Miss Kuniko Yoshimitsu - Researcher Profile

Biography

I began my association with Monash University as a postgraduate student in the area of Japanese Applied Linguistics and as a tutor in the Japanese Program. Teaching Japanese as a foreign language was a completely new area of study and profession for me back then.  In my time at Monash, I have developed, taught and coordinated a wide range of Japanese programs from beginner-level to postgraduate.  More recently, I have been involved in the development and teaching of content-based advanced-level Japanese programs.

My postgraduate supervision has been in the areas of language maintenance and shift, bilingualism and academic discourse in intercultural contact situations. For my PhD research, I studied the language planning for first language maintenance of Japanese school children in Melbourne.  I continued to focus on this area and extended it to the language socialisation of the second-generation Japanese in post-secondary Japanese language classrooms. I am interested in how these students negotiate their identities to fit into a global society where English is becoming an increasingly dominant and demanding communication tool.

Qualifications

JAPANESE APPLIED LINGUISTICS

Institution: Monash University

Year awarded: 2000

MASTER OF ARTS

Institution: Monash University

Year awarded: 1986

Publications

Book Chapters

Yoshimitsu, K., 2009, Management of study difficulties by Japanese students at an Australian university, in Language Management in Contact Situations: Perspectives from Three Continents, eds Jiri Nekvapil, Tamah Sherman and Petr Kaderka, Peter Lang, Bern Switzerland, pp. 207-223.

Yoshimitsu, K., 2007, Intercultural academic participation processes: the case of a Japanese international student at an Australian university, in Learning Discourses and the Discourses of Learning, eds Helen Marriott, Tim Moore and Robyn Spence-Brown, Monash University ePress, Clayton Vic Australia, pp. 08.1-08.15.

Yoshimitsu, K., 2003, Parental role in children's first langauge maintenance: the case of Japanese school children in Melbourne, in Sesshoku bamen to Nihongo kyooiku (Studies of contact situations and Japanese language education), eds Satoshi Miyazaki and Helen Marriott, Meiji Shoin, Tokyo Japan, pp. 143-164.

Journal Articles

Yoshimitsu, K., 2008, Japanese language socialisation of second-generation Japanese in the Australian academic context, Electronic Journal of Foreign Language Teaching, vol 5, issue Supplement 1, Center for Language Studies, National University of Singapore, http://e-fit.nus.edu.sg, pp. 156-169.

Yoshimitsu, K., 2004, Japanese home-background students at an Australian university: who they are and how they manage in university learning situations, Journal of Asian Pacific Communication, vol 14, issue 1, John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsteradam The Netherlands, pp. 137-151.

Yoshimitsu, K., 2000, Japanese school childen in Melbourne and their language maintenance efforts, Journal of Asian Pacific Communication, vol 10 issue 2, John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsterdam Netherlands, pp. 255-278.

Other

Yoshimitsu, K., 1999, Language maintenance efforts of Japanese school children in Melbourne.

Postgraduate Research Supervisions

Current Supervision

Program of Study:

(MASTER'S BY RESEARCH).

Thesis Title:

The role of academic language and learning advisors in L2 postgraduate students' academic writing.

Supervisors:

Marriott, H (Main), Yoshimitsu, K (Associate).

Completed Supervision

Student:

Nemoto, H.

Program of Study:

The management of intercultural academic interaction in student exchanges between an Australian and its Japanese partner universities. (PHD) 2005.

Supervisors:

Marriott, H (Main), Yoshimitsu, K (Associate).