As part of our ongoing commitment to supporting academics and education in Japan, Oxford University Press, is delighted to present Oxford Day 2017. This year's theme, THE POWER OF LANGUAGE, will bring together local and international speakers to discuss the influence language has on social, political, legal and educational issues. Please click here for more information and to pre-register online.
 

OUP author June Teufel Dreyer, a professor at University of Miami, has been named the 4th Kokkiken Japan Study Award recipient for her study The Middle Kingdom and Empire of the Rising Sun: Sino-Japanese Relations, Past and Present (2016, OUP). The award is given by the Japan Institute for National Fundamentals to non-Japanese researchers including first generation naturalized persons who conducted outstanding research which increases the understanding of Japan in the areas of politics, national security, diplomacy, history, education and culture. Her neutral analysis based on thorough objective research was evaluated and honored this time.

We are pleased to inform that the long-awaited Oxford Reading Tree (ORT) Tadoku Pack ‘with CD’ version is now available. This pack contains all ORT packs from Stage 1+ to 9 (30 packs, total 180 books) and 30 audio CDs. This special pack, suitable for schools and libraries interested in extensive reading, is now available for purchase only on the OUP Japan website. Learn more.

Limits to Globalization: The Disruptive Geographies of Capitalist Development by Eric Sheppard, Alexander von Humboldt Chair, UCLA, received the Meridian Book Award for Outstanding Scholarly Work in Geography awarded by the American Association of Geographers (AAG). The AAG awards the annual prize for a book that makes an unusually important contribution to advancing the science and art of geography, written or co-authored by a geographer published in the previous calendar year.

The issue surrounding our network which occurred on February 20 has now been resolved. Our technical support teams are still investigating what caused the problem, and are working to ensure this does not happen again in the future. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this has caused you during this very busy time of year and we thank you for your understanding.

The Say It: Pronunciation from Oxford app has won the 2016 ESU (English Speaking Union) President's Award in the category of new technology in English language teaching. This app improves pronunciation and fluency using content from OUP's dictionaries. You can listen to 30,000 model recordings, record yourself and compare your pronunciation both by listening and by visually comparing the audio waves. This visual recognition helps students understand key sounds. Learn more about the award.

Irregular Office Hours on January 10th
Our office will open at 10:30 on Tuesday January 10th, 2017 for a company-wide conference. We will close for business at 17:00 as usual. We apologize for any inconvenience, and thank you for your understanding.

'Post-truth', an adjective defined as 'relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief' was named Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year 2016. This word appeared frequently this year in the context of the EU referendum in the UK and the presidential election in the US. Please click here for more details.

Sherlock Holmes: The Speckled Band, from the Dominoes series published by Oxford University Press, was selected as the winner of the 2016 Language Learner Literature Award in the Adolescent & Adult: Beginner Category. Every year the Extensive Reading Foundation recognizes the best new works of language learner literature in English and awards winners in 6 categories. Also selected as a finalist this year was 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, from the Oxford Bookworms Library, in the Adolescent & Adult Intermediate Category. Learn more here.

Oxford University Press will be closed for business on Tuesday, November 1st in observance of the company foundation day. Business as usual will resume from Wednesday, November 2nd.

Due to a recent security release from Adobe Flash Player, all iTools products require an update to function properly. If you are currently using any iTools, please click here to download your iTools update. You will find a file to download and install on your computer as well as step-by-step instructions to help you. If you experience any issues while installing this update, or after the installation, please get in touch with us by email at eltsupport@oup.com or by phone at +44 (0)1865 910007.  We sincerely apologise for any inconvenience.

Oxford University Press will be closed from Monday, August 15th through Tuesday, August 16th for the annual Obon holidays. Regular business will resume on Wednesday, August 17th. 

Oxford University Press will conduct a workshop featuring experienced teacher-trainers demonstrating practical teaching methods. This will be valuable for all primary school teachers no matter what kind of teaching materials you use. Click here for details and to register online. (Japanese only)

Oxford University Press is currently looking for an ELT Consultant to join our motivated and experienced bilingual sales and marketing team. Please click here for more details.

Due to unforeseen circumstances, the Oxford University Press Japan website was temporarily closed from 11:00 until 17:00 on March 23rd. We apologize for any inconvenience caused during this suspension.

Oxford University Press will close from Monday, December 28th, 2015 through Tuesday, January 5th, 2016. Regular business will resume at 10:30am on Wednesday, January 6th, 2016. 
 

A pictograph was named the Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year for the first time ever. Each year Oxford Dictionaries selects a word or expression that reflects the ethos, mood, or preoccupations of that particular year. This year Oxford University Press have partnered with leading mobile technology business SwiftKey to explore frequency and usage statistics for some of the most popular emoji across the world, and the ‘Face with Tears of Joy’ emoji was chosen because it was the most used emoji globally in 2015. Please click here for more details.

Due to unforeseen circumstances, the Oxford University Press Japan website was temporarily closed from 15:00 until 18:00 on September 30. We apologise for any inconvenience caused during this suspension.

OUP was commissioned by Otsu City Board of Education in Shiga as their partner in a project to research and develop an ICT-based teaching methodology for their Foreign Language Activities classes. OUP will provide ELT materials along with a customised curriculum, lesson plans and extensive teacher training programme to enable all homeroom teachers in the city's 37 elementary schools to conduct English lessons with confidence and improve student proficiency. Please click here for more details.

Henry Widdowson, a world-renowned linguist and ELT expert, was awarded theELTons 2015 British Council Lifetime Achievement Award. This award is one of the most prestigious in English Language Teaching and awarded to an ELT professional who has made a significant contribution to the field throughout his/her career. Mr Widdowson is a former series advisor of Oxford Applied Linguistics, series editor ofOxford Introductions to Language Study and series advisor for the Oxford Bookworms Collection, as well as author of Teaching Language as Communication.

OUP author Marina Warner (Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford) has been named 2015 laureate of the Holberg Prize, the largest annual international prize awarded to outstanding researchers in the arts and humanities, social science, law, or theology. Warner, whose most recent work Once Upon a Time: A Short History of Fairy Talewas published by OUP in October, received the honour for her analysis of stories and myths and how they reflect their time and place. This title has also received the Anne Izard Storytellers' Choice Award, which highlights and promotes distinguished titles published in the field of storytelling.

We regret to inform you that we are experiencing technical difficulties with some of our online practice websites. Please click here for the list of the websites affected. Our technical support teams are working hard to resolve this issue as soon as possible and we will make an announcement when the issue has been resolved. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this has caused you during this very busy time of year and we thank you for your patience while we work to address this problem.

Classical Studies author Robert L. Fowler (Henry Overton Wills Professor of Greek, University of Bristol) was awarded the Society for Classical Studies' highly esteemedCharles J. Goodwin Award of Merit for his 2013 book, Early Greek Mythography: Volume 2: Commentary. The work was published as the companion volume to his previous publication, Early Greek Mythography: Volume 1: Text and Introduction, which was released in 2001. According to the judging panel, the book'leaves us with a truly three-dimensional view of the landscape we have lost,' and that'it might well be the new model for reconstructive commentaries of our century'.