studying abroad in japan

[goofball22]

Good afternoon everyone,

a bit of my background:

I'm a 3rd yr university student from California, USA. Im currently a civil engineer major, but I plan to switch majors somewhere in the college of letters and science due to a lack of motivation. The specific focus of the math and sciences in engineering has lost my interest. Also, I feel like I approached my last 2 yrs of college studies with money as the primary goal instead of being motivated by my passions and dreams. I decided that pursuing a major with a more broader focus would suit me better. Maybe something along the lines of international relations with a minor in the arts.

I also decided that my next step would be to study japan for a year. I have always been fascinated by how many of my hobbies involve the japanese culture (video games, anime, manga). I thought it might be a great idea to study the culture behind my entertainment and hopefully can find my dream career through that path.

An exchange student at my university introduced me to Waseda university, and it seems like almost the perfect match. It has a large and diverse amount of letters and art studies. The amount of international students, regular students, student activities, etc is HUGE. Its also located in Tokyo, which i think is the center for modern and traditional culture.

In addition to waseda, I have no idea where else to apply, as i dont know much about higher education, demographics, geography, people or culture in japan other than what i learn in beginning japanese and in my japanese hobbies. I came here hoping that this forum contained many knowledgeable people about japan who can provide recommendations to me.

As always, any information would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Glenski]

Just how good is your Japanese (spoken, reading, writing)? The vast majority of universities here don't teach in English.

You might want to look at Miyazaki International University.

 

[goofball22]

only taken 1 semester of japanese, so not good at all.

I know several universities have international programs, like waseda, that only require one term of japanese language. Just not sure what to look for. But i will check out miyazaki

thank you

 

[dblbstrd]

It's kind of too bad in my opinion that you're feeling discouraged about engineering after getting a couple years in. But if you were doing it with hopes of making good money, and not so much because you were interested in it, then I encourage you to seek out what you'd rather be doing.

Tohoku University has something called Junior Year Program in English, I did not attend it, but if I could go back and attend a different program from the one that I did, I would maybe look into this one. They seem to have course offerings in different fields, where many abroad programs focus on mainly Japanese/Asian studies and international studies.
The one-year program I did was Japanese/Asian studies only, and when I was done I longed for math and science! I was lucky, however, in that it satisfied almost all of my non-science gen ed. requirements, and I did hardly any work in some of those classes...

 

[goofball22]

It's kind of too bad in my opinion that you're feeling discouraged about engineering after getting a couple years in.

Tell me about it. Been going in the math and science route since high school, and just grew out of it, at least the engineering side. When i reflect back, i feel like i just went with the flow just like all the smart guys did at my high school did. I did the whole 2 yr at community college than transfer to 4 yr university. After taking a good look at the university environment, what it offered, and how "boring" my summer engineering job was, and my lack of interested in my upper division engineering studies, it was time to change

thanks for the info, much appreciated everyone