The blog introduction

はじめまして。

My name is Joanna Moody. I have just completed a year of study abroad at Nanzan University in Nagoya Japan on a Japanese government MEXT scholarship. I will soon return to the United States and my studies at Bates College. However, before doing so, having received funding from my American university, I have the wonderful opportunity to travel to Hokkaido Japan. I have created this blog to document my impressions and travels during my week-long (May 21 to May 28, 2012), with the purpose of gaining a deeper cultural understanding of the northern island of Japan to inform my undergraduate thesis on Ainu chants (kamui yukar).

Although this is my first time maintaining a serious blog (or journal for that matter), I will do my best so that this blog can 1) inform my family in the United States of my whereabouts, health, and progress, 2) serve as an account of my trip to be presented to the Tanaka Fellowship committee at Bates College upon my return, and 3) provide a reference of my immediate emotional and cognitive response to the culture and geography surrounding the Ainu texts of my research, which will hopefully prove helpful when I sit down to write my thesis.

よろしくお願いします。