2020 Activity Report
March Activity Report
31 March 2021
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
This month, the International Women’s Day was celebrated worldwide. As one of the main celebrations at UERJ, the fifth edition of an event called “?nima” took place. The event was organized by the Coordenadoria de Artes e Oficinas de Cria??o – Coart (Coordination of Arts and Creative Workshops) of UERJ and presented several thematic activities throughout the month such as musical, theatrical and dance presentations, as well as poetry, performances, audiovisual exhibitions, fashion fair and much more.
The first image below, that is part of a photo exhibition related to the event, is a photo of Marielle Franco, a very proactive and prolific councilwoman of Rio de Janeiro who was murdered three year ago, during her term. The second one is a link to the “Chora Mulheres na Roda” Youtube Channel, on which one can watch a band’s music video.
Scan the QR Code to access the site and watch the band’s music video by Chora Mulheres na Roda.
Also this month, UERJ instituted 2021 as “Paulo Freire Commemorative Year at UERJ”. Paulo Freire would be 100 years old in September this year. He was a pedagogue recognized for the literacy method developed in the 1960s and successfully applied among sugarcane cutters in Rio Grande do Norte State. He is the third most cited theorist in works in the humanities field, worldwide, and has been honored with more than 30 Doctor Honoris Causa titles and around 20 awards, granted by several national and international universities and institutions. Paulo Freire has been a Patron of Brazilian Education since 2012.
On March 19, the inaugural class “Paulo Freire and the Knowledge Society”, given by Professor Ladislau Dowbor, took place at UERJ. The event was broadcast live on TV Uerj.
Throughout 2021, several activities will be held at the University to celebrate the pedagogue’s 100th anniversary.
Image: UERJ
February Activity Report
28 February 2021
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
This month, one of the most important Brazil festivals called Carnival was supposed to be celebrated throughout the country. The celebration in Brazil is internationally famous and has singular characteristics in the diverse locations across the country. It is important not only for its cultural aspect, but also for its economic dimension. However, due to the pandemic, the Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, as in many other places, was officially canceled. Several Brazilian artists have produced videos on Carnival, which could be watched on Internet channels, as a way to celebrate it. Certainly, watching the celebrations on a screen is quite different than experiencing it, but somehow, thanks to technology, people were able to be closer to the festival safely.
Photo: Publicity | Nívea
Publicity of a show of one of the most famous singers in the country: Preta Gil. The event was transmitted through the artist’s official channel on Youtube, on February 14th.
It is also thanks to the technology that after a brief vacation, the undergraduate classes at UERJ were resumed, starting on February 22nd. This is the second semester that classes will be offered remotely. So, everyone is already more accustomed to the virtual environment. In this semester, new students are starting to learn Japanese at UERJ and senior students resumed activities that were in progress before, such as the translation group that, under the coordination of Prof. Elisa Massae Sasaki and Prof. Satomi Takano Kitahara, is proceeding with the translation into Portuguese of the work 「地球にちりばめられて」by the Japanese writer Yoko Tawada.
Below are some images of the first meeting of the translation group in February.
January Activity Report
31 January 2021
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
On January 17, the first person in Brazil was vaccinated against Covid-19. This first vaccination took place in S?o Paulo city and, shortly after, it started in different parts of the country, although with few units of the vaccine available. Up to now, just over 1% of the Brazilian population has been vaccinated.
Regarding Rio de Janeiro city, the Rio de Janeiro State University, in partnership with the Government, is serving as one of the spots for drive-thru vaccination. It is a way for UERJ to serve society in the fight against the virus. Tents were set up in the university parking lot for vaccinating and for guiding the population about the corresponding procedures. The priority, at the moment, is to vaccinate the elderly and healthcare professionals, and later, in the near future, other groups that are most at risk of contracting the disease.
For now, only two vaccines are being administered in the country: the CoronaVac and the Oxford-AstraZeneca. Both ready-made vaccines and raw materials used as inputs for vaccine production in Brazil are being imported. It will certainly still take several months for a large number of people to be vaccinated, but we hope that, after a large-scale immunization, we will return to a normal situation so that TUFS students can safely attend classes in-person at UERJ.
A report on vaccination at UERJ, produced by the TV Uerj, can be watched at: https://youtu.be/22SgGuTaqZs. Below are images of the “drive-thru” vaccination at UERJ:
UERJ entrance gate to vaccination
Preparing for vaccination at UERJ
Drive-thru vaccination against Covid-19 for the elderly at UERJ
December Activity Report
31 December 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
On December 4, UERJ celebrated its 70th anniversary. In 1950, when a municipal law gave rise to the University, Rio de Janeiro was the country’s capital, which is why the University at that time was called Federal District University (UDF). This name was changed in 1958 to University of Rio de Janeiro (URJ) and, in 1961, with the transfer of the Federal District to the city of Brasília, the University had its name changed to State of Guanabara University (UEG). Only in 1975 the Institution received the name that lasts until today: Rio de Janeiro State University (UERJ).
The University was created by merging the Rio de Janeiro Law School, the Rio de Janeiro Faculty of Economic Sciences, the Faculty of Philosophy of the La-Fayette Institute and the Faculty of Medical Sciences. Naturally, over the years, the number of courses has been expanded so that the University currently has 32 undergraduate courses, 65 stricto sensu graduate programs, more than hundred lato sensu graduate courses, in addition to more than 900 extension projects.
The Francisco Negr?o de Lima campus, where Japanese exchange students are received and where the GJO is located, was opened in 1976 and is situated in the Maracan? neighborhood, next to the famous soccer stadium Jornalista Mário Filho, better known as “Maracan?”. The campus was built where there used to be the favela do Esqueleto (Skeleton favela), which was called like that because of the unfinished building that existed on that spot, where a hospital was supposed to operate. Today the University has other campuses and external units spread across the State of Rio de Janeiro, totaling 16 units.
To celebrate the date, UERJ held some events and activities. The Rádio UERJ, for example, provided a special playlist with phrases and thoughts from Brazilian personalities such as Darcy Ribeiro, Herbert de Souza, Milton Santos, Leonardo Boff, among others, that are part of the collection of the Audiovisual Memory Center of UERJ.
TV UERJ produced a video that tells a little about the Institution’s history. It can be seen at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3FuchveHYA&feature=emb_logo
There was also a solemnity on the 4th followed by a live performance with the Brazilian composer, singer and instrumentalist Noca da Portela, transmitted by the UERJ TV channel on YouTube.
Below are some photos of the Francisco Negr?o de Lima Campus during its construction and at present:
Photos: Rede Sirius – Núcleo MID
Construction of the Francisco Negr?o de Lima Campus in the 1960s
Photo by UERJ / FotosPublicas
Jo?o Lyra Filho Pavilion at the Francisco Negr?o de Lima campus (at present)
November Activity Report
30 November 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
On November 20, the “National Day of Black Awareness” is celebrated in Brazil. The date was established by federal law and was chosen because it refers to the death of Zumbi dos Palmares in 1695. Zumbi was one of the leaders of the largest quilombo in the history of Brazil: Quilombo dos Palmares, which was located in the northeast of the country. Quilombos were places of refuge for African slaves and Afro-descendants that existed in most of the American continent.
Zumbi dos Palmares is studied in basic education classes in Brazil as an example of the struggle of blacks in the country. In honor of his memory, there is a great monument on an important road in the city of Rio de Janeiro.
The date recalls the struggle of enslaved Africans in the past and reinforces the importance of carrying out new struggles to make society more just, fighting racism and inequality still present in Brazilian society.
The Black Awareness Day, which is a holiday in the Rio de Janeiro city and in several others around Brazil, is marked by cultural activities, debates and events organized by the black movement in different regions of the country.
At UERJ, there are several events throughout the month of November to commemorate the date, all of them remote this year, such as the Uerj radio interview Structural racism: how to identify and how to fight?, held by the UERJ Educational Technology Center on November 18; The IV Quilolo Rio-Bahia, held by the Proafro Channel on November 12; the live Black is the sum of all colors, held by the Pro-rectory 3 on November 25, among several others. Here are some images of the online events and of the monument cited above.
October Activity Report
31 October 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
A few years ago, Prof. Elisa Massae Sasaki and Prof. Satomi Takano Kitahara started a Japanese – Portuguese translation group at the Rio de Janeiro State University so that Japanese undergraduate students and exchange students could deepen their knowledge in the respective foreign languages, ??as well as learn translation techniques.
The texts worked by the group vary from technical to literary ones. In 2016, the year in which the city of Rio de Janeiro hosted the Olympic Games, the group concentrated its activities on sporting themes, which helped the staff who worked with Japanese journalists and international media during the event.
A remarkable literary work translated recently, is the Yoko Tawada’s book called 「献灯使」. In 2019, we were privileged to receive the visit of the author at UERJ, who participated in a chat with the students and the interested external community about her work.
In 2020, due to the pandemic, there was a pause in activities, which, thanks to video conferencing platforms, were resumed recently. The group’s focus at the moment is a new work by the writer Tawada called「地球にちりばめられて」, published by Kodansha in 2018. The translation activity is being done online with the participation of students from UERJ, the group Coordinators, the Visitor Professor Fujiwara and with GJO support.
Below are some images related to the group that is growing year by year:
(Rio de Janeiro State University — October 18th, 2019)
September Activity Report
30 September 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
On September 14, the Rio de Janeiro State University resumed the undergraduate activities. For the first time, all the lessons and activities are being offered remotely, and due to its peculiar characteristics, this semester has been called “Emergency Academic Period”.
Before the beginning of this academic semester, an extensive digital inclusion plan was carried out by UERJ to support low-income students so they could participate in classes and activities online. In addition to the problems faced by the students, some of the professors had difficulty adapting to the new virtual environment. Considering this, academic staff and professors who are used to the distance learning platforms provided training to assist docents and officials who were not so comfortable dealing with this technology.
At the Letters Institute, Prof. Alexandre do Amaral Ribeiro was one of the professors who provided the training, since he has been giving distance learning classes of Portuguese for Foreigners for a long time. The training took a couple of weeks and people were organized in several groups so that everyone could participate in it. Prof. Alexandre demonstrated how to use the UERJ platform called Virtual Learning Environment (AVA, the acronym in Portuguese), so that professors could log into their personal pages, arrange the virtual rooms, insert, record, structure and edit contents, provide links and use several other resources such as videos, audios, among others.
Since the beginning of the classes, all the academic community has been getting used to this new modality of teaching and learning, as well as getting skilled to the new educational tools.
Here are some images of the UERJ Virtual Learning Environment and one of the many groups trained by Prof. Alexandre.
August Activity Report
31 August 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
This month, Prof. Elisa Massae Sasaki, Professor of Japanese Culture at UERJ, was invited by Prof. Maria Alice Antunes, English Professor at UERJ, to briefly talk about the practice of translation, on the Youtube channel Traduzir e Retraduzir (Translate and Retranslate) that can be found at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk3YZob7DqJmoIS60CJKUfg.
Prof. Sasaki has been leading a Japanese-Portuguese translation group at UERJ for some years, in which Brazilian undergraduate students as well as Japanese exchange students participate. Both literary and technical translations are practiced by the group: novels such as Kentoushi by Yoko Tawada, short stories by several Japanese authors and manga have been translated, as well as specific texts related to the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro for giving support to international media companies. The objective of the translation group is to develop not only linguistic skills but the perception of certain aspects of the Japanese culture.
In her presentation, Prof. Sasaki talked about the relevance of translation in her life, not only considering its linguistic dimension but as an expression of different worldviews and cultural approaches. Translating is an activity that has been permeating her entire life, since she has been living amid both languages, Portuguese and Japanese, since childhood. The capability of translating was especially important in her sociological research on migration between Japan and Brazil during her post-graduation studies.
Prof. Sasaki explained in detail how the UERJ translation group works: as mentioned above, Brazilians and Japanese students who come to Rio de Janeiro to study Portuguese at UERJ participate in the translation practice. The presence of students from different cultural backgrounds has been very rich and generates very interesting debates, since there is not always a direct correspondence between words and expressions in both languages and literal translations from Japanese rarely make sense in Portuguese. Then, the participants seek to translate by approximation of ideas, observing idiomatic and cultural nuances. These are some of the challenges that are dealt with during the translation class. Indeed, the students learn a lot not only about the target language, but also about their own mother tongue by having to explain to the others why they chose a certain word and not another, why a certain sentence is constructed one way and not otherwise.
At last, Prof. Sasaki commented about the importance of translation for the circulation and consumption of Japanese pop culture worldwide.
Prof. Sasaki’s speech can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pgixJtMGwc. Below are some images of the Prof. Sasaki presentation and Prof. Maria Alice Antunes Youtube channel:
July Activity Report
31 July 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
This month on the 15th, we had a special event on Ky?d? organized by the Daikan Kendo Canoas, through Instagram. Marcos Trindade Sensei introduced to the audience and interviewed Prof. Elisa Figueira de Souza Corrêa, founder and president of the Brasil Ky?d? Kai (BKK). The event can be viewed at: https://www.instagram.com/tv/CCrmzerF3nt/
Since 2015, Prof. Elisa has been a professor of Japanese Language at the Rio de Janeiro State University, from where she graduated some years ago. In 2006, during her undergraduate course, she had the opportunity of studying at TUFS for one year as an exchange student. It was at TUFS that she first came into contact with the martial art through the Ky?d? club.
