Asian Languages and Literatures B A

Asia is an increasingly important part of world politics, economics, and culture. The program prepares students to interact with the people and cultures of Asia.

Students in the program study an Asian language—Chinese, Hindi, Hmong, Japanese, Korean—as well as methods of literary and cultural analysis. The language study provides advanced spoken and written skills that allow students direct access to the people and cultures of Asia, where over half the world's population lives. The analytical courses give a theoretically sophisticated understanding of the rich literary and cultural texts, from the accepted literary canon to popular culture and film.

The major has three concentrations—Chinese, Japanese, South Asian—each of which introduces a broad range of language, literary, and cultural texts. Along with concentration courses, students take related electives outside the department and should take at least one course related to another area of Asia. The deeper, concentrated study in upper level courses, leads to the senior project. Study abroad is strongly encouraged and can contribute credit to the major.

Admission Requirements

For information about University of Minnesota admission requirements, visit the   Office of Admissions Web site.

General Requirements

Program Requirements

Students are required to take 4 semester(s) of Chinese, Hindu/Urdu, Japanese, or Korean.

Program Sub-plans

Students are required to complete one of the following sub-plans. (Note for the Twin Cities and
Morris campuses: The honors sub-plan does not meet this requirement. Honors students are required to
complete one sub-plan plus the honors sub-plan. Please see an adviser if no honors sub-plan is listed
for the program.)
                 

This is an honors sub-plan.

Eligibility is based on the GPA in the student's final 60 graded credits (the full semester in which the 60th credit is received will be included) at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities campus (transfer credits are not included). Satisfactory completion of at least four upper division honors opportunities after completion of the 60th semester credit is required. One of the four honors opportunities must be outside the major field, a second is achieved through the honors thesis or project, and at least two of the four must be honors classroom experiences. Students must complete the honors requirements for their degree within two years of the term in which they apply for graduation. All honors courses must be graded A-F.