This December the Department will be celebrating our 50th Anniversary with a banquet to be held at the Renissance Hotel downtown, join us for a night of more...
Each year the department offers a variety of topics under the course numbed 360B. This year we are offering courses in Modern Japanese Literature, Cultures of Manga and Anime More...
Ph.D. Comprehensive Examinations
At admission, the Graduate Advisor will assign the candidate to a supervisor.
In the beginning of the student's second year, the supervisor and the candidate, in consultation with the Graduate Advisor, will propose the fields in which the candidate will be examined in the comprehensive examination and the names of two other faculty members to be members of the candidate's committee (form). The candidate will be expected to be examined in at least three fields, which will normally be:
a) Major or General Field, namely the branch of study in which the candidate's research is expected to lie, e.g., Chinese poetry;
b) Minor Field (I), namely a sub-category of (a), from which the thesis topic is expected to emerge, e.g., Shi poetry of the Song period; and
c) Minor Field (II), which falls outside (a) but is relevant to the candidate's research interests, e.g., history of the Song Period.
The Ph.D. Comprehensive Examinations Committee is a three-member committee responsible for examining the candidate in the candidate's selected fields. The major field is normally examined by the student’s primary supervisor in the Department of Asian Studies. The other two committee members will be composed of faculty members drawn from the appropriate fields, and can include colleagues from other departments, if sufficient justification is provided to the Graduate Advisor. The composition of the examination committee will be determined through consultation among the student, the student's primary supervisor, and the Graduate Advisor.
Ph.D. candidates must sit three written examinations for the Comprehensives.
You can find here the list of required documents to conduct the exam.
Permission to Proceed to Comprehensive Exams
Students must receive “Permission to Proceed to Comprehensive Exams” FORM, signed by both the Graduate Advisor and Primary Supervisor, before taking any other steps toward Comprehensive Exams.
Preconditions for permission to proceed to comprehensive exams are the completion of:
a) all coursework and language requirements
b) Three preliminary reading lists/bibliographies approved by the Graduate Advisor and the candidate’s Comprehensive Examinations Supervisory Committee.
The Format
Students have the option of doing three take-home exams, three research papers, or a mixture of the two formats: e.g., one research paper in the major field and take-home exams for the minor fields (see below for more on these options).
The candidate must successfully complete the exams within one (1) calendar year of receiving the afore mentioned Permission in the case of the take-home examination option (see below). For the research papers option, an extra year (perhaps on an extension, which is not unusual) may be necessary.
Examinations will normally be written in English. Exams can also be written in French.
1. The questions asked in the examinations/research papers should provide reasonable coverage of the field, and each question should have reasonable breadth. To ensure that the candidate and the examiners have a common understanding of what constitutes "reasonable coverage" and "reasonable breadth," each candidate is required to meet with the chair of the examining committee (the primary supervisor) in order to discuss the examination and how to prepare for it.
2. Candidates will prepare a bibliography for each examination (paper). Each bibliography should consist of approximately 40 texts (books and articles) organized under such headings as "theory," "author," cultural/historical context," “English-language sources,” “Japanese-language secondary sources,” and so on, as appropriate. The candidate should be able to justify the categories used and the distribution of texts among them. Overall, the bibliography should represent two to three months of work and engage scholarship from the target area or country.
3. The examining committee (for oral examinations) will consist of three examiners and a neutral chair, appointed by the Graduate Advisor. One of the three examiners will normally be the candidate's primary supervisor.
4. Candidates can choose from two different examination formats (sample formats forms):
Option One: Take-home Honor System Exam (24 hours)
The student sits three take-home examinations, all three to be taken within one, two or three week's time (spacing to be agreed upon in advance). The examiners will be expected to agree with the candidate in advance on both a bibliography and a list of general topics from which examination questions will be derived. Candidates should be allowed to choose two or three questions from a list of three to five questions. The committee members will email their question to the Graduate Secretary at least four day before the exam. The Grad Secretary will email questions to a student at agreed time. After 24 hours, the student will email the answers to the examiners, the Graduate Advisor and the Graduate Secretary.
Within four weeks of the last written examination, candidates will take an oral examination, to be based mainly on the candidate's three written field examinations. All of the questions posed on the written exams are open to oral questioning. Other questions relevant to the field reading lists also may be expected. Each exam should be at least fifteen pages in length.
The written and oral examinations in each field will receive one grade: pass/fail. If a student fails a minor field, the student fails the examination and must repeat both the written and oral examinations in the minor field. A student who fails the major field or both minor fields must repeat the written and oral examinations in all fields. No substitution of fields at re-examination will be permitted. A student will be allowed to re-sit comprehensives only once, and will be required to withdraw from the Ph.D. programme upon a second failure in one or more fields.
Option Two: Research Papers
The student writes an original paper in each of the three designated fields (one major, two minor). The examiners are expected to agree with the candidate in advance on a specific topic and on a substantial bibliography. The papers should be of near-publishable quality and serve the purpose of an up-to-date bibliographic survey of the key positions and issues in the designated field. It is normally assumed that each of the papers will play at least a minor role in the student’s future dissertation, but perhaps even a major role (e.g., a section or chapter). These papers can be written anytime after any required coursework has been finished, but normally starting in the second year, and not normally beyond the third year, and always with prior approval and knowledge of both the Graduate Supervisor and the primary supervisor. Each paper should be at least forty pages in length.
At some point in time (to be agreed upon by the supervisory committee, but usually within 4 weeks of submission of the third and final paper) following submission of all three papers, candidates will take an oral examination, based mainly on the candidate's three papers. All of the issues raised in the papers are open to oral questioning, and the session is meant to be an opportunity for the examiners to gauge the candidate’s mastery of each of the fields, as well as the candidate’s ability to defend his or her written work verbally. Other questions relevant to the field reading lists also may be expected.
The written and oral examinations in each field will receive one grade (pass/fail). Under this option, if the major field paper is failed, or if both minor field papers are failed, the student must withdraw. One minor paper can be retaken if failed.
A students needs to provide all three examiners, the Graduate Advisor and the Graduate Secretary with copies of all three exams (or research papers).
Option Three: Mixture of the Two Formats
The student writes one research paper in the major field and take-home exams for the minor fields. (see above formats for more details).
A students needs to provide all three examiners, the Graduate Advisor and the Graduate Secretary with copies of all three exams papers.
The Graduate Secretary asks the Oral Exam Chair if s/he wants copies of the exams (papers).
The Oral Exam
Step one: the examiners need to agree in the first instance if the candidate’s answers (papers) are of sufficient quality to pass and thus merit an oral exam. This information must be conveyed to both the Graduate Advisor and the Graduate Secretary.
Step two: assuming all three examiners are satisfied that the written portion has been passed, the oral examination is scheduled. The Graduate Advisor appoints a Chair for the oral exam.
The oral exam itself is a free-wheeling conversation with the candidate designed to probe (again) for breadth and depth of knowledge of the subject areas. Examiners ask questions in turn, starting with the field most distant from the Major Field, and ending with the Major Field exam. After each examiner has had sufficient opportunity to ask questions about his/her field, all examiners are free to ask questions based on the other exam papers.