The Japan Foundation, Budapest
HAYASHI Toshio and NAKANO Yuri

At the Japan Foundation, Budapest (hereinafter the “JFBP”), we are running Japanese-language courses while supporting Japanese-language education in Hungary, where we are located, and in twelve other countries in Central and Eastern Europe (Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Kosovo). In this report, Hayashi, who is responsible for the whole region of Central and Eastern Europe, and Nakano, who is in charge of Hungary itself, introduce the work in JFBP.

Taking in the Results of the Survey on Japanese-Language Education Abroad 2018

Country	Poland	Romania	Bulgaria	Hungary	Czech Republic	Serbia	Slovakia	Slovenia	Croatia	Bosnia Herze- govina	Monte- negro	North Mace- donia	Kosovo
2015	4416	2052	1245	1992	1775	533	275	275	175	88	0	23	0
2018	4483	1389	1347	1906	1246	797	259	312	199	65	9	49	0

“Created by processing the following source: Survey Report on Japanese-Language Education Abroad (PDF: 5.25 MB): p.61 (The Japan Foundation)

Among the 13 countries in Central and Eastern Europe under the jurisdiction of the JFBP, we were able to confirm new Japanese-language learning taking place in Montenegro via the Survey Report on Japanese-Language Education Abroad 2018, which was made public in July 2020. From 2015 to 2018, the number of Japanese-language learners increased in eight countries: Poland, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Serbia, Slovenia, Croatia, Montenegro, and North Macedonia.

Notably, in the former Yugoslavia region, each country’s Japanese-language education is developing rapidly, led by the University of Belgrade in Serbia, which hosted the 23rd Japanese Language Education Symposium in Europe in August 2019. Japanese-language education in the University of Pula in Croatia characteristically specializes in tourism, and preparations are being made to establish the country’s first postgraduate course. In October 2019, a formal Japanese-language subject for postgraduates was offered in the University of Sarajevo in Bosnia & Herzegovina, and I was able to observe classes on the first day. In addition, preparations are being made to establish the first Japanese studies department in Bosnia & Herzegovina. North Macedonia’s first Japanese Speech Contest was held in May 2019; I was involved in the judging, and there were a lot of speeches with very high-level content, despite this being the first contest, which surprised me greatly. We have not been able to acknowledge any Japanese-language educational institutions in Kosovo, but there are Japanese-language learners who study online or privately, and in January 2020, the Embassy of Japan in Kosovo was established, so we anticipate future development.

The Japanese-Language Education Network in Central and Eastern Europe 2020

The Japanese-Language Education Network in Central and Eastern Europe 2020

The Japanese-Language Education Network in Central and Eastern Europe serves as a once-a-year opportunity for the assembly of teachers involved in diverse Japanese-language education in Central and Eastern Europe. This Network was held in Budapest on February 22 and 23, 2020, and 62 people from a total of 16 countries participated.

The overall theme for 2020 was “Bringing Japanese-language education together,” and we invited Mr. ITO Sukero from Japan to give the keynote speech and hold a workshop—for many years, Professor Ito has witnessed the changing times as President of the Society for Teaching Japanese as a Foreign Language, and has been involved in international exchange work as the Vice President of Tokyo University of Foreign Languages, and, currently, as a professor of Akita International University. In addition, the participants focused on considering ways of connecting educational institutions and people through Japanese-language education via participant presentations and group discussions.

We also created an official website for the Network, as we did for the 2019 Network, and formed a community online before the Network event using Slack. For this Network, we made a request of relevant local educational institutions in the countries eligible for participation (the 13 countries listed above): we asked them to select participants based on the perspectives of regional spread and people who could contribute to the local area for as long as possible; one significant feature of the Network is that it gives an opportunity for young, non-native Japanese-speaking teachers to give presentations, which they do not normally get many chances to do. This year, 12 of the 15 presenters were non-native speakers. I felt that if these people continue their efforts to “bring Japanese-language education together,” we will be able to stimulate Japanese-language education in Central and Eastern Europe even more.

“Coming together” in the Coronavirus Crisis

It has been nearly four months since the end of March 2020, and during this time the JFBP has been closed due to a decree from the Hungarian government, in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Under the State of Emergency, commands have been issued to limit going out, etc. —in a situation in which neither I nor our staff can go out or meet face-to-face, we have decided to implement an emergency plan: study sessions covering classes that people want to try online. These one-hour study sessions were held daily until the end of May and since then have continued every other day, with the aim of providing an experimental forum for online information exchanges for Japanese-language teachers who are at a loss, being suddenly pressured to handle online classes by their educational institutions. As of the middle of July, we have held more than 60 of these sessions, with the total number of participants reaching 1,000 people. As they are online, we have participants from around the world, not just from Central and Eastern Europe, and I think, as the title suggests, this enables us to “bring Japanese-language education together.” (Hayashi)

“Connecting” Learners with the World

Next, I will introduce the support of Japanese-language learning we give within Hungary. We strive to run Japanese-language courses and to provide locations for Japanese-language learners to practice—as one example, the Japanese-language presentation contest that we hold. In 2019, Japanese-language learners in Hungary gave presentations on the two themes of “Introducing Hungary’s ___ to Japanese people” and “Introducing Japan’s ___ to Hungarian people,” chosen to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the start of diplomatic relations between Japan and Hungary.

Did you know that it was a Hungarian doctor who first brought up the importance of hand-washing? How many Japanese people can give a detailed explanation of the “Space Dome” in the Tsukuba Space Center? The participants gave presentations with enthusiasm and humor, in the well-practiced Japanese language, about aspects of Japan that even Japanese people don't know, and about aspects of Hungary that even Hungarian people didn't know. Video of the contest will be moved onto our other site on YouTube, so you can have a look there. I hope you’ll watch their presentations, which connect Japan and Hungary.

Similarly, we also periodically set up “Saberjünk!” as forums for people to use Japanese language. “Saberjünk!” is a made-up word that combines the Hungarian first person-plural suffix “ünk” with the Japanese for “to speak,” and these meetings also serve as opportunities for Japanese people to interact and communicate in the Japanese language. We can see the dynamics of learning a foreign language here, as people talk, listen, and connect with each other. In the coronavirus crisis, it also allowed interaction with people from Japan and other countries through online meetings.

Our work as Japanese-language teachers is more than just teaching the correct form of expression to people who want to express something. I think that one of our brilliant jobs is creating a “place to enable expression,” for “people who want to express [something],” as well as for “people who want to change” by taking in that expression, and for the “changing world.”

We will continue to connect the “people who communicate” and “the world with which they communicate.” I hope that you are all able to add to these connections in some way. (Nakano)