Below is its award ceremony held on the 13th of February, 2019.
My primary reason for deciding to participate in the conference was to see again Professor Murray Straus, my mentor at the University of New Hampshire. He passed away suddenly on the 13th of May . On the 16th of May his administrative secretary wrote to me informing of his sudden death. I wondered if I should come to participate in the conference. After all, it was good that I participated in the memorial service in honor of him in the evening of the 11th of July. All of the participants miss Murray tremendously. Please read my posting on the “Murray Straus Memorial Blog” .
For more photos on the Conference and exploring Portsmouth visit the following:
2016-IFV Conference and Portsmouth.
Below are photos of Prof. Murray A. Straus, and my presentation.
Below is its award ceremony held on the 16th of February, 2016.
For more photos relating to the Seminar on various activities please visit the following sites:
For Fumie Kumagi's Presenttion:
●Japanese Older Adults Living Apart: Policy Recommendations
●杏林大学サイト
●Dr. Tomoko Wakui's Link
Photos of Outdoor Activities:
●Photos Taken by RC06 President Our Lady Chin-Chun Yi
●Syracuse Seminar-Outdoor Activities
●Photos at Pratt's Falls Park
●Excursion: Corning Museum of Glass
Photos Taken by the Organizing Committee:
●Aging/Changing Families Conference 2015 by Assistant Director Debra Gamble and Prof. Alejandro Garcia
●1-Aging/Changing Families Conference 2015 by Alejandro
●2-Aging/Changing Families Conference 2015 by Alejandro
●3-Aging/Changing Families Conference 2015 by Alejandro
●4-Aging/Changing Families Conference 2015 by Alejandro
Below is its diploma.
Below are photos of my presentation.
Below are photos of my presentation.
Below are some of the photos taken at the occasion.
Below are some of the photos taken at the occasion.
In addition to participate in the seminar program itself, I was privileged to get invited for the pre-seminar gatherings on the 27th, and joined the post-conference tour to the scenic east cost of Taiwan from the 31st of March to the 2nd of April. It was a series of excitements with fabulous foods.
The following are excerpts of snapshots of the seminar taken by the conference organizing staff, and some added by myself.
The complete photos by Academia Sinica:
Some other photos taken by myself during the seminar:
Post-Conference Tour: Day 1-March 31, 2013
Post-Conference Tour: Day 2-April 1, 2013
Post-Conference Tour: Day 3-April 2, 2013
●Fumie Kumagai’s HP: Friendship
Fumie Kumagai delivered a paper on “Changes, Continuities, and Regional Variations of Japanese Family” at the Workshop on Family Changes held at the Academia Sinica in Taipei during October 10-13, 2010. Besides the academic stimulation it was good to renew our friendship. Nevertheless, it had been a real rush trip as it was held in the midst of the fall semester. Hope to come back there again in more leisurely manner in the not too distant future.
Below are some of the snapshots at the Workshop.
For more photos on the occasion, please look at the following websites:
●Fumie Kumagai’s HP: Friendship
The 5th International Conference on Population Geographies was held at Dartmouth College in Hanover, NH from the 5th to the 9th of August 2009. New Hampshire being the state where I spent my final years of student days it was nice to revisit the region for this occasion.
The paper that I delivered for the Conference was entitled on “Regional Variations and Changes in Japanese Families” at the 5th International Conference on Population Geographies held at Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH. The order of my presentation came at the very end on the program. There being only two presentations in the parallel session, by the time of my presentation our session turned out to be the plenary session indeed. As a consequence, practically all the participants of the conference came to listen to my presentation! My presentation was well received, I hope.
Below are some of the snapshots at the Conference.
