Department of
Asian Languages &
Literatures
453 Folwell Hall
9 Pleasant St. SE
Minneapolis, MN 55455

E-mail: all@umn.edu

Department of Asian Languages and Literatures

  • Congratulations Jason, Twice!

    Postsocialist Modernity: Chinese Cinema, Literature, and Criticism in the Market AgeWe are very pleased to announce that Jason McGrath, Assistant Professor of Modern Chinese Literature and Film, has just had two significant achievements, both related to his study of film.

    First, Jason’s new book Postsocialist Modernity: Chinese Cinema, Literature, and Criticism in the Market Age has been published by Stanford University Press (March 2008). Andrew Jones of the University of California - Berkeley has said "This is the most lucid, engaging, and theoretically acute account of contemporary Chinese cultural production to have emerged in recent years from the Western academy."

    Second, Jason has just won a McKnight Land-Grant Professorship (2008-2010) for his project “Inscribing the Real: Chinese Cinema from the Silent Era to the Twenty-first Century.” This is one of the University of Minnesota’s most prestigious awards. The major purpose of the McKnight Professorship program is to nurture the careers of the University of Minnesota’s most promising junior faculty members in order to strengthen the faculty for the future. Jason is the only scholar in the Humanities to win the award this year (of 13), and one of only two people in the Humanities in the last three years.

     March 10th, 2008

Asian Languages and Literatures is a dynamic and innovative department committed to the study of the languages and cultural phenomena of East, South, and Southeast Asia. The program encourages breadth of perspective and rigorous engagement with specific materials. General theoretical issues inform all areas and topics researched or taught in the department.

Language Programs

Language learning is of vital importance to successful research in the Asian world. Our teaching staff explores and implements new methodologies in second-language acquisition at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Currently, we offer Chinese, Hindi, Hmong, Japanese, Korean, Urdu and Vietnamese.

Programs

The undergraduate and graduate programs incorporate the best of traditional models of area studies as well as challenge these by encouraging comparative approaches and perspectives. Our undergraduate major requires students to attain advanced language skills, high levels of cultural literacy, and methodological sophistication. The PhD program in Asian Literatures, Cultures, and Media (ALCM) is designed to advance the fields of Asian studies and the humanities in general. See the specific areas covered in the program.