Question about Arts - Japanese Studies?! (1 Viewer)

[Insanity]

Hi all.

I'm planning on doing a combined degree of Commerce/Arts [ http://www.handbook.unsw.edu.au/undergraduate/programs/2006/3525.html], however I have a few questions regarding Arts ... I know that I want to do/specialise in Japanese Studies, but I'm a bit confused about all the courses offered ...

According to the online handbook, for first year 2006 undergraduates like me, Year 1 of Comm/Arts will be completed with 48 uoc, with 12 uoc from the Arts and Social Science courses [2 level 1 courses].

Rules Relating to the Bachelor of Arts Component

1. Of the 108 units of credit in Arts and Social Sciences required for the combined degree:

(a) none may be from courses offered by the Faculty of Commerce and Economics;

(b) at least 24 and no more than 36 units of credit must be obtained in Level 1 courses, including no more than 12 Level 1 units of credit offered by any one School, Department, Unit or Interdisciplinary Program; and

(c) no more than 54 units of credit in total may be from any one School, Department, Unit or Interdisciplinary Program within the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

2. Each student must complete a major sequence (42 units of credit) in one of the following areas within the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

Okay, this is where I'm basically confused ... it says that the Arts component requires 108 uoc, but if I'm specialising in Jap Studies (42 uoc via JAPNA13400), that means I'm left with 66 uoc left ... what the hell do I do with those remaining 66 uoc ? I could specialise in Chinese studies ... but according to (c) I'm not allowed to do this?

Or are the remaining 66 uoc reserved for core units?

==============

Basically could someone just tell me the basic program structure for Comm/Arts with a focus on Jap studies?

 

[mushroom_head]

I remember having the same confusion last year, however i asked the faculty and this is what they said:

what (c) basically means is you cannot do more than 54 uoc ie 9 subjects in any one major. however since chinese is a different major, it is possible to do up to 54uoc of chinese as well.
I am also majoring in both japanese and chinese studies in my arts component.

there are no core units in arts because it's sucha flexible degree

Com/arts
1st year: 6 core commerce, 2 arts
2nd year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
3rd year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
4th year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
5th year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
however, you do not need to fix yourself to this structure. you can do it in a way that is convenient for u.

In japanese studies, if you're starting from beginners,
1st year: japn1000, japn1001
2nd year:japn2000, japn2001
3rd yera: japn3000, japn3001
4th year: japn3400, japn3401
you dont have to do all of these until 4th or 5th year. It depends on whether you wish to continue with your japanese studies.
In a japanese major, you must also do japn2500 at some stage of your degree

 

[Insanity]

there are no core units in arts because it's sucha flexible degree

Com/arts
1st year: 6 core commerce, 2 arts
2nd year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
3rd year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
4th year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
5th year: 4 commerce, 4 arts
however, you do not need to fix yourself to this structure. you can do it in a way that is convenient for u.

In japanese studies, if you're starting from beginners,
1st year: japn1000, japn1001
2nd year:japn2000, japn2001
3rd yera: japn3000, japn3001
4th year: japn3400, japn3401
you dont have to do all of these until 4th or 5th year. It depends on whether you wish to continue with your japanese studies.
In a japanese major, you must also do japn2500 at some stage of your degree

Commerce - Do you start choosing your majors in 1st year or 2nd year?

Arts - So, basically for 1st year Japanese studies, the only 2 courses you can do is Japn1000 [Jap Communication 1A, offered only S1] and Japn1001 [Jap Communication 1B, offered only S2]?

And then for years 2 - 5, in addition to doing the compulsory core language courses [japn2000, japn 2001, etc, etc like you've listed out], for each year you have to pick 2 other courses, that come from the electives? like japn 3501 and japn 2701?

Also I heard that the student contribution towards a Comm degree and a Comm/Art degree are about the same [approx $7000 a year]? Is that true or just a rumour?

Thanks for your help heaps by the way!

 

[mushroom_head]

Commerce - Do you start choosing your majors in 1st year or 2nd year?

We start our commerce major in 2nd year because in 1st year, 6 of the 8 subjects are core commerce, and the other 2 subjects are taken up by arts.

Arts - So, basically for 1st year Japanese studies, the only 2 courses you can do is Japn1000 [Jap Communication 1A, offered only S1] and Japn1001 [Jap Communication 1B, offered only S2]?

yep...that's right if you decide to do Japanese.

