Abstract

Writing centers are a common service to support students in their writing at most colleges and universities in the United States and, within recent years, have become increasingly popular abroad given the global trend to internationalize educational institutions. But what are writing centers like in countries outside the United States? In this article, I review literature on writing centers in Japan to better understand how one EFL context adopts—and adapts —the U.S. writing center model. The findings of this literature review explore obstacles and opportunities that may occur in tutor-tutee interactions and writing center administration. This knowledge is key for personnel in EFL contexts seeking to create and implement writing centers based on those in the American context. Keywords : writing center, Japan, English as a foreign language (EFL) When someone walks into the writing center at a college or university in the United States, they are likely to find a common scene: Two students—one a tutor, the other a tutee—sit together at a table, or perhaps in a cubicle. The two read the tutee’s paper together as the tutor asks questions about structure, thesis, or word choice. It resembles more a conversation between classmates than a lecture from professor to student. But what about writing centers in other countries? Is this a common scene too? Within recent years, writing centers have become more prevalent at colleges and universities in countries where English is not commonly spoken, known as English as a foreign language (EFL) contexts. Often supported by governmental grants, stakeholders in EFL contexts have sought to internationalize their educational institutions by creating programs conducted entirely in English, promoting increased matriculation of international students, and encouraging students and faculty to publish their works in English (LaClare & Franz, 2013; Okuda, 2019b). To support these goals, colleges and universities have turned to the writing center from their American counterparts as a model. One such country where colleges and universities are adopting the U.S. writing center model is Japan. Although the first reported writing center in Japan was founded on an American military base in Tokyo in the 1930s (McMillan, 1986, as cited in McKinley, 2011), it was not until 2004 that a Japanese college or university established a writing center to support students’ English writing (Johnston, Cornwell, & Yoshida, 2010). Since 2004, supported by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT), numerous Japanese educational institutions have independently created their own writing centers. These writing centers organized across institutions for the first time at the Japan Writing Center Symposium in 2008 and then formed the Writing Centers Association of Japan in 2011 (Fujioka, 2011). According to the Writing Centers Association of Japan (2022), as of December 2022, there were a total of eighteen writing centers as members. Thus, the history of writing centers in Japan is relatively short, and research on them is limited (Fujioka, 2011; Nakatake, 2013). While there has begun more effort to research writing centers in Japan, there is still work to be done. The purpose of this literature review is to explore current research on writing centers at Japanese colleges and universities to better understand how one EFL context adopts—and adapts —the U.S. writing center model. The most recent literature review on this topic that I found is from approximately a decade ago (see Nakatake, 2013); therefore, this literature review seeks to expand previous research by including more recent scholarship into the discussion. By revealing both obstacles and opportunities in adopting the U.S. writing center model in Japan, the findings of this literature review have implications for writing center personnel who may seek to establish writing centers in other EFL contexts.