I guess this is a language question...

[Ryan-]

How do college students in Japan write headers for their essays and such?

Name, date, class, title? What kind of formatting is used?

 

[yasuyuki]

Hello, Ryan-^^
I am a graduate student in Japan so I can answer so easily.
Maybe a basic format is like this.
Title (in center)
英語と日本語の起源から見る西欧人と東洋人の差異
date-class-student ID-name(in right)
6月26日1回生11組xxxx-yy-zzzz-Ryan Cabrera

However, the style depends on classes.
The most important point of header is, you know, making teachers know who the submitter is and what the report is.
Therefore, if we have to hand in every week, we include date in the title.
If the class is for all students of a university, we have to add the department in the header before class.
And in general, in college, class seems not so important.
...I'm not sure this answer is what you really want.
Are you going to hand in some essays for Japanese college?

 

[Glenn]

一回生? Come to think of it, I remember my 近現代文学 teacher asking the class about counters for school year, and some people said they used 回 instead of 年. He had this look of disbelief on his face. I think someone may have even said they used 次. I don't know about 回, though. It sounds like you may do that level (or class?) over and over again to me.

 

[yasuyuki]

I see. That's a very difficult point, Glenn^^
The reason why I used 回 is I am talking now about college students.
In elementary, junior high and high scools, we use 年 like 高校二年生.
But for colleges, we use 回 and 大学四回生.
(Sorry, I don't know why... But as you mentioned, I felt the same way we go round and round.
Ah, this may be because college students are easy to repeat a course...^^)

 

[Glenn]

Oh, so it's more of a distancing yourself from pre-secondary education, then? That's a fair point about classes being easy to repeat, I suppose. Heh, I know I did a few more than once, anyway.

 

[Elizabeth]

I see. That's a very difficult point, Glenn^^
The reason why I used 回 is I am talking now about college students.
In elementary, junior high and high scools, we use 年 like 高校二年生.
But for colleges, we use 回 and 大学四回生.
(Sorry, I don't know why... But as you mentioned, I felt the same way we go round and round.
Ah, this may be because college students are easy to repeat a course...^^)

And if you say you're a 1年生, everyone knows it must be either a first grader or someone from a 短大.

 

[Toritoribe]

一回生? Come to think of it, I remember my 近現代文学 teacher asking the class about counters for school year, and some people said they used 回 instead of 年. He had this look of disbelief on his face. I think someone may have even said they used 次. I don't know about 回, though. It sounds like you may do that level (or class?) over and over again to me.

一年生？一回生？

I too use 回 for college, but wasn't aware of the difference between 回 and 年.

 

[Glenn]

ほ、面白い。I was in 京都 at 同志社大学, which would make sense as to why it was ○○回生, but that wouldn't explain why my teacher was surprised, because judging from his use of おかん and おとん and other things like that he was from around the area. Maybe I'm just remembering wrong. Maybe it was 次 that he was surprised at. I don't know. It was three years ago, after all.

I suppose the really interesting thing to take out of this is the difference between the systems at the eastern and western schools. I had no idea about that. Thanks for the link!

 

[Ryan-]

Hello, Ryan-^^
I am a graduate student in Japan so I can answer so easily.
Maybe a basic format is like this.
Title (in center)
英語と日本語の起源から見る西欧人と東洋人の差異
date-class-student ID-name(in right)
6月26日1回生11組xxxx-yy-zzzz-Ryan Cabrera

Thank you for the help! Is the date, year, ID, and name all on the same line just like that with no spacing? This is for an essay I had to write for one of my Japanese writing classes.

 

[epigene]

Having lived in the Tokyo/Kanto region all my life, I still have qualms over the use of 回 to mean the year in university... But that's not why I'm writing this.

I have a feeling that the OP wrote "class" and not "year and class" in the sense of students entering university at a certain year are grouped into "classes" as done in Japan? By "class," I think he's referring to the "name of the course" (Introduction to English Literature, for example) rather than the "year/class in university"? I don't think American universities identify students by their "year/class" but by the number of credits they've earned. :bored:

About 一回生 , it may be all right to use that in writing down one's year on an essay in western Japan. If you're at a university in Tokyo and the rest of eastern Japan, however, you identify your year in writing as 一年 rather than 一年生, so it's 一年11組 -- although, once again, I feel that this isn't what the OP meant.

 

[Elizabeth]

I have a feeling that the OP wrote "class" and not "year and class" in the sense of students entering university at a certain year are grouped into "classes" as done in Japan? By "class," I think he's referring to the "name of the course" (Introduction to English Literature, for example) rather than the "year/class in university"? I don't think American universities identify students by their "year/class" but by the number of credits they've earned. :?

Yes, you are correct. They identify themselves according to the graduating year of classes - but just to be safe, that isn't normally until the final credits are awarded and all other petitions to commencement have been granted.


The preferred formatting of a paper should have been part of the assignment or the OP needs to ask the professor for his/her choice of style.