And then for years 2 - 5, in addition to doing the compulsory core language courses [japn2000, japn 2001, etc, etc like you've listed out], for each year you have to pick 2 other courses, that come from the electives? like japn 3501 and japn 2701?

you don't HAVE to do electives for that major yet. Some people wish to start on their other major, which is also possible. It really depends on personal preference, whether you want to complete one major then start on the next, or do a bit of both and finish at the same time.

Also I heard that the student contribution towards a Comm degree and a Comm/Art degree are about the same [approx $7000 a year]? Is that true or just a rumour?

Thanks for your help heaps by the way!

yeh, it's similar, though commerce subjects are slightly more expensive than arts. It was a little over $2500 per semester ($680/com subject and $480/arts sub) to do com/arts last year, and it was about $2700 per semester if you did 4 commerce subjects.

 

[Insanity]

Thanks very much - you've been a very big help!

Just one more question - what's the difference between Lectures, Tutorials and Seminars?

 

[Rekkusu]

Lectures are basically lessons where you head to an auditorium or a theatre, there a professor/lecturer [in US they call it a Professor] just lectures you on your course, picture it as a high school teacher who just keeps talking like a textbook reader. You are of course allowed to ask questions during a lecture, however if you do so, then you may slow down the entire class. [Big lectures from popular courses say BIOS1101, consist of lectures with 400 ppl]

And hence, that leads onto Tutorials, this is where some Uni student who's doing a PHD or master and had previously done your course, say BIOS1101, he would provide personal advice to you, and in some tuts like maths, they give out homework, or have short quizes or tests, which totally contribute 26% to your wam I believe.

Labs are where you conduct practicals, if its chem labs,etc your professor might conduct the prac in front of you, rather than letting you do it, e.g. calcium + water

Seminars are almost like lectures, however I suspect that they're like lectures + tutorials combined together.

Good luck!

 

[mushroom_head]

Yeh, as Rekkusu said, in lectures, the lecturer just talks n talks, and students sit and take notes down. It's a very non-interactive, yet informative way of teaching.

When you study Japanese, Tutorials (T-tutes) and Seminars (S-tutes) are pretty much the same except in the different tutes you study different parts of your course. It's also where you do your quizzes. These are more interactive, and held in classrooms with one tutor and around 20 students.
From what i know, in Japanese 1a/b, both tutorials and seminars are 2 hrs each.

 

[Insanity]

Hi, me again [turns out I lied in my last post ...]

you don't HAVE to do electives for that major yet. Some people wish to start on their other major, which is also possible. It really depends on personal preference, whether you want to complete one major then start on the next, or do a bit of both and finish at the same time.

Stupid question ... but you can do just one major [Jap Studies] in Arts right? Like it isn't compulsory to do 2 majors?

 

[mushroom_head]

Stupid question ... but you can do just one major [Jap Studies] in Arts right? Like it isn't compulsory to do 2 majors?

hmm....i guess it's possible, but what would you do with your remaining 66uoc? It would be very meaningless and a waste of time to do a little bit of many subjects.

 

[disko]

i'm in similar position here doing compsci/arts, majoring in japanese. with all my spare arts credit i'm trying korean out along side it (making timetables a complete bitch) don't know if i will continue/major in it yet though.

another question if anybody happen to know, i'm transferring from newcastle where i have already done JAPN1001 equivalent which i should be getting credited for soon, do i still goto the placement test and whatnot? thanks.

 

[mailinh]

hi everyone, i have a question may odd to the topic, but ya io have enrol n got so may class that r permitted clash so wat should i do, change the course or wat! I really have no idea with thi skind of enroling. I'm having trouble with it all the time. Any help n suggestion?? plz

 

[Insanity]

hmm....i guess it's possible, but what would you do with your remaining 66uoc? It would be very meaningless and a waste of time to do a little bit of many subjects.

See, before I was enlightened today at the advising day where my friend reminded me that to major in Jap studies, the most you could do was 42 u.o.c ... I thought you could use all 108 u.o.c to major in Jap.

Ahh ... the inner workings of a confused transitional HS student.

At this stage, doing the Arts component is a bit of a test run for me - to see how I go, if I can cope doing 2 degrees at the same time.
If I do decide to drop Arts, I've been told that that it won't take me any longer than a normal Comm student to complete the degree and I won't be disadvantaged ... it'll just take me 3 years to complete it, provided I do some make-up time in Summer school.