For more photos on the occasion, please look at the following websites:
●Fumie Kumagai’s HP: Friendship
The project team for the IT application to Gaigo program gave a presentation at 「全国大学IT活用教育方法研究発表会【私情協】」 held at ARCAIDA in Ichigaya on Saturday, July 4, 2009. We DID (!) our best to summarize our attempt to apply various IT/media programs for pedagogical purposes. IT and media tools we currently in use for the Gaigo program are in the eight areas as follows:
1. CRV System
2. Universal Passport
3. Distance Learning
4. PEP & CIC
5. Gaigo e-Learning Websites
6. Home Page
7. BLOG
8. Microsoft Office: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, & MANDARA
It was quite stimulating indeed to have critical and constructive comments from the floor. It would be good if we present some concrete numerical figures that indicate the impact of IT/media application. They are, for example, the effect to the student performance, and the participation rate of the faculty members to each of these eight IT/media tools.
The result of the evaluation as to who would advance to the final contest will be announced by Wednesday, the 7th of July. If we are successful we will give the revised version of the final presentation on Saturday, the 5th of September. Let’s wait to see our fingers crossed! (Posted by F. Kumagai)
It was good to see many people at the public lecture I gave on the topic of “Going Around the U.S.A.” yesterday afternoon. I am very pleased to find that the audience seemed to have enjoyed the lecture. In fact the question and answer session followed by my talk was quite lively indeed. It certainly is impossible to explain all the attractive places in the United States. However, I was glad to have introduced certain ways of touring through there. (Posted by F. Kumagai)
I was in India (11/09-15) to participate in the Jubilee Conference at Banasthali University, Rajasthan, India. The jubilee conference was on the issue of “Women’s University,” and all went fine with me as a guest speaker, a chair of the round-table, and a panelist for other round-table. However, the degree of poverty in India was just too overwhelming for me to take. Nevertheless, it is astounding to see magnificent historical artifacts and World Heritage such as Amber Palace and Taji Mahal, everywhere in India. I sincerely wish that these historical heritages would be preserved forever. The below are some of the photos taken in India during my brief stay there. (Millions of photos were taken, but it is not possible to upload all!)
Conference:
Banastali-Rajasthan:
Amber Palace-Jaypur
Taji Mahal-Agra:
Portugal as I remember it from ten some years ago attending the conference in Spain was a frugal and somewhat gloomy country. It revealed itself as a clear contrast with a vivid and lively Spain from where I traveled to Portugal. Today, however, I found that Portugal has changed to a good significantly. Perhaps, it would be due to the impact of EU economies. Although Portugal became a member of the European Union in l986, the impact was not apparent for some years. Now that Euro currency is widely in use in great majority of the European Union Portugal has been benefited than being suffered from their relatively low costs of living. I found cost of living there are low despite somewhat high tourism related costs instead. Tourism, in-bound in particular, seems to be a very important industry there.
ISARC06 Seminar on "Family Diversity and Gender" in itself was fine. However, I found it somewhat lacked in the focus with ten too many parallel sessions. As a consequence, the attendance to each session tended to be minimal. Unfortunately enough, therefore, it was difficult to exchange lively academic dialogue with those who attend each session.
Taking advantage of being in Lisbon I took a full-day tour to Fatima to observe the planet's biggest Sanctuary. It was a small group guided tour with five people, two from the UK, two from Australia, and one from Japan with an excellent tour guide with the national tour guide license. The excursion included so many treasures of cultural, historical, leisure, beautiful, and religious landscapes. Locations visited included Obidos, Nazare, Batalha, and Fatima.
The Conference organizer arranged a trip to Sintra, splendor of culture and tradition just an outskirt of Lisbon. On the way to Sintra we visited Cascais and Cabo da Roca, western most point of the European continent. It is extremely satisfactory to see so many of the historic and cultural artifacts, which reminded us of the powerful empire of Portugal in olden times. Let us enjoy some of the photos taken during the trip.
