Two CAHSS Students, One Summer in Tokyo, and a Whole New Perspective

Imagine stepping off a plane in a new city of millions where few people speak your language and almost nothing is familiar. For two College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences (CAHSS) undergraduate students, that was the appeal. 

University of Denver (DU) students Eli Gehring and Natalie Inazu each spent part of this past summer studying abroad in Tokyo, Japan, and came home with a confidence they didn’t have before: “The challenge forces you to grow,” Gehring said. “You come out of that experience as a more developed and worldly person. It changed me for the better.” 

Why Tokyo 

For Gehring, a junior majoring in studio art and minoring in gender, women's, and sexuality studies (GWSS), he chose to visit Japan because of cultural differences. Gehring also enjoys Japanese media, Studio Ghibli films, and video games like "Genshin Impact" and "Honkai: Star Rail,” so visiting Tokyo felt like the right fit for his academic and personal interests. 

“Part of the reason I chose Tokyo is simply that it’s so different from America,” he said. "I could walk around a corner and find a store dedicated to my specific fandom." 

For Inazu, a senior double majoring in psychology and international studies with a minor in Russian, she chose to visit Japan because of family. She is part Japanese, and her grandfather was born in a Japanese internment camp. “I thought it would be really cool to go there and experience where my family came from,” she said. 

Rethinking Gender 

The DU course they both enrolled in while abroad, Gender and Society in Japan, traced the evolution of masculinity in Japan from samurai to the modern “salaryman” and how it shapes women’s place in the workforce. For Gehring, the course allowed him to understand his minor through a different cultural lens. He found that traditional norms persist in Japan, including the idea of a woman as a homemaker and caregiver. Japanese masculinity, he said, is defined largely by financial and career success. 

Studying abroad amplified the skills Gehring has been learning in GWSS all along: open-mindedness, empathy, and critical engagement with the world around you. “A key insight I discovered [while abroad] was that your individual conceptions of gender only apply to you and your culture, not to other places. You might think that experience is universal, but it's not." 

Learning Through Experience 

Both students said the trip changed how they see themselves. Little English is spoken in Tokyo, and Inazu noticed some travelers expect to be understood instead of making the effort to understand when visiting another country. "I loved learning about the culture through my class and being able to see Japan through a more critical, educational lens," she said. 

Gehring was nervous beforehand. “I thought it was going to be so scary. I was terrified, but I got there and realized that I can do this,” he said. “I can live in a foreign country and truly thrive.” 

Different Paths Forward 

Gehring hopes to move to Tokyo after graduation to earn a Master of Fine Arts in Japan, where they will eventually work as an independent artist selling work, taking commissions, and showing their work in galleries. Painting and ceramics are his primary media. “I have an intense drive to create,” he said. “Being in the studio art program at DU is just a fulfillment of that. We have huge sculpture, ceramic, woodworking, and metalworking studios: things I could have never dreamed of." 

Inazu is the cadet wing commander of her Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) program and leads cadets from nine different universities, a role that has strengthened her time management, communication, and leadership. She will commission into the U.S. Air Force as an intelligence officer after graduation and credits ROTC’s culture with teaching her resilience. “You’re failing, but you’re failing forward,” she said. “All the small mistakes that you make are a learning opportunity.” 

Skills That Cross Fields 

Both students said their studies in CAHSS taught them to think critically. Gehring claims studying gender made him more critical of everything he watches and consumes: “I want to create stories and things for people, and being aware of the impacts of that, and what message I’m sending, is super important,” he said. 

Inazu finds that her instructors in psychology are "empathetic people who hold you to a high standard," she said. "I am naturally empathetic, but studying psychology has helped me hone it in productive ways." For example, Inazu used those skills abroad, learning about Japanese culture by recognizing behavioral interactions and patterns among Tokyo residents, even though she does not speak Japanese. 

Both Inazu and Gehring left Tokyo with newfound perspective. “People are capable of a lot more than they think they are,” Inazu said. "Pushing yourself to open up to another culture and try new things can be scary, but it develops so much confidence." 

Gehring’s advice to prospective students was similar: “It’s up to us as individuals to experience this world for ourselves and make our own opinions," he said. "Be open-minded, curious, and skeptical."