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Western Science And Japanese Identity From The Meiji Restoration To The Pacific War
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Book Synopsis Western Science and Japanese Identity from the Meiji Restoration to the Pacific War by : Shaun Patrick Marx
Download or read book Western Science and Japanese Identity from the Meiji Restoration to the Pacific War written by Shaun Patrick Marx and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This thesis is in response to scholarly works on Japanese society and the ideal of the monoethnic race in relation to minorities and immigrants living in contemporary Japan. Race is as much a biological concept as it is a social one, and much of our modern understanding of race was borne out of the scientific and philosophic thought of nineteenth-century Europe and North American. Therefore, I posit that the adoption of western science by Japan effectively translated the Japanese body into a biological construct and blurred the line between science and culture, developing into a racially-based national identity by the time of the Pacific War. The construction of the Japanese body in this manner occurred in three successive translations: (1)the body as an object to be improved upon in order to compete with the West; (2) the body as a racialized object, distinct from all others and (3)the body as an object to be safeguarded from degradation. The discourse among social actors, including scholars, the government, religious leaders, and others, followed along western models of biological determinism and ultimately led to Japan's own indigenous form of eugenics. The catalyst for this process was the "scientizing" of the body. Just as Douglas has theorized that what is acted upon the body reflects larger societal issues, when western science was placed into the framework of the Japanese body it can be discerned that the translation from a traditional form to a scientific one, resulting in a "scientized" body. However, the translation was not wholesale and indigenous concepts of the body, like the family state, merged with biodeterminist conceptions to create a mono-ethnic race in line with Neo-Shintoist ideology. Implications for postwar Japan fall outside the confines of this thesis, but threads from the prewar period do carry over into the present.
Book Synopsis The Japanese and Western Science by : Masao Watanabe
Download or read book The Japanese and Western Science written by Masao Watanabe and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2016-11-11 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Japanese first encountered Western scientific technology around 1543, when the Portuguese drifted ashore and left them firearms. For the next few centuries Japan's policy of national isolation severely limited contact with the West. In the middle of the nineteenth century, when Commodore Perry introduced the Japanese to a few of the West's technological achievements, they realized how vulnerable their technological ignorance made them and felt great pressure to master Western science as quickly as possible. In The Japanese and Western Science, Masao Watanabe succinctly examines the intersection of Western science and Japanese culture since Japan's opening to the West. Using case studies, including a Japanese scientist trained in the West and foreign teachers brought to Japan, he describes how the Japanese quickly and effectively accepted Western science and technology. Yet Japan, eager to catch up, sought for the fruits of science rather than its cultural and religious roots or the processes that allowed it to flourish. The author contends that this resulted in a lack of integration of the new science into Japanese culture with the resulting strains in people's lives, their education, in research, in international affairs, and in environmental pollution. The central three chapters focus on Darwin, how his views were introduced, what aspects were of most interest—survival of the fittest rather than the common origins of animals and humans—and how one Japanese biologist sought to blend social Darwinism and Buddhist ideas. In one of the summarizing chapters, Watanabe contrasts the Western and Japanese conceptions of nature, and points out that the latter has tended to make the Japanese rely on mother nature to cope with the effects of human actions, no matter what these might be. The book is the product of painstaking research and penetrating insight by a Japanese scholar who has firsthand knowledge of Western science and culture.
Book Synopsis Overcoming Modernity by : Richard Calichman
Download or read book Overcoming Modernity written by Richard Calichman and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the summer of 1942 Japan's leading cultural authorities gathered in Tokyo to discuss the massive cultural, technological, and intellectual changes that had transformed Japan since the Meiji period. They feared that without a sufficient understanding of these developments, the Japanese people would lose their identity to the reckless and rapid process of modernization. The participants of this symposium hoped to settle the question of Japanese cultural identity at a time when their country was already at war with England and the United States. They presented papers and held roundtable discussions analyzing the effects of modernity from the diverse perspectives of literature, history, theology, film, music, philosophy, and science. Taken together, their work represents a complex portrait of intellectual discourse in wartime Japan, marked not only by a turn toward fascism but also by a profound sense of cultural crisis and anxiety. Overcoming Modernity is the first English translation of the symposium proceedings. Originally published in 1942, this material remains one of the most valuable documents of wartime Japanese intellectual history. Richard F. Calichman reproduces the entire proceedings and includes a critical introduction that provides thorough background of the symposium and its reception among postwar Japanese thinkers and critics. The aim of this conference was to go beyond facile and unreflective discussions concerning Japan's new spiritual order and examine more substantially the phenomenon of Japanese modernization and westernization. This does not mean, however, that a consensus was reached among the symposium's participants. Their tense debate reflects the problematic efforts within Japan, if not throughout the rest of the world at the time, to resolve the troubling issues of modernity.
Book Synopsis Samurai to Soldier by : D. Colin Jaundrill
Download or read book Samurai to Soldier written by D. Colin Jaundrill and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2016-07-09 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Samurai to Soldier, D. Colin Jaundrill rewrites the military history of nineteenth-century Japan. In fifty years spanning the collapse of the Tokugawa shogunate and the rise of the Meiji nation-state, conscripts supplanted warriors as Japan’s principal arms-bearers. The most common version of this story suggests that the Meiji institution of compulsory military service was the foundation of Japan’s efforts to save itself from the imperial ambitions of the West and set the country on the path to great power status. Jaundrill argues, to the contrary, that the conscript army of the Meiji period was the culmination—and not the beginning—of a long process of experimentation with military organization and technology. Jaundrill traces the radical changes to Japanese military institutions, as well as the on-field consequences of military reforms in his accounts of the Boshin War (1868–1869) and the Satsuma Rebellions of 1877. He shows how pre-1868 developments laid the foundations for the army that would secure Japan’s Asian empire.
Book Synopsis In Search of Identity by : John William Bennett
Download or read book In Search of Identity written by John William Bennett and published by Minneapolis, U. of Minnesota P. This book was released on 1958 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Search of Identity was first published in 1958. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.Educated Japanese have been faced with a basic ideological problem emerging out of their country's modernization program. They have had to declare themselves on the great issues involved in their nation's planning: West versus Orient, democracy opposed to autocracy, individualism versus collectivism. To the individual this ideological debate became a search for identity, and it is this problem, the search for identity, that forms the background of this book.The authors report upon a cross-disciplinary study of the Amerikaryugakusei - "those who study in America" - in the historical context of the modernization of Japanese society and Japan's cultural relations with the United States; they describe and portray the experiences of the individual Japanese student on the American campus and back in Japan; and they analyze the adjustment of the Japanese student to different cultural environments.One group studied included Japanese students who were enrolled at two American universities. Another group consisted of Japanese who had returned to their homeland after their American education. The study is concerned, not with education per se, but with social and psychological aspects of the educational experiences.This is the fourth in a series of monographs resulting from a program of research sponsored by the Committee on Cross-Cultural Education of the Social Science Research Council.
Download or read book Building a Modern Japan written by M. Low and published by Springer. This book was released on 2005-05-05 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the late Nineteenth-century, the Japanese embarked on a program of westernization in the hope of building a strong and modern nation. Science, technology and medicine played an important part, showing European nations that Japan was a world power worthy of respect. It has been acknowledged that state policy was important in the development of industries but how well-organized was the state and how close were government-business relations? The book seeks to answer these questions and others. The first part deals with the role of science and medicine in creating a healthy nation. The second part of the book is devoted to examining the role of technology, and business-state relations in building a modern nation.
Book Synopsis China and Japan in the Late Meiji Period by : Urs Matthias Zachmann
Download or read book China and Japan in the Late Meiji Period written by Urs Matthias Zachmann and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-10-30 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Demonstrates the close relation between Japan’s changing international status and the thought process behind this by focusing on the public discussion on China and China politics during the interwar years 1895-1904. Winner of the JaDe Prize 2010 awarded by the German Foundation for the Promotion of Japanese-German Culture and Science Relations
Book Synopsis Re-inventing Japan by : Tessa Morris-Suzuki
Download or read book Re-inventing Japan written by Tessa Morris-Suzuki and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-03-04 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text rethinks the contours of Japanese history, culture and nationality. Challenging the mythology of a historically unitary, even monolithic Japan, it offers a different perspective on culture and identity in modern Japan.
Book Synopsis Japanese Historians and the National Myths, 1600-1945 by : John S. Brownlee
Download or read book Japanese Historians and the National Myths, 1600-1945 written by John S. Brownlee and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ancient tales tell of Japan's creation in the Age of the Gods, and of Jinmu, a direct descendant of the Sun Goddess and first emperor of the imperial line. These founding myths went unchallenged until Confucian scholars in the Tokugawa period initiated a reassessment of the ancient history of Japan. The application of Western theories of modern scientific history in the Meiji period further intensified the attacks on traditional beliefs. However, with the rise of ultranationalism following the Meiji Constitution of 1889, official state ideology insisted on the literal truth of these myths, and scholars who argued otherwise soon met with public hostility and government suppression. In Japanese Historians and the National Myths, John Brownlee examines how Japanese historians between 1600 and 1945 interpreted the ancient myths of their origins. These myths lay at the core of Japanese identity and provided legitimacy for the imperial state. Focusing on the theme of conflict and accommodation between scholars on one side and government and society on the other, Brownlee follows the historians' reactions to pressure and trends and their eventual understanding of history as a science in the service of the Japanese nation. This is the first comprehensive study of modern Japanese historians and their relationship to nationalism. It breaks new ground in its treatment of Japanese intellectual history and provides new insights into the development of Japan as a nation. Japanese Historians and the National Myths will prove invaluable to scholars of Japanese history on both sides of the Pacific, as well as to those interested in political ideology, nationalism, censorship, and mythology.
Book Synopsis Science, Technology, and Medicine in the Modern Japanese Empire by : David G. Wittner
Download or read book Science, Technology, and Medicine in the Modern Japanese Empire written by David G. Wittner and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-03-22 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Science, technology, and medicine all contributed to the emerging modern Japanese empire and conditioned key elements of post-war development. As the only emerging non-Western country that was a colonial power in its own right, Japan utilized these fields not only to define itself as racially different from other Asian countries and thus justify its imperialist activities, but also to position itself within the civilized and enlightened world with the advantages of modern science, technologies, and medicine. This book explores the ways in which scientists, engineers and physicians worked directly and indirectly to support the creation of a new Japanese empire, focussing on the eve of World War I and linking their efforts to later post-war developments. By claiming status as a modern, internationally-engaged country, the Japanese government was faced with having to control pathogens that might otherwise not have threatened the nation. Through the use of traditional and innovative techniques, this volume shows how the government was able to fulfil the state’s responsibility to protect society to varying degrees. Chapter 14 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
Book Synopsis Outposts of Civilization by : Joseph M. Henning
Download or read book Outposts of Civilization written by Joseph M. Henning and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2000-06 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Civilization and progress, Gilded Age Americans believed, were inseparable from Anglo-Saxon heritage and Christianity. In rising to become the first Asian and non-Christian world power, Meiji Japan (1868-1912) challenged this deeply-held conviction, and in so doing threatened racial and cultural hierarchies central to American ideology and foreign policy. To reconcile Japan's stature with American notions of Western supremacy, both nations embarked on an active campaign to construct an identity for the Japanese which would recognize Japan's progress and abilities without threatening Americans' faith in white, Christian superiority. Japanese efforts included reassurances in diplomatic exchanges and in the American press that their nation adhered to the central tenets of Western civilization, namely constitutional government, freedom of religion, and open commerce. Many anxious Americans eagerly accepted such offerings, and happily re-conceived the Japanese as adoptive Anglo-Saxons. As with the best new work in diplomatic history, in Outposts of Civilization Henning considers culture to be integral to understanding foreign relations. Thus in addition to official documents and press reports, he examines American missionaries' writings on the Japanese, and American and Japanese art and literature produced during the Gilded Age. In exploring the delicate and deliberate process of identity construction, and how these discourses on race and progress resonated throughout the twentieth century, Henning has produced a fascinating and important study of American-Japanese relations.
