150055 VU International Relations in East Asia (2025W)

To receive a positive grade, you must (1) attend and (2) actively participate in class, (3) submit a reading response, and (4) submit a final essay.
These four partial achievements are graded separately from each other on a scale of 1 to 5 weighted in accordance with the percentages specified above in the 'Assessment' section.
- Attendance: This course requires regular attendance by participants to discuss readings and input from the course instructor. After one absence without penalty, each additional absence will result in a lowering of the 15% attendance portion of the grade. 5 or more absences will result in a negative assessment (grade 5) for the entire course.
- Active participation in class discussions will be graded as either excellent (20%), very good (15%), good (10%), okay (5%), or insufficient (0%). From week 9 onwards classes will begin with student discussion regarding assigned readings.
- Reading/theory response Should be written about one of the theoretical readings from weeks 3-8. The reading response should be a critical reflection on the theory propagated in the assigned text. Students are free to expand on this as they see fit but are encouraged to endorse or critique the ontological or epistemological standpoint of the text and posit, by way of examples about international relations not covered in the text, how ideas from the theory help us to explain or understand international relations. The reading response should be between 500 and 800 words long. As this is a reflection the reading responses do not need to cite academic texts (although they can if the student wishes). Furthermore, because these are students’ personal opinions, reactions to the text, and critical reflections on the text, students should refrain from using artificial intelligence tools in this assignment. The reading response should not include a summary of the text.
It should be submitted on moodle by December 1st 2025, a delay in reading response submission of up to 1 week will result in downgrading by one full grade. Submissions after December 8th will not be accepted and therefore receive a fail (5) grade.
- Essay: Students must write one 3,000 - 5,000 word (word count not including cover page, table of contents or bibliography) end of semester essay exploring a specific phenomenon in relations between two or more East Asian states utilizing one theoretical perspective as covered in weeks 3 ~ 8. The essay should cite academic texts and be the student’s original work. It should be submitted as a pdf with a cover page including the author name, title of the paper, course title and word count.