer internships with business enterprises, financial institutions, civic groups, or government agencies.

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Manchu

Manchu is offered for a full academic year in alternate years. Manchu, together with Chinese, was the official language of the last dynasty ruling China. Historical, religious, and literary works, as well as documentary sources have been written in Manchu from the early 1600's, and Manchu continues to be used by the Sibe, a minority nationality in China. As archival research in the People's Republic of China uncovers increasingly large collections of Manchu documents, knowledge of Manchu has become essential for original research in a variety of areas, ranging from the pre-dynastic history of the Manchus, to ethnic history, frontier history, and most areas of institutional history from the 17th to the 19th centuries.

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Mongolian

Classical Mongolian is offered for a full academic year in alternate years. The program, which focuses on reading and translating ability, is aimed at introducing mostly graduate students to Classical Mongolian as a research tool for their work in history, linguistics, religion, and other areas of research. The first course is mainly devoted to getting students acquainted with the Mongol script, vocabulary, and basic grammar. It includes simple readings from standard historical and religious texts. The spring course focuses on more advanced grammatical knowledge and is meant to introduce students to a wider variety of texts, ranging from the pre-classical to the modern.

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Vietnamese

Harvard is one of the few universities in the USA that has been offering Vietnamese for many years. Vietnamese is the official language of Vietnam, spoken by 80 million people in Vietnam and approximately 2 million overseas Vietnamese including about 1 million Vietnamese Americans. It belongs to the subfamily of Mon-Khmer languages in the Austroasiatic family of languages. Vietnamese has three main dialects: northern, central, and southern. The dialectal differences concern both the vocabulary and the phonetic system. However, Vietnamese everywhere understand each other despite these dialectal differences. All of the Vietnamese language courses offered at Harvard introduce the contemporary Hanoi dialect.

Vietnamese language courses provide students with the basic ability to understand, speak, read and write Vietnamese through an interactive and communication-oriented approach. Texts vary from readings on Vietnamese culture, ads from Vietnamese newspapers and magazines, short stories, poems, texts on Vietnamese geography, history, culture, and customs. Audio tapes, video clips, and similar materials are used to enhance students' listening skills.

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For further information

For further information regarding languages and language placement, please contact the offices of the Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese Programs at 5 Bryant Street, telephone 495-2961, website http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~eal, e-mail: eal@fas.harvard.edu.

We encourage interested students to contact the Undergraduate Concentration in East Asian Studies, telephone 495-8365, e-mail eas@fas.harvard.edu, with questions, and to visit the Program's offices at 9 Kirkland Pl. to meet with its faculty and staff members at any time.