Newcastle University

East Asian Studies

East Asian studies at Newcastle allow the flexibility to study Chinese or Japanese alongside French, German or Spanish, or with Business or Linguistics, as well as to study cultures across regions (East Asia, Europe and Latin America). We work closely with colleagues in the Schools of Historical Studies and Geography, Politics and Society, who provide specialisms in the history and politics of China and Japan.

Our Modules

We operate a dual entry system, which allows students to start from scratch or with an A level qualification. Language classes are small, ensuring that each student receives individualised care from our dedicated teaching team. With regard to the cultures of China and Japan, you can choose to focus on modern history, society, politics, business and management studies, film and media studies, literary studies or popular culture.
Chinese and Japanese studies at Newcastle are supported by a diverse and multi-disciplinary team of nationally and internationally renowned East Asia experts (see below). All modules in East Asian culture are research-informed, while at the same time providing the breadth to ensure maximum appeal to a range of student interests. All of our Lecturers deliver language as well as culture modules, ensuring smooth integration across curricula.

The Year Abroad in East Asia

We are especially proud of the flexibility and variety we offer during the Year Abroad in East Asia. At Newcastle, we offer 5 destinations in China, ranging from cosmopolitan cities in the north and on the eastern seaboard (Beijing, Shanghai) to exciting destinations located off the beaten track in the western and southernmost regions (Chongqing, Chengdu, Hainan). In Japan, we offer a large choice of state and private universities in a range of attractive cities, including Tokyo, Kyoto, Akita and Fukuoka.

Extra-curricular activities

We offer lots of extra-curricular activities, such as reading clubs, speech clubs and the student-run Anglo-Chinese and Anglo-Japanese Societies, all of which foster linguistic and intercultural exchange. You can further enhance your language skills via tandem learning partnerships with exchange students and Masters students from China and Japan. And you can try out your newly acquired cultural skills at the annual Spring Festival celebrations in the city's buzzing Chinatown! Newcastle is proud to be hosting the newest Confucius Institute in the country, with a remit to promote Chinese language and culture in the Northeast through a series of intercultural events undertaken in partnership with the East Asian Studies section.

Postgraduate opportunities

If you plan to continue your education, we offer a one-year MLitt research degree, which allows you to focus on an area of Chinese or Japanese studies of particular interest, and which you may wish to carry further into postgraduate research as a PhD student. Linguistic high-fliers can apply to the School's world-renowned MA degrees in Translating and Interpreting.

Research Interests and Expertise

Expertise in East Asia research at Newcastle spans three Schools in the Faculty of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences. Research publications and projects range across the fields of Political Science, Social Anthropology, Gender Studies, Film and Media Studies, Literary Studies and Historical Studies.
East Asian Studies is one of five subject groups within the School of Modern Languages (SML) which operates as a single administrative and academic unit. Researchers in this group include:

Dr Laura Moretti
Dr Valerie Pellatt
Dr Joanne Smith Finley
Dr Shiro Yoshioka
Dr Sabrina Yu

These colleagues work closely with the following East Asia experts based in the Schools of Historical Studies and Geography, Politics and Sociology, particularly in terms of undergraduate and postgraduate team teaching initiatives:

Dr James Babb
Dr Michael Barr
Dr Martin Dusinberre
Mr Jonathan Howlett

Areas of East Asia research interests include:

Political studies

• identity, ethnicity and nation in modern China and Xinjiang (Barr, Smith Finley)
• Chinese soft power and Sino-Western relations (Barr)
• bio-ethics and bio-security in China (Barr)
• Islamic renewal among the Xinjiang Uyghurs (Smith Finley)
• alternative minority representation in Uyghur popular song (Smith Finley)
• Japanese political history and political thought (Babb)
• Japan's political parties, elections, politicians and corruption (Babb)
• Local political identity construction in modern Japan (Dusinberre)
• " history, nostalgia and Nihonjinron [Japaneseness] in contemporary Japanese animation (Yoshioka)

Gender studies

• social meanings of gendered Uyghur proverbs (Smith Finley)
• Chinese numerology; number and gender in nursery rhymes (Pellatt)
• gender and sexuality in contemporary China (Yu)

Film and media studies

• transnational Chinese cinema and stardom (Yu)
• audience/reception studies (Yu)

Literary and historiographical studies

• origins and development of Japanese popular literature (Moretti)
• genre consciousness and narrative identity in Japanese popular literature (Moretti)
• Textual scholarship and intertextuality (Moretti)
• Shunga (Japanese art and literature that explicitly portray sex) (Moretti)
• Japanese Popular Texts and Representation (Yoshioka)
• Kusazôshi (woodblock-printed illustrated literature) as pre-modern manga (Yoshioka)

Historical studies

• social and cultural history of Japan (mid-19th to late-20th c) (Dusinberre)
• Japan's post-war nuclear power industry (Dusinberre)
• discourses of 'furusato' (hometown) in modern and contemporary Japan (Dusinberre)
• diaspora and cross-border maritime history of modern Japan (Dusinberre)

Each research-active scholar specialises in one or more fields and engages in theoretical and methodological debates at School, Faculty, regional, national and international levels. For full publications lists, please see individual staff web pages via the above links.

Postgraduates

Alessio Compagnucci – Mlitt, early-modern Japanese jest-books
Lydia Dan Wo – Mlitt, memory and nostalgia in post-1997 Hong Kong cinema (Yu)
Cary Lo – IPhD, regional politics of translating Taiwanese literature (Pellatt)
Zhu Zhu – IPhD, subtitling in Chinese feature films (Pellatt)
Andrew Campion – PhD, energy security and the rise of China (Barr)
Ji-Jen Hwang – PhD, cyber-security in Taiwanese international relations (Barr)
Zhang Yu – PhD, Chinese soft power in Southeast Asia (Barr)

In addition, three students completed the MA in East Asian History in 2009-10, and four students in 2010-11. Find information on this degree.

Externally funded Research Projects

• 2011-12: ‘The Asian Sea: A Transnational Maritime History in the Age of Imperialism, 1850-1918’, led by Professor Harald Fuess (University of Heidelberg), with visiting professor collaboration from Dr. Martin Dusinberre.
• 2010-12: 'Uyghur youth identities in urban Xinjiang', a collaboration with Professor Zang Xiaowei (Sheffield University). International workshop to take placeheld on 8th July 2011 at the White Rose East Asia Centre (WREAC), Sheffield, and leading to an edited book to be published in 2012 in the Routledge series: Studies of Ethnicity in Asia. Workshop funded by the China and Inner Asia Council of the Association for Asian Studies (Smith Finley)
• 2009-10: ‘Sustaining a Global Network for Biosecurity: The Life Sciences and Dual Use Research’, collaboration between Dr. Michael Barr (Newcastle), Dr Brian Rappert (Exeter), and Prof Malcolm Dando (Bradford), funded by Alfred P Sloan Foundation.

Other Collaborative Research Projects

• 2010-11: ‘Digitalization and cataloguing of the Marega Collection’, run jointly by Università Pontificia Salesiana (Rome) and Ritsumeikan University (Kyoto) (Moretti)
• 2009-11: ‘Shunga Japanese Erotic Art’, run jointly by SOAS, the British Museum, the International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Kyoto) and Ritsumeikan University (Kyoto) (Moretti)