Attendance at the “Learning Japanese through Manzai” language lecture

On Friday 17th October, Cultural Consul Masataka Abe attended the "Learning Japanese Through Manzai" lecture held at the University of Stirling. Franponais, a comedic duo from the Yoshimoto Kogyo (a Japanese entertainment agency) who also performed multilingual Manzai-style comedy at the Expo 2025 Osaka-Kansai served as the instructors. The comedy duo consists of a married couple – Manabu Shimaoka (Manu), the only Japanese person who is able to perform Manzai in French, and Shira-chan from Switzerland. The lecture began with an introduction to Manzai, including the roles of the “boke” and “tsukkomi”, and how to create a three-part punchline. This was followed by live demonstrations of Manzai in simple Japanese and English. Participants then paired up to come up with a duo name, created their own Manzai routines, and then performed them for each other. In addition to promoting cultural exchange and Japanese language learning through Manzai, Franponais hopes that these lectures will help to achieve their goal of 'solving social issues through laughter.'
 
During their visit to the UK, the same course held at the following universities during the month of October: The University of Edinburgh on Saturday the 18^th of October, both the University of Edinburgh and the University of Glasgow on Monday the 20th, Newcastle University on Tuesday the 21st, Durham University on Wednesday the 22nd, the University of Leeds on Thursday the 23rd, and the University of Manchester on Friday the 24th.
 
For more information about Franponais, who served as the lecturer, please see the following website:
https://note.com/teamfranponais