Why am I studying Japanese

 I am studying Japanese due to a general interest in the language. This interest was cultivated through out my life. Ever since I was little, I watched anime and read manga which gave me a superficial view of Japanese media. As I got older, I started to study the culture behind manga and anime but not the language. In my sophomore year at Notre Dame, I took Seeing Anime with Professor Amanda Kennel. This class gave me a significantly more in depth view into Japanese culture and it effects on anime and manga. This made me want to study the language more but not enough to actually take a class in it. At the same time I was taking Seeing Anime, I got accepted into College of Engineering's Japan study abroad program. This allowed me to live and work in Kita-Kyushu and Tokyo. The experience of living in Japan is what made me decide to study Japanese in a formal classroom setting. It forced me to learn a basic level of the language, and I realized that I liked the language and wanted to take my learning of it a step further. Now that I am taking Elementary Japanese 1, I am excited to share this learning experience with all of my classmates.