Japanese studies

Dulwich Boys and Beyond, 100 Years of Japanese Studies at SOAS University of London

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• published: 09 Feb 2016
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http://www.soas.ac.uk/jrc This event titled "Dulwich Boys and Beyond, 100 Years of Japanese Studies at SOAS" was held at SOAS University of London on 1 February 2016. It focused on the story of the Dulwich Boys and their achievements, as well as celebrating the expansion and diversity of Japanese studies over subsequent decades. Panelists: Professor Ronald Dore (Dulwich Boy) Sir Hugh Cortazzi (Wartime Language Student) Mr Martin Hatfull (Diageo, SOAS Foreign Office Scheme Alumnus) Ms Caroline Bennett (moshimoshi, SOAS Alumna) Ms Branwyn Darlington (Harro Foods, SOAS Alumna) Professor Laura Hein (SOAS Centenary Fellow) Chaired by Mr Nick Higham (BBC) Opening remarks by Dr Helen Macnaughtan (Acting Chair, Japan Research Centre (JRC), SOAS) Synopsis SOAS celebrates its centenary in 2016-17. The School received its Royal Charter in 1916 and the first students were admitted in January 1917. Japanese language was taught from the outset and both the army and navy sent students for language training during the 1920s. However, the teaching of Japanese expanded in 1942 when the Board of Education, at the behest of the War Office, established a scholarship scheme for boys from secondary and public schools aged 17 and 18 to study languages critical to the war effort. Accommodated at Dulwich College, the ‘Dulwich Boys’ as they came to call themselves, attended language courses at SOAS every morning, and returned to the college each afternoon to study the regular Dulwich curriculum. On completing their 18 months of language training, each student was inducted into the military or intelligence services. By the 1944-45 academic session, there were 183 Japanese languagestudents at SOAS including those in the armed forces. The story of the Dulwich Boys as featured in the BBC One’s Today Show and included interviews with the last surviving members of SOAS’s wartime Japanese Studies alumni. The SOAS Japanese programme’s close links with the government continued in the post-war period, with special language training programmes being run for the Ministry of Defence and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office. A new degree syllabus for a BA Honours in Japanese was introduced in 1946, and in the 1960s there was an expansion of Japanese studies at SOAS to include several new posts in language and in social science disciplines. The Japan Research Centre (JRC) was founded in 1978 and now brings together some 30 SOAS academic and language staff as well as research associates. Japanese Studies at SOAS now encompasses the fields of language, linguistics, literature, film and media, history, anthropology and sociology, economics, management studies, politics, art history, religious studies and music. We look forward to welcoming the Japanese studies community as well as SOAS alumni to this centenary celebration of Japanese Studies. If you are interested in getting in involved, please get in touch with Ms Nenna Chuku on centres@soas.ac.uk Further details about this event: http://www.soas.ac.uk/jrc/events/dulwich-boys-and-beyond/