LibGuides: Cornell University: Institution Main

Overview

About Cornell University:

Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White with a land grant from the New York State Senate, the university was created to support education and research in all fields of knowledge. It opened to the public in 1868. Its main campus remains in Ithaca, New York, with smaller campuses in New York City and one medical campus in Qatar.

Cornell's undergraduate schools include those that are private and those that are part of Cornell's public land-grant status. Those in the private category include Cornell's College of Arts and Sciences, the School of Hotel Management, the College of Architecture, Art and Planning, the College of Engineering, and the graduate and professional schools of College of Veterinary Medicine, the S.C. Johnson Graduate School of Management, and Cornell Law School, all in Ithaca, as well as the Weill Cornell Medical College based in Manhattan. The public colleges at Cornell include the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, and the College of Human Ecology.

The Ithaca campus of Cornell University is also home to the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, which is home to a Japan collection, the second largest collection in their Asian department. Its pieces range from Jomon- and Yayoi-period works, through the Edo-period and up to artists active today.

Other Programs and Collections of Interest

East Asia Program
Part of the Center for International Studies, the East Asia Program provides instructional, faculty, and student support in a variety of ways. They also provide funding for conferences and speaker series, as well as supporting 12-15 visiting scholars through their Associates-in-Research (AiR) program.
The Morgan Garden
Scroll down for information about the Rebecca Q. and James C. Morgan Japanese Garden, housed at the Johnson Museum of Art, was built in 2011 as part of the Museum extension. The designer of the garden, Marc Peter Keane received his initial training in Landscape Architecture at Cornell University and mastered Japanese gardening during years of residence in Kyoto. The Morgan Garden is designed in the karesansui (枯山水) style.
Southeast Asia Program (SEAP)
One of the nation's largest programs for Southeast Asia, Cornell's SEAP is a National Resource Center by the US Department of Education. The program offers advanced foreign language training in such languages as Burmese, Indonesian, Khmer (Cambodian), Tagalog, Thai, and Vietnamese. SEAP also provides area and international knowledge in the liberal arts and applied discipline focused on Southeast Asia. Other major Southeast Asia Centers profiled in these guides include those at Kyoto University and the profile underdevelopment for at EFEO in Paris.

Institution

Website

Institution: Cornell University

Founded: 1865

Type: public and private university

Location: Ithaca, NY

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Resources and Facilities

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Japanese Studies

18 faculty and staff teach Japan-focused courses at Cornell University.

Undergraduate Studies

The Department of Asian Studies offers a B.A. with a concentration on East Asia, which requires a two-year proficiency level in one of over a dozen Asian languages taught at Cornell, including Japanese.
An honors program in Asian Studies is available, and requires a 3.7 GPA and an honors essay.
Asian Studies also offers a minor in East Asian Studies for any B.A.- or B.S.-eligible student at Cornell University.
For undergraduate admission information, please see the Cornell Undergraduate Admissions website.

Undergraduate Admissions

Graduate Studies

Cornell offers an M.A. in East Asian Studies and a Ph.D. in East Asian Literature, Religion, and Culture.
Various other Ph.D. programs are offered with the possibility of focusing on East Asia or Japan in particular.
The East Asia Program offers five categories of fellowships for advanced study of East Asian languages, as well as graduate studies and general research on East Asia.
For more information regarding the Graduate School at Cornell, please visit the Cornell Graduate School website.

Graduate Admissions

Other Departments

Japan-focused courses are taught outside of Asian Studies and Japanese Language and Literature in the following departments: anthropology, architecture, business administration, city & regional planning, comparative literature, economics, government, history, history of art, international & comparative labor, linguistics, policy analysis & management, religious studies, and science & technology studies.
The majority of these Japan-focused courses are in the history and linguistics departments.