Japanese Studies Commons^™

When I Was A Boy In Japan, Sakae Shioya

Zea E-Books Collection

Japanese children in the 1870s and 1880s were offspring of a centuries-old traditional order who faced a world suddenly dominated by foreign science and commerce. As a child in Meiji Japan, Sakae grew up among survivors of the shogunate and observed their samurai culture displaced by Western morals and practices. Meanwhile the traditional values of Japanese life still exerted a strong influence over his family and education and played a large part in shaping his experience, as recounted with charm and tenderness in this simple and reflective reminiscence.

Sakae Shioya (1873–1961) attended Tokyo’s First Imperial College and came to the …

Butoh: From Wwii To The West, Caroline Conner

[Archive] Belmont University Research Symposium (BURS)

Butoh is an underground dance movement in Japan that explores the human psyche in unconventional and sometimes grotesque ways. It originated out of the devastation of WWII Japan and rails against the rigidity of society as well as traditional theatre and dance forms. It has ties to Buddhism, in that both view suffering as a natural state of the world, and both may lead to depersonalisation (intentionally or otherwise), which is described as a loss of identity or sense of self. Gone unchecked, this detached exploration of the psyche can lead to personality dissolution, which can be especially problematic to …

Striking Chords Ii: Music In Ukiyo-E Prints (2022), Theory & History Of Art & Design Department, Elena Varshavskaya (H791 Instructor)

Ukiyo-e Prints Course | Exhibition Catalogs

"The theme of music in ukiyo-e prints has been explored by the RISD art history students for two semesters (fall 2021 and spring 2022) in a hands-on curatorial format. The resulting exhibition Striking Chords: Music in Ukiyo-e Prints, is on view at the RISD Museum from February through July 2022.

The spring semester project is virtual. However, the approach is similar – to comprehensively study music-related prints in the collection of the RISD Museum and to share the findings with interested audiences, albeit in digital format.

Nineteen prints have been selected. In the exhibition’s virtual space, they are displayed according …

Xbox In Japan? Understanding The Distinctions Of The Japanese Video Game Market To Increase Microsoft's Competitive Advantage, Sekani Adebimpe

Senior Theses

Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony remain the biggest players in the video game console space. While all three companies have achieved worldwide success, Microsoft’s performance with the Xbox brand in Japan is an outlier for its historically poor sales numbers dating back to its 2001 debut. The purpose of this thesis is to unearth the various cultural distinctions inherent to the Japanese gaming industry that Microsoft must consider to gain a stronger foothold in the country, as well as diagnose the biggest issues facing Xbox with Japanese consumers. To accomplish this, several cultural frameworks were used to assess the differences between …

“For Now We See In A Mirror, Dimly”: Dialectical Wholeness In Oshii Mamoru’S Ghost In The Shell, Mari Aida

Comparative Literature M.A. Essays

This essay argues that Oshii Mamoru's 1995 animated film Ghost in the Shell, while indicating possible alliances with the political interests of cyberfeminism, ultimately advocates for the oppositional agenda of dialectical wholeness. Foundational texts of cyberfeminism, such as Donna J. Haraway's "A Manifesto for Cyborgs," have criticized narratives of isolation and a return towards a primordial wholeness implicit in Euro-American scientific culture. In the context of these texts, the cyborg symbolizes a departure from such narratives and guides the political project of reimagining epistemological boundaries. However, despite its apparent alignment with such projects, Ghost in the Shell dramatizes and …

The Influence Of The Thirty-Six Stratagems On Chinese Strategy In The Diaoyu Islands, Brent Schuliger

Senior Honors Theses

The Diaoyu Islands are a small, uninhabited archipelago in the East China Sea which has begun increasing in strategic significance due to its advantageous location near Taiwan and along the First Island Chain. The islands are currently under Japanese administration, but the People’s Republic of China considers them historically Chinese and contests Japan’s claim to the islands. A careful examination of China’s actions in challenging Japan’s rule over the Diaoyus reveals the influence of the Thirty-Six Stratagems, a tome of ancient Chinese military wisdom which provides a framework onto which China’s current strategy corresponds. This thesis examines the historical …

