Faculty

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)

Phuong Chung Nguyen

Phuong Chung Nguyen

Lecturer in Vietnamese, Director the Vietnamese Language Program

Office: 502-A Kent Hall
Office Hours: T 3:00-5:00
Email: cn2496@columbia.edu

Educational Background

MA: Linguistics and Applied Linguistics, Hanoi National University (2007)
Diploma: Teaching English as Second Language, Hanoi University (2003)
BA: English Language and Culture, Hanoi University (2000)

Classes Taught

VIET UN1101 & UN1102 First Year Vietnamese
VIET UN2201& UN2202 Second Year Vietnamese
VIET UN3301 & 3302 Third Year Vietnamese

Research Interests

Teaching Vietnamese for Special Purposes
Material Development
Testing and Assessment

Phuong Chung Nguyen served as the Vietnamese Language Coordinator for the Post Language Program at the US Embassy in Hanoi from 2008 to 2018. Before joining the Post Language Program, she was the Professional Language Coordinator at the Vietnamese Language Center, Hanoi University and taught for seven years in various Vietnamese language programs for expatriate staff at embassies, universities, and other organizations in Hanoi. She has also created language materials such as Vietnamese Vocabulary Elementary 1, Vietnamese Listening Elementary 1, Survival Vietnamese Handout Volume 1 and Volume 2, Listening and Note-taking for Advanced level, Reading Material on Economics (Intermediate), and Reading Material for RSO and PAS (Advanced level).

Sonam Tsering Ngulphu

Sonam Tsering Ngulphu

Lecturer in Tibetan

Office: 502-G Kent Hall

Office Hours: By appointment
Email: st2855@columbia.edu

Educational Background

PhD: Columbia University
MTS: Harvard University
MA: Central University for Tibetan Studies

Research Interests

Tibetan Studies, Religion, and Buddhist Studies

Sonam Tsering Ngulphu has taught topics on religion, Buddhist philosophy, and Tibetan language and literature at monasteries and modern educational institutions in India and the US. He had previously worked as the managing editor of Tibet Journal, an academic quarterly on Tibetan studies, where he also co-edited thematic series on Tibet and British Raj, Tibetan monuments, and a fourteen-issue history of Tibetan art.

Sonam’s doctoral dissertation examined the eighteen-volume Collected Works of Je Tsongkhapa (1357–1419) to assess the role of the texts in the formation of Geluk School in Tibet during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. It studied the significant roles that Je Tsongkhapa’s writings have played in establishing doctrinal authority, defining philosophical boundaries, postulating intellectual identity, and reorienting monastic education for Tibet’s largest school of thought and philosophy.

Trained in several languages, Sonam specializes in translation and interpretation with a focus on classical Tibetan Buddhist texts.

Selected Publications

Precious Garland: Buddhist Polity on Life and Liberation (Rājaparikathāratnāvali, Trans & Annot. LTWA, 2014)

Verses of Naga King Drum (Nāgarājabherīgāthā, Trans. 8400, 2020)

“The Sixth Ling Rinpoche Thupten Lungtok Namgyal Trinlé (1903–1983),” “Emchi Khyenrab Norbu (1883–1962),” “Tuksé Tubten Lhundrub (1906–1955),” and other biographies under National Endowment of Humanities (NEH) Grant (Biographical Encyclopedia of Tibet, Inner Asia, and the Himalaya, http://www.treasuryoflives.org/) 

Tibet Journal (Managing Editor, 2001–2004)

Tshan rig dus deb (Assistant Editor, 2001–2003)