Book Synopsis Network of Knowledge by : Terrence Jackson
Download or read book Network of Knowledge written by Terrence Jackson and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2016-02-29 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nagasaki during the Tokugawa (1603–1868) was truly Japan's window on the world with its Chinese residences and Deshima island, where Western foreigners, including representatives of the Dutch East India Company, were confined. In 1785 Ōtsuki Gentaku (1757–1827) journeyed from the capital to Nagasaki to meet Dutch physicians and the Japanese who acted as their interpreters. Gentaku was himself a physician, but he was also a Dutch studies (rangaku) scholar who passionately believed that European science and medicine were critical to Japan's progress. Network of Knowledge examines the development of Dutch studies during the crucial years 1770–1830 as Gentaku, with the help of likeminded colleagues, worked to facilitate its growth, creating a school, participating in and hosting scholarly and social gatherings, and circulating books. In time the modest, informal gatherings of Dutch studies devotees (rangakusha), mostly in Edo and Nagasaki, would grow into a pan-national society. Applying ideas from social network theory and Bourdieu's conceptions of habitus, field, and capital, this volume shows how Dutch studies scholars used networks to grow their numbers and overcome government indifference to create a dynamic community. The social significance of rangakusha, as much as the knowledge they pursued in medicine, astronomy, cartography, and military science, was integral to the creation of a Tokugawa information revolution—one that saw an increase in information gathering among all classes and innovative methods for collecting and storing that information. Although their salons were not as politically charged as those of their European counterparts, rangakusha were subversive in their decision to include scholars from a wide range of socio-economic backgrounds. They created a cultural society of civility and play in which members worked toward a common cultural goal. This insightful study reveals the strength of the community's ties as it follows rangakusha into the Meiji era (1868–1912), when a new generation championed values and ambitions similar to those of Gentaku and his peers. Network of Knowledge offers a fresh look at the cultural and intellectual environment of the late Tokugawa that will be welcomed by scholars and students of Japanese intellectual and social history.
Book Synopsis Understanding Modern Japan by : P W Preston
Download or read book Understanding Modern Japan written by P W Preston and published by SAGE Publications Limited. This book was released on 2000-03-25 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Understanding Modern Japan takes the reader from pre-modern times to the development of Japan within Pacific Asia and the wider global system, and finally to the current economic crisis in the region.
Download or read book Japan on Display written by Morris Low and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2006-09-27 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sixty years on from the end of the Pacific War, Japan on Display examines representations of the Meiji emperor, Mutsuhito (1852-1912) and his grandson the Showa emperor, Hirohito who was regarded as a symbol of the nation, in both war and peacetime. Much of this representation was aided by the phenomenon of photography. The introduction and development of photography in the nineteenth century coincided with the need to make Hirohito’s grandfather, the young Meiji Emperor, more visible. Photo books and albums became a popular format for presenting seemingly objective images of the monarch, reminding the Japanese of their proximity to the Emperor, and the imperial family. In the twentieth century, these 'national albums’ provided a visual record of wars fought in the name of the Emperor, while also documenting the reconstruction of Tokyo, scientific expeditions, and imperial tours. Drawing on archival documents, photographs, and sources in both Japanese and English, this book throws new light on the history of twentieth-century Japan and the central role of Hirohito. With Japan’s defeat in the Pacific War, the Emperor was transformed from wartime leader to peace-loving scientist. Japan on Display seeks to understand this reinvention of a more 'human’ Emperor and the role that photography played in the process.
Book Synopsis Japan in Transition by : Marius B. Jansen
Download or read book Japan in Transition written by Marius B. Jansen and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2014-07-14 with total page 499 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book social scientists scrutinize the middle decades of the nineteenth century in Japan. That scrutiny is important and overdue, for the period from the 1850s to the 1880s has usually been treated in terms of politics and foreign relations. Yet those decades were also of pivotal importance in Japan's institutional modernization. As the Japanese entered the world order, they experienced a massive introduction of Western-style organizations. Sweeping reforms, without the class violence or the Utopian appeal of revolution, created the foundation for a modern society. The Meiji Restoration introduced a political transformation, but these chapters address the more gradual social transition. Originally published in 1986. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Book Synopsis The Japanese and Western Science by : Masao Watanabe
Download or read book The Japanese and Western Science written by Masao Watanabe and published by . This book was released on 1976 with total page 141 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Book Synopsis A Genealogy of 'Japanese' Self-images by : Eiji Oguma
Download or read book A Genealogy of 'Japanese' Self-images written by Eiji Oguma and published by ISBS. This book was released on 2002 with total page 486 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eiji Oguma demonstrates that the myth of ethnic homogeneity was not established during the Meiji period, nor during the Pacific War, but only after the end of World War II. Oguma also examines how the peoples of the Japanese colonies were viewed in prewarliterature on ethnic identity.