A Study On The Sports Industry In Edo: Preface To A Study Of The History Of The Sports Industry In Early Modern Japan, Hironori Tanigama

Japanese Society and Culture

This study discusses what sorts of industries developed in Edo during the early modern period and their characteristics, with a specific look at the sports industry. The results of this study are as follows. 1. In the 17th century, the sports industry in Edo targeted the ruling samurai class. Samurai in Edo were fond of sumo tournaments and archery exhibition competitions; both were heavily influenced by the Kyoto area (then the capital). At the time, traditions carried on since the Middle Ages remained strong in the world of sports. 2. At the end of the 17th century, various urban sports …

Pathetic Beauty: Mono No Aware In Hollywood Cinema –To Family And Friends In These Estranged Times–, Aaron Francis Ward

Japanese Society and Culture

Mono no aware is considered to be one of the central-most Japanese aesthetics and distinctive to Japanese identity (Keene 1995; Miller 2011). This aesthetic standpoint finds wistful beauty in the transient, and is most often translated to ‘beauty in pathos’ or ‘the ah-ness of things’ (Hume 1995), as exemplified in the Heian-era classic, The Tale of Genji (Murasaki 1981). To the outside world, mono no aware is most commonly associated with cherry-blossom viewing, where the short-lived existence of the falling cherry blossom is seen as a metonym for contemplation of the beauty in the transience of life itself. Although this …

The Cherry Blossom And Its Influence On Japanese Culture, Gilberto Mejía Salazar

Japanese Society and Culture

The following research is of a documentary approach, and its objective is to analyze the cherry blossom from a social and cultural perspective, to know the importance and influence that this flower has on society and the environment. Thus, the Shinjuku Gyoen Park and Chidorigafuchi Park were taken as a reference, in this sense, it is understood that within the city of Tokyo there are parks and areas whose purpose is to provide various activities to citizens to contemplate nature, and therefore giving a great show to witness the cherry blossom in its maximum splendour. The influence of the cherry …

“The Power Of Onomatopoeia In Manga” An Essay By Natsume Fusanosuke With Translators’ Introduction, Jon Holt, Teppei Fukuda

World Languages and Literatures Faculty Publications and Presentations

Natsume Fusanosuke is one of the founding critics of manga that pioneered a style of formal analysis of manga in the 1990s. Natsume’s first important foray into his “theory of expression” (hyōgenron) was seen in the collaborate work, Manga no yomikata (How to read manga) in 1995. He later streamlined those ideas in a twelve-episode series Manga wa naze omoshiroi no ka: sono bunpō to hyōgen (Why is manga so interesting?: Its grammar and expression) for NHK television in 1996. The accompanying expanded book (1997) consists of well-ordered, individual essays on elements of manga such as …

The Pagoda, Rohan Kōda, Nariyuki Koda

Zea E-Books Collection

This novel is a landmark in Japanese literature, widely known, read, and beloved. Sometimes known as “The Five-Story Pagoda,” it tells the story of Jubei, a carpenter and craftsman, who dreams of building a pagoda for the Abbot of the Kannoji Temple. Despite his poverty, low station, and poor reputation—he is known as “the slouch”— Jubei’s determined and uncompromising allegiance to his own vision bring him the possibility of raising a great work for the ages … but will it stand against the howling demons of a tropical typhoon?

Rohan Kōda’s The Pagoda (Gojūnotō, 五重塔) first appeared in …

A Daughter Of The Samurai, Etsu Inagaki Sugimoto

Zea E-Books Collection

Born in 1874 the youngest daughter of a samurai and former daimyo—a feudal prince under the Takugawa shogunate—Etsu Inagaki grew up surrounded by ghosts of an aristocratic military lineage. Having fought on the losing side in the wars that installed the Meiji emperor, the ­Inagaki family was reduced in power, status, and wealth but not in pride or ­devotion to its traditional roles and customs. Etsu’s upbringing and education were conservative and old-fashioned, guided by the Shinto and Buddhist beliefs her family held. The samurai virtues of honor, ­stoicism, and sacrifice applied to daughters and wives as well as sons …

Zen And The Art Of Resistance: Some Preliminary Notes, James Mark Shields

Faculty Contributions to Books

In the Western and oftentimes Asian imagination, Buddhism generally—and Zen more specifically—is understood as being resolutely disengaged, attaching itself to a form of awakening that is not only, as the classical phrase has it “beyond words and letters,” but in the modern summation by D. T. Suzuki, perfectly compatible with any and all forms of political and economic “dogmatism,” whether capitalist, communist, socialist, or fascist. Of course, as numerous scholars have shown over the past century, on the level of historical actuality, Buddhist and Zen teachers and institutions have long participated in (usually hegemonic) economic and political structures. The …

Ten Nights' Dreams And Our Cat's Grave, Natsume Soseki

Zea E-Books Collection

Ten Nights’ Dreams (夢十夜, Yume Jūya) is a classic written work from the Japanese master Natsume Soseki. Originally published in 1908, it announced the emergence in Japanese literature of a modernist and impressionistic mode. Short ­vignettes with fantastic, tragic, or magical events convey an exquisite sensibility compounded with stark realism. Love, honor, duty, artistry, desire, despair, and regret all shape events in the dream-world. The stories themselves suggest echoes of meanings beyond the failures of rational sense-making. Ten dreams—each unique and arresting—form a panorama of life and feeling, at once universal and intensely present.

“Our Cat’s Grave” is a brief …

I Am A Cat, No. Ii, Natsume Sōseki, Kan-Ichi Ando

Zea E-Books Collection

What would the neighbors say about you if they didn’t know your cat was listening?

What if it was “The Cat With No Name”? The one who claims “I have, as a cat, attained the highest pitch of evolution imaginable. … My tail is filled with all sorts of wisdom and, above all, a secret art handed down in the cat family, which teaches how to make fools of mankind. … I am a cat, it is true, but remember I am one who keeps in the house of a scholar who reads the Moral Discourses of Epictetus and bangs …

Japanese-English Translation: Katayama Hiroko—Jesus And Simon Peter (June 1953), Christopher Southward

Comparative Literature Faculty and Student Scholarship

Translation of 「イエスとペトロ」、片山廣子著、昭和２８年６月

Source: Aozora Bunko (a digital archive of public-domain Japanese-language works)

General website: https://www.aozora.gr.jp

Current text: https://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/001346/files/50159_41222.html

Japanese-English Translation: Katayama Hiroko—Fifty-Dollar Coffee (June 1953), Christopher Southward

Comparative Literature Faculty and Student Scholarship

Revised translation of「コーヒー五千円」、片山廣子著、底本「燈火節」暮しの手帖社、昭和２８年

Source, Aozora Bunko (a digital archive of public-domain Japanese-language works):

General website: https://www.aozora.gr.jp

Current text: https://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/001346/files/49517_35999.html

Reminiscences Of Lafcadio Hearn, Setsuko Koizumi, Paul Kiyoshi Hisada, Frederick Johnson

Zea E-Books Collection

Setsuko Koizumi (1868–1932) was the daughter of a Japanese samurai family in Matsué. In 1891 she married a foreigner — Lafcadio Hearn (1850–1904) — and their union lasted 13 years and produced three children. Hearn adopted her family name, becoming Koizumi Yakumo 小泉八雲,and spent those years in Japan writing, teaching, and achieving international recognition. Setsuko’s Reminiscences tells something of the couple’s moves and travels, but focuses mostly on the character, habits, and eccentricities of her husband. The book is a heartfelt and intimate portrait of a marriage that brought Lafcadio the home and family he had never before enjoyed. This …

“Living As Art”: Performance And The Haunting Of The Japanese Diaspora, Hana Tanabe

East Asian Languages and Cultures Department Honors Papers

In this thesis, I focus on the themes of family memory and history in relation to the Japanese diaspora, and how performance becomes an invaluable method of expression and discovery when words are inadequate. To explore these themes, I analyze the performances of three Japanese and Japanese American artists, each of whom expresses their stories through a variety of genres, ranging from experimental short film and documentary to musical theater. Although the stories that the artists tell are connected by their discussion of the intergenerational impact of Japanese American incarceration in the United States during World War II, a history …

Music And Sound In Weihsien Internment Camp In Japanese-Occupied China, Zhihui Sophia Geng

Asian Studies Faculty Publications

From the chapter's Introduction:
On 7 July 1937, Japanese forces based in Manchuria charged southward towards Beijing, invading north China and hence starting the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–45). On 7 December 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, transforming the Second Sino-Japanese War into the Pacific War. As a result of Pearl Harbor, the status of Allied citizens living in China at the time changed from neutral to ‘enemy aliens’. These Allied citizens included individuals and their families who worked in China as government officials, executives, engineers and Christian missionaries. They were forced into internment camps under the watchful eyes of the …

The Representation Of Japanese Working Women And The Labor Standard Law Of Japan – A Feminist Postcolonial Approach, Angela Louise C. Rosario

Japanese Studies Program Faculty Publications

Since the 1947 Constitution was drafted at the behest of the Allied General Headquarters led by the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers (SCAP), it is only fitting to scrutinize the media directly under it. One of the policies that should have affected Japanese women’s status is the Labor Standard Law. With this Law as a reference point, this paper anchors the SCAP’s ideals for Japanese women in terms of labor whilst I look at the portrayal of Japanese women in the 1948 issues of Pacific Stars and Stripes, an unofficial military daily newspaper under the supervision of SCAP. Through …

Botchan, Natsume Sōseki, Yasotaro Morri , Trans.

Zea E-Books Collection

This English translation of 坊っちゃん (1906) was published in Tokyo by Ogawa Seibundo in 1918. It is a first-person narrative of a young man’s two-month tenure as assistant mathematics teacher at a provincial middle school in 1890s Japan. A native son of Tokyo, with all its traits and prejudices, he finds life in a narrow country town unappealing — with its dull and mischievous students, scheming faculty, bland diets, stifling rules, and gossipy inhabitants. Impulsive, combative, committed to strict ideals of honesty, honor, and justice, he is quickly enmeshed in the strategems of the head teacher, “Red Shirt.” His sufferings …

Women In Post-War Japan: Bodies Of The Avant Garde, Cassidy P. Boulanger

Honors Undergraduate Theses

From 1945 onward, post-war artists in Japan encountered two interrelated challenges: to both adjust to the war’s aftermath, and also to create a new visual language which expressed new ideas and emotions. For women artists in Japan, this time of distinct culture change allowed for a re-defining of their role in the art community as well as society. However, there were strict boundaries surrounding the institutional and academic realm of art, one that was not inviting to women, or one that allowed opportunity or growth. Nevertheless, many women artists sought to explore gender roles, the idea of womanhood, sexuality, and …

Kokoro: Hints And Echoes Of Japanese Inner Life, Lafcadio Hearn, Koizumi Yakumo

Zea E-Books Collection

The works of Lafcadio Hearn (Koizumi Yakumo) played a critical role in introducing his adopted Japan to a worldwide audience. In Kokoro: Hints and Echoes of Japanese Inner Life, he writes, “The papers composing this volume treat of the inner rather than of the outer life of Japan, — for which reason they have been grouped under the title Kokoro (heart). This word signifies also mind, in the emotional sense; spirit; courage; resolve; sentiment; affection; and inner meaning, — just as we say in English, ‘the heart of things.’” After centuries of isolation Meiji-era Japan was forced to adjust …