However, if I continue to go with Arts for the full 5 years, I was thinking of doing majors in Chinese and Jap like you ... however this is where again, I get confused with the mathematics

Major in Jap [42 uoc] + Major in Chinese [42 uoc] = 84 uoc.
So like ... what do I do with the rest of the remain 24 uoc? Just choose some other specialisation offered in Arts? Can I ask what you're doing with your remaing 24 uoc?

Oh yeah, just another question - this time regarding placement tests. Do I still have to go do it for Jap, even though I've never done it [except for Year 7]? And also since I'm planning to do Chinese, if I decide to do Comm/Arts all the way, do I also have to sit the placement test for Chinese this year?

P.S Just really want to thank you again for helping out - it's really been gratefully appreciated. :wave:

 

[mushroom_head]

i'm in similar position here doing compsci/arts, majoring in japanese. with all my spare arts credit i'm trying korean out along side it (making timetables a complete bitch) don't know if i will continue/major in it yet though.

another question if anybody happen to know, i'm transferring from newcastle where i have already done JAPN1001 equivalent which i should be getting credited for soon, do i still goto the placement test and whatnot? thanks.

I cannot give you a definite answer for this question, but it's best to contact the arts faculty
Email: languages@unsw.edu.au
Tel: 9385 1681
Calling up is the better option cos most probably those people won't reply your emails, just like what they did to me last yr.

 

[mushroom_head]

hi everyone, i have a question may odd to the topic, but ya io have enrol n got so may class that r permitted clash so wat should i do, change the course or wat! I really have no idea with thi skind of enroling. I'm having trouble with it all the time. Any help n suggestion?? plz

If there really are no other lecture streams that you can enrol in to avoid the clash, i guess you would have to change the course you're doing this semester. Even though it says "permitted clash", the thing is, you'd only be able to attend one lecture/tute at the one time, unless you are willing to skip some lectures.

 

[mushroom_head]

See, before I was enlightened today at the advising day where my friend reminded me that to major in Jap studies, the most you could do was 42 u.o.c ... I thought you could use all 108 u.o.c to major in Jap.

Ahh ... the inner workings of a confused transitional HS student.

At this stage, doing the Arts component is a bit of a test run for me - to see how I go, if I can cope doing 2 degrees at the same time.
If I do decide to drop Arts, I've been told that that it won't take me any longer than a normal Comm student to complete the degree and I won't be disadvantaged ... it'll just take me 3 years to complete it, provided I do some make-up time in Summer school.

However, if I continue to go with Arts for the full 5 years, I was thinking of doing majors in Chinese and Jap like you ... however this is where again, I get confused with the mathematics

Major in Jap [42 uoc] + Major in Chinese [42 uoc] = 84 uoc.
So like ... what do I do with the rest of the remain 24 uoc? Just choose some other specialisation offered in Arts? Can I ask what you're doing with your remaing 24 uoc?

Oh yeah, just another question - this time regarding placement tests. Do I still have to go do it for Jap, even though I've never done it [except for Year 7]? And also since I'm planning to do Chinese, if I decide to do Comm/Arts all the way, do I also have to sit the placement test for Chinese this year?

P.S Just really want to thank you again for helping out - it's really been gratefully appreciated. :wave:

To clear things up a bit, for a Jap major, the minimum is 42uoc, and maximum is 54uoc.

Well, in my case, Jap takes up 54uoc, Chinese 42uoc, and for the remaining 12, i'd probably do something like psychology or french. Yeh, some people drop arts at the end of 1st yr coz they don't like the idea how it's an additional 2 years just for an additional arts degree. But then again, i think it's more important that you enjoy what you're studying.

Since you haven't done Japanese before, you won't need to do the placement test. Just enrol in JAPN1000.

It's been a pleasure to help

 

[Insanity]

To clear things up a bit, for a Jap major, the minimum is 42uoc, and maximum is 54uoc.

Well, in my case, Jap takes up 54uoc, Chinese 42uoc, and for the remaining 12, i'd probably do something like psychology or french. Yeh, some people drop arts at the end of 1st yr coz they don't like the idea how it's an additional 2 years just for an additional arts degree. But then again, i think it's more important that you enjoy what you're studying.

Since you haven't done Japanese before, you won't need to do the placement test. Just enrol in JAPN1000.

It's been a pleasure to help

So is the maximum for chinese 42 uoc? Or 54 uoc as well?

Well, I also agree with your POV - that it's more important to enjoy what you're studying thus I took up Comm/Arts ... like, what's the point of life if you don't enjoy life? :wave: