NICOLE BARRINGTON
News Writer

This summer, students will be able to take a three- or six-credit Japanese course at Lutheran Theological Seminary.

The Saskatoon Theological Union will offer Japanese among its other introductory language courses. After receiving a request from a member of the Religious Studies department, the Union decided to go ahead with the program. The course outline will follow a similar structure to the year-long program offered at the University of Regina.

The College of Arts and Science at the University of Saskatchewan has undergone budget cuts recently — most notably in the fine arts. However, there may be cuts to lecturers in all departments, including humanities. The annual budget for sessional lecturers in all departments has already been cut from $700,000 to $300,000, and further reductions are expected.

For those who don’t want to stress about getting into a language class during the summer or the regular year, this program would be a reasonable alternative. So far, the Japanese course will only be offered in the May-June Spring session.

The class itself will involve “developing a reading ability in the languages equivalent to what would be achieved in a typical year-long university course” according to William Richards of the Department of Religion and Culture. Despite the fact that Japanese is becoming an increasingly useful language in the era of globalization, it is not being directly offered by the University of Saskatchewan. In the realm of international business, Japanese is essential.

Currently, the only Eastern language class offered through the Department of Linguistics and Languages is Chinese.  Only the University of Regina offers programs in other Eastern languages such as Korean and Japanese.

Those who are interested must register by April 15 by contacting the religious studies department.  Once registered, they will be considered “occasional students” in the college. At the end of the course, students will be issued transcripts to transfer the credit into their degree programs of choice.  The course will begin on Mar 9 and run until June 24.