Japanese Fairy Tales, Lafcadio Hearn

Zea E-Books Collection

• Chin-Chin Kobakama • The Goblin-Spider • The Old Woman Who Lost Her Dumplings • The Boy Who Drew Cats • The Silly Jelly-Fish • The Hare of Inaba • Shippeitarō • The Matsuyama Mirror • My Lord Bag-o’-Rice • The Serpent with Eight Heads • The Old Man and the Devils • The Tongue-Cut Sparrow • The Wooden Bowl • The Tea-Kettle • Urashima • Green Willow • The Flute • Reflections • The Spring Lover and the Autumn Lover • Momotaro

The versions of the first four tales in this volume are by Lafcadio Hearn. The others are …

Anti-Art In Postwar Korea And Japan, Emma Patterson

MA Projects

Emerging from the traumatic devastation of World War II and the economic upheaval that followed, artists in Japan and South Korea adopted similar creative strategies and addressed parallel themes in their artistic responses to the postwar period. Anti-Art in Postwar Korea and Japan brings together artists from the two nations—which share a complex socio-political history—to introduce a new lens through which to understand contemporary East Asian art. Seung-taek Lee, Ha Chong-Hyun, Kim Tschang-Yeul, Lee Ufan, and Nobuo Sekine were few of a number of Korean and Japanese artists who developed comparable practices across the media of painting, sculpture, installation, and …

Compulsory Conformity In Modern Japanese Culture: An Exploration Of Asexuality In The Works Of Murata Sayaka, Kawakami Mieko, And Kamatani Yuki, Nicholas Colecio

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

This thesis investigates the representation of asexual individuals in the works of Murata Sayaka, Kawakami Mieko, and Kamatani Yuki, all of whom are contemporary Japanese writers that portray near–suffocating social environments in their depictions of modern-day Japan. Their texts illustrate the augmented demands Japanese society places upon a cross-section of asexual and neurodivergent individuals. Despite the thematic and character–related similarities in their works, I argue that each author presents a unique interpretation of how these asexual individuals interact with—and try to integrate into—wider Japanese society and mainstream culture. Murata's texts demonstrate an unapologetically radical separatism by invoking an idealized queer …

In Search Of Unicorns: An Analysis Of Japan's Startup Ecosystem, Kaito Komoriya

CMC Senior Theses

While Japan previously dominated global consumer markets in innovative electronic products, the economy has failed to live up to this performance since the burst of the asset price bubble in 1992 and the subsequent lost decades. In the modern economy, startup companies have become synonymous with innovation. Most of these companies have emerged from Silicon Valley, as well as other startup hubs around the globe. However, critics have criticized Japan for the limited number of notable startup companies from the country.

My thesis seeks to answer the two following questions: First, what is the current state of Japan’s startup ecosystem? …

Yoshitsune And The Gendered Transformations Of Japan’S Self-Image, Sachi Schmidt-Hori

Dartmouth Scholarship

This essay traces the transformations of Japan’s self-image through the figure of Minamoto no Yoshitsune. As Japan in the late 600s replaced its name granted by China—“the land of dwarfs”—with “the land of harmony,” its desire to positively repackage its smallness illuminates how the “short and ugly” Yoshitsune in Heike monogatari (fourteenth century) morphed into a “small but beautiful” youth by the fifteenth century. Furthermore, the modern imperial regime repurposed the child Yoshitsune (Ushiwaka-maru) for propaganda by inundating children’s media with the image of Ushiwaka-maru fighting Benkei, which symbolized the “small but mighty” Japan subjugating the massive “West.”

Language Learning Through Interaction: Online And In The Classroom, Andrew J. Demil, Rachel Kozikowski

The Coastal Review

Online language teaching has become a popular alternative to classroom learning (Liu et al; Warschauer and Meskill). This led to research comparing the two learning environments (Young). Regardless of the learning environment, in order to be effective, the second language classroom must be designed to lead learners to acquisition. Studies suggest that collaborative tasks that push learners to negotiate meaning lead to acquisition (Leeser; Loewen and Erlam; Mackey and Philp; Stafford, Bowden, Sanz). Participants in this study were in two environments; a second language classroom in the typical in person classroom format, and a language learning course in an online …