Thursday, March 5, 2026, 13:00-14:30 JST (Doors Open at 12:30)

Following LDP's historic landslide victory in Japan’s lower house election, the Takaichi administration starts deliberating a temporary consumption tax cut, which LDP pledged during the campaign. This seminar examines what these promises imply for Japan’s consumption tax system and fiscal structure more broadly. Will this be just a short-term relief measure or the first step toward deeper reform, or a combination of both?

Wednesday, March 25, 2026, 14:00-15:00 JST

The concept of transition, derived from the Latin transire, meaning “to change state,” has been employed across a wide range of fields since the nineteenth century. In contemporary discourse, it is most often associated with climate change and the notion of an “energy transition.” This lecture introduces the concept of power transition – understood as energy flow over time – to account for the rapid acceleration of eco-social change since the mid-twentieth century. It examines the unprecedented challenge of voluntarily moving away from highly powerful fossil fuels. Moving beyond purely techno-solutionist approaches, the seminar emphasizes the central role of social and human innovation. Adapting to renewable and fluctuating energy sources will require a profound rethinking of lifestyles, drawing inspiration from the long-term resilience of living organisms.

Monday, 27 February 2023, 4:00-5:30 pm

The general public is more familiar with Mary Wollstonecraft’s daughter Mary Shelley, who imagined Frankenstein as a monstrous metaphor of modernity. Historians are also aware that Mary Wollstonecraft died giving birth to Mary Shelley.
However, among scholars, the two texts of Mary Wollstonecraft, Vindication of the Rights of Men as a response to Edmund Burke and A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, are of foremost importance. In this lecture, Prof. Serna will introduce another less-known and long-depreciated text titled An Historical and Moral View of the French Revolution; and the Effect it Has Produced in Europe. He intends to show that it is one of the first great histories of the French Revolution, proposing a new narrative and a new historiographic epistemology.

Monday, 20 February 2023, 4:00-5:30 PM

A number of humanoid robots in Japan have been supplied with gender and emotions, qualities that are stereotyped and greatly simplified in order to create algorithms. Artificial intelligence (AI), which is comprised of numerous algorithms, is useful for tasks that rely on pattern recognition, but AI can also perpetuate and reproduce the everyday social biases of their human designers. In this presentation, Prof. Jennifer Robertson discusses these robots and the implications that their design has for other industries, including surveillance.

Wednesday, 15 February 2023, 3:00-4:00 pm

Higher education around the world is experiencing vast changes in its multiple environments as a result of numerous factors, including globalization, shifts in the boundary conditions of truth, the effects of technology, geopolitical uncertainties, and calls for ‘decolonisation’. This seminar series explores the impact of these factors on the future of higher education.

Wednesday, 8 February 2023, 4:00-5:30pm

Professor Craig Jeffrey and Associate Professor Jane Dyson will show how young people in rural Uttarakhand, north India, attempt to make viable lives as they respond to environmental and socio-economic crises and engage in everyday social action. They will also screen Professor Dyson’s documentary film Spirit, which explores related themes.

Wednesday, 8 February 2023, 10:00-11:00 am

Higher education around the world is experiencing vast changes in its multiple environments as a result of numerous factors, including globalization, shifts in the boundary conditions of truth, the effects of technology, geopolitical uncertainties, and calls for ‘decolonisation’. This seminar series explores the impact of these factors on the future of higher education.

Friday, 3 February 2023, 4:00-5:30 pm

In 2021, the British Government announced and put in train a ‘tilt to the Indo-Pacific’ in defence, security, development and foreign policy. How has this fared in 2022, in the face of developments including political turmoil and economic difficulties in the UK, and the consequences of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine?

Thursday, 2 February 2023, 17:30 - 18:30 JST

This talk extends the concept of translanguaging by looking at transitional mutilinguals’ journey of 'transpositioning,' a process where people break from their pre-set or prescribed roles and switch perspectives with others through communicative practices such as translanguaging and transmodalities.

February 2, 2023 18:30-19:30 JST

In this workshop, we are aiming to present up-to-date approaches to linguistic identity and multilingualism. Focusing on linguistic identity as emerged through various forms of natural speech, we will discuss how transnationalism, migration, pandemic, and digital communication affect linguistic identities.

Wednesday, 1 February 2023, 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm

Higher education around the world is experiencing vast changes in its multiple environments as a result of numerous factors, including globalization, shifts in the boundary conditions of truth, the effects of technology, geopolitical uncertainties, and calls for ‘decolonisation’. This seminar series explores the impact of these factors on the future of higher education.

Tuesday, 31 January 2023, 10:00 am - 1:30 pm JST

This symposium discusses the trajectory of human-centered society development in Asia through interdisciplinary and transnational dialogues. To what extent can technology support human-centered approaches to urban living? Does the trajectory for human-centered society development address human interests, values, and well-being, or simply the technology itself? Where are cultural, societal, and heritage values situated within this trajectory?

Wednesday, 25 January 2023, 10:00-11:00 am

Higher education around the world is experiencing vast changes in its multiple environments as a result of numerous factors, including globalization, shifts in the boundary conditions of truth, the effects of technology, geopolitical uncertainties, and calls for ‘decolonisation’. This seminar series explores the impact of these factors on the future of higher education.

Tuesday, 24 January 2023, 4:00-5:30 pm

This lecture - and the book, In the Shadow of the God: The Emperor in World History, on which it is based - looks at emperors and emperorship across five millennia and most of the world.