EVENT

Tuesday, 22 April, 14:30–16:00 JST

From "Being about Something to Being for Somebody" is the memorable title of Stephen Weil's contribution to the 1999 Daedalus volume on American Museums. Though decades old and not without challenges, the phrase continues to resonate within the museum field. In many ways it encapsulates the ways in which institutions have changed from privileging curator-defined information and institution-defined goals to promoting the visitor's experience and the broader community.
In her talk, Leslie Bedford, a longtime museum practitioner and professor of museum studies, will explore the meaning of Weil's phrase and how it has been implemented by museums, including those she has visited in Japan. Her talk will include a discussion of the online conversations she is facilitating with Japanese museum professionals and academics. And finally, she will raise the question of what "visitor centered" can mean today and in the future.

Wednesday, April 23, 2025 15:00-16:30 JST

Carbon and nature markets are struggling with low trust, high costs, and limited scale—falling far short of what’s needed. In this lecture, Professor Weder di Mauro presents a new market design co-developed with Estelle Cantillon and Eric F. Lambin. Jurisdictions offer large-scale projects; investors buy shares that yield carbon and biodiversity “dividends” without conferring land ownership. Market prices reveal demand and support liquidity. Compared to credit-based systems, this approach cuts costs, boosts credibility, and supports long-term commitments. It tackles the core problems holding back today’s markets—and offers a credible path to scale with real environmental impact.

Thursday, 8 May, 10:30–12:00 JST

World literature has been a reality since at least the nineteenth century. Texts travel across continents and cultures, translated from every language, taught in universities worldwide, and forming an emerging global canon. Never before have we been so free to read whatever we wish, from anywhere. Or so it seems. But is this true freedom, or merely a comforting illusion? What are the boundaries of this seemingly limitless literary exchange? This talk aims to explore those limits and propose a new approach to literature—a different way of reading texts, one that is either entirely new or, perhaps, simply old and forgotten. Welcome to the world library!

Monday, 17 April 2023, 2:30-4:00 PM

In this workshop, we will discuss how the question of identity is reflected in education and language policy, through the process of standardization of the national language, as well as the teaching and treatment of the foreign, national, regional languages.

Tuesday, 4 April 2023, 4:00-5:30 pm

What is the relationship of humans to animals and to mountains in Japanese culture? To natural disasters? How can these complex relationships help us generate an environmental ethics relevant to the present? Shirane proposes an “ecology of disaster, afterlives, and rebirth” as a means to rethink the relationship of the human to the non-human.

Friday, 31 March 2023, 10:00-11:30 am

In honor of International Women’s Day, Tokyo College’s “Gender, Sexuality & Identity” collaborative research group will host a panel that will explore the role of translation in practices of transnational feminist solidarity. Panelists will discuss the recent protests in Iran for “Woman, Life, Freedom” as a case study for contemplating how women led movements may be translated into different contexts to facilitate multi-directional relationships of learning and solidarity.

Friday, 10 March 2023, 4:00-5:30 pm

Prof. Björkegren’s research focuses on the helical nature of DNA. The lecture will give a background to this analysis, presenting the structure and function of chromosomal DNA and how these features influence cellular growth. This will set the stage for a final discussion on how and if the organization of the hereditary material into a double stranded helix shapes the identity and development of our cells.

Wednesday, 8 March 2023, 5:00 pm - 6:30 pm JST

Challenges that both concern and span the globe, such as those indicated by the SDGs, are drawing increasing attention, and the problems resulting from pandemics and economic turmoil have grown more significant. Many of these challenges become apparent as they come in contact with issues at the local and regional level. Rather than attempting to solve individual challenges, however, more fundamental, forward-thinking social transformations are required. In this discussion forum, we explore what social responsibilities universities should fulfill in these circumstances with a special focus on the impact on knowledge production. The forum will also summarize the contents of “The Future of Higher Education” dialogue series held by Tokyo College over seven sessions from December 2022 to March 2023.

Wednesday, 1 March 2023, 15:00-16:00

In this presentation, Dr. HIRAMOTO Mie explores the changing ideas of masculinity in Asia and beyond through the lens of sociolinguistics. She focuses on the relationships between sociocultural stereotypes and masculinity ideologies, as well as the ways in which genre, style, and medium shape our understanding of these concepts. Drawing mainly on Agha’s works, the theoretical concepts of mediatization and enregisterment, as well as figures of personhood, will be employed in the analysis of three case studies.

Wednesday, 1 March 2023, 16:00-17:30

In this workshop, we discuss the role of media in manifesting, representing, and reifying identities, and what role language plays in this relationship. We explore the role of genre, imagined audience, and media creator in language use, and what implications media consumption has for our own perceptions of identity and belonging.

Wednesday, 1 March 2023, 10:00 am - 11:00 am

Higher education around the world is experiencing vast changes in its multiple environments as a result of numerous factors, including globalization, shifts in the boundary conditions of truth, the effects of technology, geopolitical uncertainties, and calls for ‘decolonisation’. This seminar series explores the impact of these factors on the future of higher education.

Monday, 27 February 2023, 4:00-5:30 pm

The general public is more familiar with Mary Wollstonecraft’s daughter Mary Shelley, who imagined Frankenstein as a monstrous metaphor of modernity. Historians are also aware that Mary Wollstonecraft died giving birth to Mary Shelley.
However, among scholars, the two texts of Mary Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Men as a response to Edmund Burke and A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, are of foremost importance. In this lecture, Prof. Serna will introduce another less-known and long-depreciated text titled An Historical and Moral View of the French Revolution; and the Effect it Has Produced in Europe. He intends to show that it is one of the first great histories of the French Revolution, proposing a new narrative and a new historiographic epistemology.

Monday, 20 February 2023, 4:00-5:30 PM

A number of humanoid robots in Japan have been supplied with gender and emotions, qualities that are stereotyped and greatly simplified in order to create algorithms. Artificial intelligence (AI), which is comprised of numerous algorithms, is useful for tasks that rely on pattern recognition, but AI can also perpetuate and reproduce the everyday social biases of their human designers. In this presentation, Prof. Jennifer Robertson discusses these robots and the implications that their design has for other industries, including surveillance.

Wednesday, 15 February 2023, 3:00-4:00 pm

Higher education around the world is experiencing vast changes in its multiple environments as a result of numerous factors, including globalization, shifts in the boundary conditions of truth, the effects of technology, geopolitical uncertainties, and calls for ‘decolonisation’. This seminar series explores the impact of these factors on the future of higher education.

Wednesday, 8 February 2023, 4:00-5:30pm

Professor Craig Jeffrey and Associate Professor Jane Dyson will show how young people in rural Uttarakhand, north India, attempt to make viable lives as they respond to environmental and socio-economic crises and engage in everyday social action. They will also screen Professor Dyson’s documentary film Spirit, which explores related themes.