The Oriental Studies Division of the Humanities Department at NSU hosted a Russian-Japanese conference 鈥淛apan in the context of Asian history and culture鈥�, which took place at the end of October and is arranged annually welcoming scientists and faculty fr om Tohoku University (Japan), one of the Top-100 international universities.
Not only did Japanese professors attend the conference but they also conducted two lectures for the students of the Oriental Studies Division at NSU. The former Vice-President of Tohoku University, Mr. Akihiro Kidzima, spoke about issues of reconstructing the coastal line of Tohoku which suffered badly during the tsunami and earthquake in March, 2011. Prof. Sano Masato from Graduate School of International Cultural Studies, Department of Area Studies at Tohoku University, spoke about the modern Japanese cinema of the late XX century.
During the days of the conference, junior and senior students of the Oriental Studies could attend a research seminar wh ere they were given an opportunity to present their research and discuss their term projects with the Japanese professors.
Another aim of this visit for the Japanese delegation was to discuss the possibilities of further cooperation with NSU. Our Japanese guests offered a set of steps on the cooperation program between Tohoku University and three Russian universities including NSU, MSU and the Far Eastern Federal University, which is to be five-year long. The cooperation involves close relations in the research and educational spheres, such as exchange at graduate and post-graduate levels, supervising students, holding conferences and seminars, developing joint Master鈥檚 programs and joint laboratories.
鈥淥ur universities have collaborated since 1997,鈥� said Prof. Oka Hiroki (Center for Northeast Asian Studies at Tohoku University) in the interview to our correspondent. 鈥淲e do appreciate this cooperation. We have united the efforts of NSU, SB RAS and Tohoku University and have been giving lectures on different disciplines, from humanities to sciences. Now our collaboration has found a new solid support 鈥� we can launch joint megaprojects and exchange programs for students and lecturers, thus strengthening our relationships.
During the period up to March 2015, a significant two-way student exchange is worthy of consideration in the groups of 10 students who are going to get acquainted with the Japanese language, culture, history and sights.
The Japanese professors suggest that such an introductory trip to Japan should be taken by groups of students half of whom would be successful students of the Oriental Studies Division, who are studying Japanese and the culture, and the other half equally successful and active students of other NSU departments, who should be good at English. The first step is to select the students for the exchange program, which should be done soon, and to form a support group including volunteer students.
Prof. Oka Hiroki believes that the most promising areas for cooperation are material engineering, geology, energy engineering, mathematics, IT and culture. Given the high research rating of Novosibirsk Scientific Center and NSU as well as the mega-grants of Siberian and Japanese scientists, the Japanese party insisted on considering a possibility to create joint laboratories in different fields supervised by prominent scientists, which would develop both science and art areas, e.g. a laboratory of Geophysics by Prof. Otani and K. Litasov or of Asian Research in the field of Humanities by Prof. Oka and Ye. Vojtishek.
