Dr Thomas McAuley

Tom McAuley

Lecturer in Japanese Studies

Education
BA (Sheffield), PhD (London)

Contact details
Email: t.e.mcauley@sheffield.ac.uk
Tel: 0114 222 8413
Room: C06

Research	SEAS Research Cluster East Asian Text and Culture I am currently engaged in two research projects: first, studying the judgements in classical poetry competitions with a view to analysing how they functioned as criticism and their role in the construction of mediaeval Japanese poetics. The long-term aim of this is to produce a book on the development of the poetry competition between the eighth and thirteenth centuries in Japan, however, an initial output will be a complete translation and commentary on Roppyakuban uta’awase (‘The Poetry Contest in Six Hundred Rounds’; 1193), the largest extant poetry competition judged by a single judge, Fujiwara no Shunzei. Second, I am working on a project studying botanical gardens in Japan which display the plants mentioned the poetry of the eighth century poetry anthology, the Man’yōshū, to determine how they function as both botanical and literary tourism facilities. Research Supervision I welcome the opportunity to supervise promising PhD students in a broad range of areas related to Japanese to English translation, linguistics and literature. I have recently supervised to successful completion a thesis on ideological and propaganda content of children’s songs in the pre-war Japanese school curriculum, and am currently co-supervising a thesis on the integration of instruction on Intercultural Communicative Competence in to the Japanese university English language curriculum.
Teaching	Dr McAuley currently teaches on the following modules: EAS332 Japanese Language V EAS333 Japanese Language VI EAS364 Japanese Popular Culture EAS6147 Upper Intermediate Japanese Language I EAS6148 Upper Intermediate Japanese Language II Teaching Philosophy If I had to sum up my teaching philosophy in a single phrase, it’s that I want to motivate students to learn for themselves. To that end, in my language classes, I don’t provide a single ‘right’ answer – there aren’t any when translating advanced level texts – but seek to provide skills students can apply to any situation, so that when they encounter words, phrases, texts and situations which are unfamiliar, they can feel confident in how to approach them, and discover the challenge and the joy of studying a foreign language and culture. In my studies classes, the focus is on encouraging students to use the materials, whether it be my lectures, or Japanese anime, manga, television, film or music, as a starting point for their own deeper analysis of intricacies of Japanese society, culture and language, and thereby enable them to develop their own understanding.
Media expertise	I am available to media organisations to discuss various aspects of Japanese language, literature and culture.

Research

SEAS Research Cluster
East Asian Text and Culture

I am currently engaged in two research projects: first, studying the judgements in classical poetry competitions with a view to analysing how they functioned as criticism and their role in the construction of mediaeval Japanese poetics. The long-term aim of this is to produce a book on the development of the poetry competition between the eighth and thirteenth centuries in Japan, however, an initial output will be a complete translation and commentary on Roppyakuban uta’awase (‘The Poetry Contest in Six Hundred Rounds’; 1193), the largest extant poetry competition judged by a single judge, Fujiwara no Shunzei.

Second, I am working on a project studying botanical gardens in Japan which display the plants mentioned the poetry of the eighth century poetry anthology, the Man’yōshū, to determine how they function as both botanical and literary tourism facilities.

Research Supervision

I welcome the opportunity to supervise promising PhD students in a broad range of areas related to Japanese to English translation, linguistics and literature.

I have recently supervised to successful completion a thesis on ideological and propaganda content of children’s songs in the pre-war Japanese school curriculum, and am currently co-supervising a thesis on the integration of instruction on Intercultural Communicative Competence in to the Japanese university English language curriculum.

Teaching

Dr McAuley currently teaches on the following modules:

EAS332 Japanese Language V
EAS333 Japanese Language VI
EAS364 Japanese Popular Culture
EAS6147 Upper Intermediate Japanese Language I
EAS6148 Upper Intermediate Japanese Language II

Teaching Philosophy

If I had to sum up my teaching philosophy in a single phrase, it’s that I want to motivate students to learn for themselves. To that end, in my language classes, I don’t provide a single ‘right’ answer – there aren’t any when translating advanced level texts – but seek to provide skills students can apply to any situation, so that when they encounter words, phrases, texts and situations which are unfamiliar, they can feel confident in how to approach them, and discover the challenge and the joy of studying a foreign language and culture. In my studies classes, the focus is on encouraging students to use the materials, whether it be my lectures, or Japanese anime, manga, television, film or music, as a starting point for their own deeper analysis of intricacies of Japanese society, culture and language, and thereby enable them to develop their own understanding.

Media expertise

I am available to media organisations to discuss various aspects of Japanese language, literature and culture.

Books

McAuley TE (2020) The Poetry Contest in Six Hundred Rounds (2 vols). BRILL.
McAuley TE (2016) Two Hundred Poem Sequences: The Entō Onhyakushu and Keiun Hyakushu. UK: www.wakapoetry.net.
McAuley TE (2016) Sanekata-shū: The Personal Poetry Collection of Fujiwara no Sanekata. UK: www.wakapoetry.net.
McAuley TE (2016) An Anthology of Classical Japanese Poetry: From Man'yōshū to Shinkokinshū. UK: www.wakapoetry.net.

Journal articles

McAuley TE (2019) A fine thing for the way : evidence, counter-evidence and argument in the Poetry Contest in Six Hundred Rounds. Japan Forum: the international journal of Japanese studies. View this article in WRRO
McAuley TE (2016) Institutional Responses to the Great East Japan Earthquake, Tsunami and Fukushima Nuclear Crisis: The University of Sheffield. Japan Forum, 28(3), 364-371. View this article in WRRO
McAuley TE (2016) Viewing a Myriad Leaves: Man’yō Botanical Gardens in Japan. International Journal of Contents Tourism, 1(2), 1-16. View this article in WRRO
McAuley TE (2015) Audience Attitude and Translation Reception: The case of Genji Monogatari. Babel: International Journal of Translation, 61(2), 219-241. View this article in WRRO
McAuley TE (2002) Switch-reference and semantic discontinuity in Late Old Japanese. Journal of Japanese Linguistics, 18, 29-58.
McAuley TE (1997) Cultural obstacles to Japanese language learning for native English speakers. Teanga Bliainiris na Teangeolaíochta Feidhmí in Éirinn, 17, 55-67.

Chapters

McAuley TE (2010) 源氏物語英訳における各種アプローチの比較的考察―異国文化のドメスティケーション In 京都大学大学院文学研究課 (Ed.), 世界の中の『源氏物語』―その普遍性と現代性 (pp. 101-126). 京都: 臨川書店.
McAuley TE (2001) The Changing Use of Honorifics in Japanese Literary Texts In McAuley T (Ed.), Language Change in East Asia (pp. 47-69).

Theses / Dissertations

McAuley TE (1995) The Genji Monogatari: A Loose Sequence of Vague Phrases?.

Edited books

McAuley TE (Ed.) (2001) Language Change in East Asia. Richmond: Curzon Press.