Discovering Japanese History and Culture Through Anime: A Multidisciplinary Examination of Miyazaki Hayao's Princess Mononoke Grant uri icon

abstract

  • PURPOSE The proposal requests funding of $5,000.00 from the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership in support of a faculty development workshop for middle and high school social studies teachers in the Pitt Country, NC area. The funds will go to cover honoraria for 15 middle and high school social studies teachers ($200.00) who will be participating in the workshop, plus teaching materials ($120.00) per teacher. The Pitt County Social Studies Coordinator will receive an honorarium of $200.00. OBJECTIVE The objective of this proposal is to fund a faculty development workshop, taught by a multidisciplinary team of 13 ECU faculty, for Pitt Country, NC middle and high school social studies teachers. The objective of the workshop is to enrich the teachers' understanding of Japanese history and culture through an academically intense examination of a classic of Japanese animated film (anime), Miyazaki Hayao's Princess Mononoke. The viewing of the film will be preceded by a lecture, and followed by discussion featuring the ECU faculty in dialogue with Pitt middle and high school social studies teachers. METHOD OF THE PROJECT Methodologically, the project involves an interpretive examination of an historically-oriented anime classic, Princess Mononoke, winner of the 1998 Japan Academy Award Picture of the Year Award. ECU faculty representing an array of disciplines, including art, anthropology, classics, foreign languages, history, international studies, sociology, and religion and philosophy, will offer their insights into the deep meanings of the film, especially as they related to understandings of Japanese history and culture. The workshop forum is well-suited to the interpretive project proposed. Given the popularity of anime among young people, the workshop should be especially valuable to middle and high school teachers of social studies seeking a more appealing pedagogical strategy for communicating the foundations of Japanese history and culture.

date/time interval

  • January 2006 - March 2006