Upon returning to Rio de Janeiro, after the exchange program, she did not find a place where she could continue practicing Ky?d? and, then, decided to found an association. Indeed, it is the first Ky?d? association in Brazil.
During the interview, Prof. Elisa, whose Ky?d? rank currently is the 4th dan, explained the history of Ky?d?, the use of the bow in Japan, the history of the Association in Rio de Janeiro, the support received from Japanese residents in Brazil who donated equipment for the practice of Ky?d?, and talked about the expansion of the Japanese martial art in the country. As much as possible, BKK supports the incipient groups from other states in Brazil that are willing to practice Ky?d?. Some of these states are: S?o Paulo, Paraná, Bahia, in addition to the city of Brasília, the country’s capital.
Below are some images related to the Daikan Kendo Canoas event on the 15th, as well as some pictures of Ky?d? practice by BKK.
Marcos Sensei and Prof. Elisa during the interview on Instagram
Event posters by Daikan Kendo Canoas
Photos by Ant?nio Lima (on the left) Simone Rodrigues (on the right)
Some of the members of the BKK in an event at UERJ in November 2018
Prof. Elisa in a Ky?d? demonstration in the event “O Jap?o na UERJ” in 2018
Demonstration by another BKK member, Pedro Machado, in the above mentioned event
June Activity Report
30 June 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
This month, it was still not possible to resume face-to-face classes because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Despite this, students continue to advance their studies in Japanese thanks to the remote learning offered by the UERJ Japanese Language Department with GJO support.
Some high school students, who started their studies in Japanese recently, have already learned hiragana and katakana and are progressing in the basic structures of the language.
E-learning has been a challenge for both teachers and students, as they were used to classroom teaching. Despite this, little by little, remote learning is becoming habitual. Not only classes and courses have been offered systematically online, but also lectures and other academic activities. We wonder if, after the end of the pandemic, the e-learning modality will be put aside or will it become part of our academic life.
Below are some images of the free NHK Japanese Language Course used in online classes for beginners, and a student’s notebook photo sent by herself:
May Activity Report
31 May 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
Although, for now, face-to-face classes are not possible due to the Covid-19 pandemic, students from elementary and high schools, as well as university students, are taking Japanese language classes offered by the UERJ Japanese Department, through digital platforms.
The classes are coordinated by Prof. Satomi Takano Kitahara, Coordinator of the Japanese Department; Prof. Elisa Figueira de Souza Corrêa, Head of the Classical and Oriental Letters Department and the Visiting Professor Mari Fujiwara. UERJ interns and the GJO give support to the activities.
This month, online classes started at Instituto de Aplica??o Fernando Rodrigues da Silveira (Cap-UERJ), whose teacher is the undergraduate student and new Japanese Department intern, Bruna dos Santos Faria, who is teaching Japanese under the guidance of the above mentioned coordinators.
Classes take place regularly and live, in order to promote an intensive interaction between students and teachers as well as between students themselves.
Here are some images of the classes and of the new intern, who is very welcome to join the online lessons and other educational activities:
Japanese class with Mari Sensei in the upper left window and Prof. Elisa Figueira in the bottom right window
Opening class with Bruna Faria in the upper left frame and Prof. Elisa Figueira in the top frame in the center
The newest Japanese Department intern Bruna dos Santos Faria
April Activity Report
30 April 2020
Global Japan Office Coordinator
Leonardo Brescia de Sousa Henriques
For April 2020, it was scheduled the second edition of the Workshop of Japanese Language and Culture at the Nippakuji Temple, in S?o Paulo city, from April 17 to 24. Unfortunately, this event, as many others, had to be cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
UERJ Japanese language students and the Japanese exchange students were supposed to participate in this one week workshop that would be an immersion in the Japanese culture. Just like in the first edition, several activities were planned such as lectures on Japanese culture, shodō and ikebana lessons, haiku practice, sadō demonstration, Japanese songs performance, hyakunin isshu contest, among others.
In addition to the cultural dimension of the workshop, this event would aim to strengthen the relationship between Japanese and Brazilian students.
For now, here are some images of the wonderful Temple where the students who participated in the first workshop edition in 2019 were gently received, and where hopefully the second edition of the workshop will be held in the near future:
