- SOPHIA ONLINE Top
- Sophians Talk -Japan and the World
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Do Your Usual Work Wherever You Like—Revitalizing the Whole of Japan through Teleworking
- Yuri Tazawa (Yuri Tazawa CEO, Y's Staff Corporation President, Telework Management Inc.)As a high school student I dreamed of becoming an English teacher. The reason was very straightforward, actually. I really admired my English teacher, so I thought of as many questions as possible with the sole purpose of talking to the teacher, and as a result my grades just improved on their own, so I came to enjoy studying English…
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Attract More People to Live Performances Using the Internet as Gateway
- Sannosuke Yanagiya (Rakugo comic storyteller)If I hadn't made it into Sophia University, I wouldn't now be a professional storyteller—probably not, anyway.In high school my studies were motivated not so much by wanting to go to university as by an intense desire to move to Tokyo, but I was lucky enough to get a place in the Faculty of Economics on recommendation. At that time…
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Lessons Learned as a Historical Novelist
- Reiko Morota (Writer)This September NHK will start screening a six-month historical drama series based on my novel Yonju-hachinin-me no chushin (The forty-eighth retainer). While it deals with Chushingura, the well-known Japanese story of forty-seven ronin on a mission to avenge their master, this drama offers a completely new angle on the tale that…
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Sparking Diversity of Thought through Our Work
- Koichiro Shima (Editor and Creative Director, President and Joint CEO of Hakuhodo Kettle, Inc.)The Japan Booksellers' Award is now in its 13th year. I was one of the founders of the award, and still serve on its executive committee. This year the award went to Hitsuji to Hagane no Mori (A forest of sheep and steel) by Natsu Miyashita, who attended Sophia ahead of me…
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A Leading Musical Star Who Keeps on Chasing Her Childhood Dream
- Seiko Niizuma (Singer and actress)According to my older sister, even as young as five years old I was declaring that I would one day be a star, mimicking pop singers, and practicing signing autographs. Perhaps it's thanks to that devotion from such a young age that I got to where I am today [laughs]!…
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Ten Seconds to Shine: Bringing Personality and Skill to Station Jingle Composition
- Hiroshi Shiozuka (Composer, arranger and guitarist)My father liked classical music and played it to me before I was born. Maybe that's why, at the age of four, I suddenly said I wanted to learn the piano. Unfortunately I didn't improve much, but even at that age I showed an outstanding talent for improvising by ear.At elementary school I loved the Japanese band…
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Magazines Have Potential to Create Communities Leading to New Business
- Yuki Yamamoto (Magazine Editor)I decided that my future lay in the media when I was still a kid. My father was originally an eager newspaper journalist, but later he was transferred to the non-newspaper division and I saw him going to work at a leisurely hour in the morning and coming home by taxi at night after he'd been out drinking. So I thought working in the media was an easy job where you didn't have to ride on crowded commuter trains [laughs]. Regardless of my motivation, Dad was delighted…
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Sophia Wove My Dream into Reality : Aiming Now for New Heights as a Stage Actor
- Jay Kabira (Musical Actor)At junior and senior high school I liked drama and musical so much that I even formed a club with my friends, but I was mostly interested in playing soccer.I belonged to the youth team of the Yomiuri Football Club (as it was then), and I went on a soccer exchange to Texas State University in the aim of becoming a professional player…
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The Meandering Path of an Unwaveringly Focused Market Economist
- Yasunari Ueno (Economist)Since my father was a legal professional and my high school grades weren't bad, it seems that everyone thought I would enroll in the faculty of law of a national university [laughs]. However, as I had liked history ever since having a good teacher at junior high school, I decided to study history at university. Sophia University had an international image and seemed…
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A Pioneer in Japanese Police Procedural Novels with a New Spin on the 'Whodunit'
- Bin Konno (Novelist)I applied for Sophia University because I had a thing for pop singer Agnes Chan, who was a student at the International Division (now the Faculty of Liberal Arts) at the time. I failed the first time around–possibly something to do with my less-than-admirable motivation for applying. While I was studying to retake the entrance exam the following year, I started to…
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Anime Can Bring Young Japanese and Russians Closer
- Sumire Uesaka (Voice Actor)I was attracted to the Soviet Union and Russia after hearing the national anthem of the USSR when I was in high school. The anthem fascinated me with its magestic melody and beautiful Russian tune. I was lucky to get a recommendation to enroll in the Department of Russian Studies at Sophia University…
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![Aki Isoyama Drama Producer, 〔TV Production Division〕 Tokyo Broadcasting System Television, Inc. [TBS]](/adv/sophia/img/sophian/sophi_list_13.jpg)
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TV Dramas Should Be Watched When They Are First Aired
- Aki Isoyama (Drama Producer, 〔TV Production Division〕 Tokyo Broadcasting System Television, Inc. [TBS])In high school, I won an award for a manga I created. I belonged to the Art Club at the school, and I thought I wanted to be an artist. But, even though I was young, I was concerned about security [laughs] and sought stability.I decided to enter a regular university rather than go freelance…
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Protecting and Nurturing Sustainable Primary Industries:
Introducing a Japanese Social Business to China and Other Asian Countries
- Kazuyoshi Fujita (President of Daichi wo Mamoru Kai Co., Ltd.)When I entered the Faculty of Law at Sophia University as a freshman, many universities were in the midst of a storm of student protests. It was an era in which no one–and especially no college student–could remain indifferent to issues, such as the revision of the US–Japan Security Treaty, the Vietnam War, and the return of Okinawa to Japanese sovereignty…
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To Become a World Citizen, Know the Culture of Your Own Country
- Keiko Hanada (Wife of Takanohana, Stable Master at the Takanohana Sumo Stable)I first dreamed of becoming a television news presenter and working overseas when I was in fifth grade in elementary school. In those days, all the TV stations had programs about foreign countries, like Kaoru Kanetaka's “The World around Us.” It was as if the stations were in competition with each other over these programs. As a result…
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Has the “Japan Is Amazing!” Craze Gone a Little Too Far?
- Goro Yamada (Editor and Commentator)When I was in high school, I was interested in art and film and I particularly wanted to study film at university, not from the perspective of a film creator but from the perspective of a film commentator. There were surprisingly few universities that offered that area of study, though…
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Sophia University Has Made Me Who I Am Today
- Junko Hibiya (President of International Christian University)From my junior high school days, I enjoyed English, or rather I liked the structure of language—both English and Japanese. I was different from the others: I liked everyone's nemesis, grammar. Given my interests, I thought I wanted to study linguistics at university. I was attending a Catholic high school…
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Hindrances to the Acquisition of Communicative English: The Attitudes of the Japanese Education Community and the Japanese People
- Kensaku Yoshida (Professor, Center for Language Education and Research)I left Japan during my first year of elementary school and lived in the United States and Canada for a number of years. I returned to Japan when I was a seventh grader. In those days, there were hardly any Japanese schools for children living abroad, so my Japanese was very shaky when I returned, making it doubtful at one point whether my school, which was a combined junior high and high school, would allow me to move up to the high school…
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Creating Films That Invite Viewers to Take a Moment to Look at Things from a Different Angle
- Yoshimasa Jimbo (Film Director)I studied at the Department of Sociology within Sophia University's Faculty of Humanities (today the department is in the Faculty of Human Sciences). We had a good deal of freedom in our selection of courses so I was able to bring together diverse disciplines and study a variety of fields…
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Creating Films That Invite Viewers to Take a Moment to Look at Things from a Different Angle
- Yoshimasa Jimbo (Film Director)When I was at high school, I went to the US for a short one-month homestay. My host father worked at NASA, and he told me a lot of interesting stories. Because it was all in English, I couldn't follow everything he said, but I was still suitably impressed. It was partly because of that experience that I chose the Faculty of Science and…
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Creating Films That Invite Viewers to Take a Moment to Look at Things from a Different Angle
- Yoshimasa Jimbo (Television News Presenter)I was born and raised in Miyoshi Town (today's Miyoshi City) in Aichi Prefecture. It is a wonderful place known for its delicious fruit, but it was not a place with much information about Tokyo, let alone about its universities. To be honest, Sophia was…
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Energizing Japan through Effective Communication Techniques
- Keiichi Sasaki (Copywriter & TV Advertisement Producer, Part-time Lecturer at Sophia University, President of Ugokasu Inc., Lecturer at Sendenkaigi)I work in copywriting, a profession that normally attracts those with a humanities background. I, however, graduated with a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Sophia University and then went on to graduate school here in that same field…
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Sophia University Should Take Lead in Reforming English Education in Japan
- Tetsuya Yasukochi (Lecturer at Toshin High School and Toshin Business School)I wanted to study English at university from the time I was in high school, but I wanted to study English that could be used for communication, not English literature. I couldn't get into a national university because I was not good at mathematics, but…
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The study of spiritual care as a new form of emotional care at Sophia
- Osamu Mizutani (Visiting Professor at Hanazono University, Part-time Lecturer at Sophia University)I graduated from the Department of Philosophy in the Faculty of Humanities here at Sophia University. I am teaching an Ethics Seminar for junior and senior students in the same department from April of this year. But I don't think this is the only reason I was brought back to my alma mater…
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It's important to keep challenging yourself and asking questions.
In doing so, you are bound to make new discoveries.
- Kurara Chibana (Model, Japanese Ambassador for the United Nations World Food Programme)Since high school, I had desired to study a wide range of subjects, including psychology and philosophy, in the field of humanities at a university. Therefore, I entered the Department of Education under the Faculty of Humanities…