(A couple of photos are those of kind contribution by our Lady Lord Chin-Chun Yi!) (^_~)
Conference:
Obidos:
Nazare:
Batalha:
Fatima:
Cascais:
Cabo da Roca:
Sintra:
I visited the Republic of South Africa for 17 days to participate in the World Congress of the International Association of Sociology held in Durban. While in South Africa I took part in the sociological tour of the wildest Africa-Safari game park trip, starting from Johannesburg, Soweto, Mpumalanga, Lone Creek, Kruger National Park, Bongani, Swaziland, Phinda, Cruise to Durban. Taking advantage of the historical nature of the city of Durban I was fortunate to visit several museums there.
RC06-Demography and the Family:
As for the ISA meeting, it was a good opportunity to refresh our
collegial friendship, and exchange dialogue. I was an organizer of the
session on "Demography and the Family" of RC06-Family. Not only did I
organize the session, but also I chaired it and read a paper on the session. I
am very pleased to find the session was well received. Three
presentations, by Wen Shan Yang, Bernhard Nauck, and myself were all
presented well. The audience was enthusiastic to pose their comments
and questions.
Trip to the Republic of South Africa:
It was an inspiring, and an eye-opening tour indeed to observe the
family, society, and culture of South Africa. Everything there was just
chaotic with extremely high crime rate, high unemployment (40%),
HIV/AIDS prevalence, poverty and destitution, and it was too dangerous
to walk one bloc away even in the daytime. It all happened ever since
the strict racial segregation of Apartheid was abolished in 1994.
Blacks being the majority (90%) of the population, there seems to exist
no orderly management by the government. I do wonder if it would be
ever possible to host the World Cup in four years time in 2010.
It is hard to believe, but walking in the daytime for just one block is
extremely dangerous. In fact, ten of the sociologists participating in
the ISA World Congress were assaulted in the daytime. Sadly enough, a Greek sociologist was seriously injured for not giving up his cell
phone, was hospitalized, and died next day. It was too horrifying just
to go to the Convention Center from the hotel in a few minutes' walk.
It was said that the authorities were reluctant to report the crime
incidents for fear of receiving criticism from international communities.
The tribal culture is so different from those of the modern society.
The family system, for example, is based on the patriarchal polygamy.
One wife is equated with 11 cows, and it is legal for a wealthy man to
get married with as many wives as he wishes simultaneously. It is
usually the case, therefore, the family unit exists without the presence
of the husband.
Fortunately, I was able to take a weeklong wildest Africa-Safari game park tour of the Kruger National Park starting from Johannesburg down to Durban. We visited Soweto, Mpumalanga, Lone Creek, Kruger National Park, Bongani, Swaziland, Phinda, and took the cruise trip. It was so wonderful that has changed my world of perspective. It was truly eye-opening to observe such animals as lions, leopards, elephants, zebras, giraffes, and hippopotamuses in just a few meters away. These experiences have broadened my horizon tremendously. I hope you will join me to enjoy some of the photos taken during the trip.
Soweto:
Mpumalanga:
Lone Creek-Kruger National Park:
Kruger National Park-Bongani:
Bongani-Swaziland-Phinda:
Phinda-Cruise:
Durban Botanical Garden-Zulu Tribal Families:
Durban Science Museum:
Durban Historical Museum:
For the web version of these TV programs please avisit the following websites:
The interview went on for as long as two hours, followed by a nice stroll to the nearby Katase-Kaigan seashore. I enjoyed explaining my views on Japanese elderly. At the same time, it is interesting to hear views toward the elderly in Sweden that differ significantly from those of Japanese counterparts. It is essential for Japan to develop social policies for the elderly of her own rather than just simply adopting what have been done in Western societies. In this sense, it is innovative ideas to have such new developments as Robot Care Maid of Mitsubishi Heavy Industry, and Taking Bath Aid of SANYO.
Swedish Educational TV has been planning to broadcast a series of TV program on the topic of "Aging Society in Japan: the Elderly and Care by Robots." A series of the program will be aired in April 2006. I certainly look forward to watching on it.