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kidkensei · Joined: 17 Nov 2008 Posts: 36

Konichiwa,

How many of you would think about reintroducing English translations of Japanese texts you find interesting like �Essays in Idleness� by Yoshida Kenko or Haikus by Matsuo Basho in your classes???

Would Japanese kids find this as boring as we would trying to learn Shakespear in Japanese??

I suppose one could always find texts highly influential in Japanese culture but not required in the school system like Hagakure or Confucius?

Aaron

iverin · Joined: 26 Jun 2008 Posts: 111 Location: Ontario

Hi, I myself have taken university courses where we've studied Basho's haikus as well as Kangaroo Notebook by Kobo Abe (as well as some other works as well) and I enjoyed reading them in the translated English.

I'm not sure how much they would enjoy reading the translated works since they originated in Japanese, but I myself didn't mind reading the translated texts

Apsara · Joined: 20 Sep 2005 Posts: 2142 Location: Tokyo, Japan

Applying to universities with no experience and teaching haiku in English school kids- I have my doubts about how serious you are...
Would you be pulling our legs by any chance?

Glenski · Joined: 15 Jan 2003 Posts: 12844 Location: Hokkaido, JAPAN

I'm with Aspara here.

But to answer your question, kid...

dove · Joined: 01 Oct 2003 Posts: 271 Location: USA/Japan

When I was teaching at a junior high school way back in the day, I and the JTE actually gave a haiku lesson. We used the Basho haiku about the frog, translated into English. It was difficult, but the students could get most of it. Then the Japanese teacher and I presented haiku poems we had written in English, translated into Japanese. When you teach about Basho, you can talk about how he traveled to Tohoku, observing nature. There are lots of dimensions to a haiku lesson, many that can be simplified for students.

Another activity for higher level students is to compare the titles of Japanese books with the titles they are given in the English translation. This can also be used for movie titles. Also, you can show a Japanese movie that has English subtitles. Have the students see how certain phrases were translated. Again, more appropriate for higher level students.

natsume · Joined: 24 Apr 2006 Posts: 409 Location: Chongqing, China

We just had a 2-class lesson in a writing class (low level high school) using ideas very similar to the last post. The kids in this class are very creative, and they illustrated and made a book out of their English haikus.

They did some very impressive work. I think using English creatively without having to worry so much about the grammar opened them up a bit, and they had fun with it.

TokyoLiz · Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Posts: 1548 Location: Tokyo, Japan

It depends what you focus on, Dove. I'd say that giving a literature lesson on Bassho is redundant, except perhaps for introducing the features of a haiku - syllables, seasonal words, theme. You could quickly move on to a creative writing component.

In my junior high advanced (in name only) English class, we started with famous Japanese haikus translated into English, then haikus by English authors (H.D. for example). Then we composed our own. After that, we moved on to tanka form, examined its features in English, and then wrote tanka. Finally, I gave them sonnets, and they wrote poems in sonnet form.