East Asian Languages and Societies Commons^™

"Kore Saa (コレサア)": Visual Representations Of Dialogue In Edo Popular Fiction, Lauren Gatewood

Masters Theses

During Japan’s Edo period (1600-1868), popular literature began to take on a variety of physical formats and develop into various genres. Because many authors of this period were familiar with and producing creative works in a number of these genres, there was much crossover of content, format, and style. Authors were experimenting and playing with different ways to represent and give information about their characters through devices such as the dialogue they wrote, the illustrations included in the works, asides in the images, and many more. In this thesis, I explore the myriad ways authors of Edo period popular fiction …

Benjamin Smith Lyman: Geologist At The Intersection Of Hokkaido, Japan, And The United States, Benjamin Ashby

Masters Theses

Benjamin Smith Lyman was a geologist from Northampton, Massachusetts, who was contracted by the Japanese government in 1872 to carry out coal surveys on the island of Hokkaidō 北海道. What started out as a standard geological survey, quickly evolved into a lifelong interest in Japan for Lyman. The large collection of letters, books, photographs, and other documents housed under the Benjamin Smith Lyman Collection at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, serve as a primary source on both early relations between the Japanese and the West and the beginnings of the large network of academic writings which today can be classified …

Everything Feels Like The Future But Us: The Posthuman Master-Slave Dynamic In Japanese Science Fiction Anime, Ryan Daly

Masters Theses

This thesis is an exploration of the relationships between humans and mechanized beings in Japanese science fiction anime. In it I will be discussing the following texts: Ergo Proxy (2006), Chobits (2002), Gunslinger Girl (2003/2004), and Mahoromatic (2001/2002). I argue that these relationships in these anime series take the form of master/slave relationships, with the humans as the masters and the mechanized beings as the slaves. In virtually every case, the mechanized beings are young females and the masters are older human males. I will argue that this dynamic serves to reinforce traditional power structures and gender dynamics in a …

Imagining A Home For Us: Representations Of Queer Families In Contemporary Japanese Literature, Patrick Carland

Masters Theses

This thesis addresses popular works of fiction written or produced near or after 1989 in Japan and examines the roles that sexual orientation, gender and 20^th century social and discursive history have had on the conceptualization of familial relations in postwar Japan. This thesis will analyze the means by which writers and artists during the 1980s and 1990s have engaged discourses of family in their works and will argue that these writers explicitly use queer (hereby defined as non-heterosexual and/or non-gender conforming) individuals and narratives to question, reshape and propose alternatives to culturally received images of heterosexual marriage and …

Publishing Networks In Edo Japan, Hisako Kobayashi

Masters Theses

The publishing business in the Edo period (1603 – 1868) was very unique since it was divided into two genres: shomotsu mononohon and jihon kusazōshi. Publishers had their specialties and their business strategies varied. In this research paper, I examine the publishing strategies from the view of the network system. First, I state the definition of this network. Next, I study the publishing history of the Edo period to gain a general understanding. Lastly, I examine the network systems of the shomotsu publishers and the jihon kusazōshi publishers. I use examples from Tsutaya Jūzaburō, Suharaya Mohē, Tsuruya Kiemon, …

The Unnatural World: Animals And Morality Tales In Hayashi Razan's Kaidan Zensho, Eric Fischbach

Masters Theses

Kaidan is a genre of supernatural tales that became popular during Japan’s Edo period. In 1627, Hayashi Razan translated numerous supernatural tales from China and collected them in five volumes in a work known as Kaidan zensho, the “Complete Collection of Strange Works.” Hayashi Razan was an influential Neo-Confucian scholar and was instrumental in establishing Neo-Confucianism as a dominant ideological force in Tokugawa Japan. As his teachings and stories reached a wide audience, and the government was supportive of Neo-Confucian ideas in Japan, his Kaidan tales, which contained subtle didactic elements, enjoyed success. However, Kaidan zensho was never translated into …

Flowers, Trees, And Writing Brushes: Extraordinary Lovers In The Otogi-Zoshi Kazashi No Himegimi And Sakuraume No Soshi, Haley R. Blum

Masters Theses 1911 - February 2014

This thesis presents translations of Kazashi no himegimi and Sakuraume no sōshi, two tales belonging to the genre of medieval Japanese narrative known as otogi-zōshi, and of the subcategory known as iruimono (tales of non-humans). Chapter 1 provides context, beginning with a brief history of otogi-zōshi and a description of residual challenges in its research, including the parameters of the genre and problems with its nomenclature. This is followed by a discussion of the typical physical formats of these tales, Nara ehon and emaki, and a brief history of iruimono and plant symbolism in otogi-zōshi completes the …

Drops Of Blood On Fallen Snow: The Evolution Of Blood-Revenge Practices In Japan, Jasmin M. Curtis

Masters Theses 1911 - February 2014

Blood revenge – or katakiuchi – represents one of many defining principles that characterize the Japanese samurai warrior; this one act of honorable violence served as an arena in which warriors could demonstrate those values which have come to embody the word samurai : loyalty, honor, and personal sacrifice. Blood revenge had a long and illustrious history in Japan – first, as the prerogative of the gods in the Kojiki, then as a theoretical debate amongst imperial royalty in the Nihongi, and at last entering into the realm of practice amongst members of the warrior class during Japan’s medieval period. …

Tainted Gender: Sexual Impurity And Women In Kankyo No Tomo, Yuko Mizue

Masters Theses 1911 - February 2014

This thesis consists of research on women and Buddhism in light of a medieval Japanese Buddhist tales collection called Kankyo no Ｔomo. This collection reveals the predicament in which women in medieval Japan found themselves. As the focus of sexual desire (towards them and by them), they were also inherently polluted due to their connection with blood (kegare).

The Good Empire: Japan's New Order At Home And Abroad, Stephen E. Pelz

Asian Language & Literature Occasional Papers

PREFATORY NOTE

The Area Studies Programs within the International Programs Office of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst initiated in 1976 a series of Occasional papers to provide an outlet for both informal and formal scholarly works of a generci interest to the University community. In 1978 the first numbers in this series devoted to issues and themes related to Asia were introduced under the sponsorship of the Asian Studies Committee at the University. The initial three papers deal with topics in Japan, China and Laos. In future papers topics will be presented which encompass the major regions of Asia; …