Japan

Gregory M. Pflugfelder

Gregory Pflugfelder

Associate Professor

Office: 408 Kent Hall
Office Hours: T 4:00–5:30 PM (walk-in basis), or by appointment (via Zoom)
Phone: (212) 854-5035
Email: gmp12@columbia.edu

Educational Background

BA: Harvard University (’81)
MA: Waseda University (’84)
PhD: Stanford University (’96)

Classes Taught
ASCE UN1361 Introduction to East Asian Civilizations: Japan
HSEA UN3871 Modern Japan: Images and Words
HSEA GR6009 Graduate Colloquium on Early Modern Japan
EAAS UN3888 Cultural History of Japanese Monsters
Research Interests

Early-Modern and Modern Japanese History, Gender, Sexuality, Visual Culture

Gregory Pflugfelder specializes in Japanese history and gender studies. He received his A.B. from Harvard, his M.A. from Waseda, and his Ph.D. from Stanford. His books include Seiji to daidokoro: Akita-ken joshi sanseiken undōshi (Politics and the kitchen: a history of the women’s suffrage movement in Akita prefecture), which received the 1986 Yamakawa Kikue Prize, and Cartographies of Desire: Male-Male Sexuality in Japanese Discourse, 1600-1950. His current work engages the the historical construction of masculinities, the history of the body, and representations of monstrosity.

Selected Publications

“The Nation-State, the Age/Gender System, and the Reconstitution of Erotic Desire in Nineteenth-Century Japan,” Journal of Asian Studies (2012)

Cartographies of Desire: Male-Male Sexuality in Japanese Discourse, 1600-1950 (University of California, 1999)

JAPANimals: History and Culture in Japan’s Animal Life (co-editor, University of Michigan, 2005)

Keiko Okamoto

Keiko Okamoto

Lecturer in Japanese

Office: 520 Kent Hall
Office Hours: MW 3:10-4:10
Phone: (212) 854-5502
Email: ko47@columbia.edu

Educational Background

MA: Japanese Pedagogy, Columbia University
BA: Linguistics, International Christian University

Classes Taught

JPNS UN1101 First Year Japanese I
JPNS UN1102 First Year Japanese II
JPNS UN3005 Third Year Japanese I
JPNS UN3006 Third Year Japanese II

Research Interests

Japanese Reading
Japanese Phonetics

Keiko Okamoto has many years of experience teaching Japanese. She has taught at Columbia University, Princeton University, NYU, Spence School, and has been a Senior Instructor at the Japan Society, among other locations. She received her BA in Linguistics at International Christian University (Tokyo), where she minored in Teaching Japanese as a Foreign Language. At Columbia University, Ms. Okamoto has taught a wide range of Japanese levels, ranging from beginner to early-advanced.

Publications

“Systematic Long-Term Approach to Improving Reading-Aloud Skills” (Proceedings of the 28th Annual Conference of the JLTANE, 2014; co-author)
“Listen to the Voice! Express the Voice!” (The 20th Princeton Pedagogy Forum Proceedings, 2013; co-author)
“Reading HIYAKU: Using Courseworks/Wikispaces” (Proceedings of the 26th Annual Conference of the JLTANE, 2012; co-author)
“Exploration through “Hiyaku”: Considering Authenticity of Context”(The 18th Princeton Pedagogy Forum Proceedings, 2011; co-author)
Hiyaku: An Intermediate Japanese Course (Routledge, 2011; co-authors: Shigeru Eguchi, Miharu Nittono, Fumiko Nazikian, Jisuk Park)

Miharu Nittono

Miharu Nittono

Senior Lecturer in Japanese

Office: 520 Kent Hall
Office Hours: TR 4:00-5:00
Teaching Hours: MW 11:40-12:55, MTWR 1:10-2:15
Phone: (212)854-5500
Email: mn70@columbia.edu

Educational Background

EdD: Teachers College, Columbia University
MA: TESOL at Teachers College, Columbia University
MA: Waseda University

Classes Taught

JPNS UN2201 Second Year Japanese I
JPNS UN2202 Second Year Japanese II
JPNS GU4516 Fifth Year Japanese I
JPNS GU4517 Fifth Year Japanese II

Research Interests

Japanese Linguistics
Japanese “Hedging”

Miharu Nittono is a senior instructor of Japanese at Columbia University, where she has taught all levels of Japanese. She also has experience teaching intensive summer courses in Japanese, including “Japanese Language and Culture” at Sophia University in Tokyo as an invited professor. She has also served as the Administrative Director of the MA Program in Japanese Pedagogy at Columbia University.

Publications

Hiyaku: An Intermediate Japanese Course (Routledge, 2011; co-authors: Shigeru Eguchi, Fumiko Nazikian, Keiko Okamoto, Jisuk Park)
“Follow the Old Ways: A New Approach to Kanji Learning” (The Seventeenth Princeton Japanese Pedagogy Forum Proceedings, 2010)
“We’re doing traditional rakugo!: Striving towards acquiring the ‘five’ skills through performing rakugo” (The Sixteenth Princeton Japanese Pedagogy Forum Proceedings, 2009)
“Show & Short: A Journey through 10 Years of Student-Written Short Stories” (The 20th Annual Conference of the Central Association of Teachers of Japanese (CATJ20), 2008)
“Contrasting Group Size and Hedge Use” (The Fifteenth Princeton Japanese Pedagogy Forum Proceedings, 2008)
“Avoidance and Appeal: A Two-Fold Motivation for Japanese Hedging Use” (Sophia International Review, 2007)
“Hedging at Work: How Occupations Affect the Use of Hedging in Japanese Interactions during Non-Work Conversations” (The Fourteenth Princeton Japanese Pedagogy Forum Proceedings, 2007)
“Two-Fold Conversation Management Function of Japanese Hedging: Speaker-Centered and Listener-Centered” (Humanities Conference 2004 Proceedings, 2006)
“The Golden Mean: Japanese Speakers’ Use of ‘Downtoners’” (Hawaii International Conference on Arts and HumanitiesProceedings, 2005)
“Japanese Hedging in Friend-Friend Discourse” (Teachers College, Columbia University, 2003)