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Bringing Whales Ashore

Oceans and the Environment of Early Modern Japan

By Jakobina K. Arch. Foreword by Paul S. Sutter

Japan today defends its controversial whaling expeditions by invoking tradition—but what was the historical reality? In examining the techniques and impacts of whaling during the Tokugawa period (1603–1868), Jakobina Arch shows that the organized, shore-based...

Seeds of Control

Japan’s Empire of Forestry in Colonial Korea

By David Fedman. Foreword by Paul S. Sutter

Japanese colonial rule in Korea (1905–1945) ushered in natural resource management programs that profoundly altered access to and ownership of the peninsula’s extensive mountains and forests. Under the banner of “forest love,” the colonial government...

Yumeji Modern

Designing the Everyday in Twentieth-Century Japan

By Nozomi Naoi

The hugely popular Japanese artist Takehisa Yumeji (1884–1934) is an emblematic figure of Japan’s rapidly changing cultural milieu in the early twentieth century. His graphic works include leftist and antiwar illustrations in socialist bulletins, wrenching...

Japanese Prostitutes in the North American West, 1887-1920

By Kazuhiro Oharazeki

This compelling study of a previously overlooked vice industry explores the larger structural forces that led to the growth of prostitution in Japan, the Pacific region, and the North American West at the turn of...

Emperor Hirohito and the Pacific War

By Noriko Kawamura

This reexamination of the controversial role Emperor Hirohito played during the Pacific War gives particular attention to the question: If the emperor could not stop Japan from going to war with the Allied Powers in...

Onnagata

A Labyrinth of Gendering in Kabuki Theater

By Maki Isaka

Kabuki is well known for its exaggerated acting, flamboyant costumes and makeup, and unnatural storylines. The onnagata, usually male actors who perform the roles of women, have been an important aspect of kabuki since its...

Spaces of Possibility

In, Between, and Beyond Korea and Japan

By Clark W. Sorensen, Andrea Gevurtz Arai

Spaces of Possibility, which arose from a 2012 conference held at the University of Washington’s Simpson Center for the Humanities, engages with spaces in, between, and beyond the national borders of Japan and Korea. Some...

Conflicts of Interest

Art and War in Modern Japan

By Philip Hu, Rhiannon Paget, Sebastian Dobson, Maki Kaneko, Sonja Hotwagner, and Andreas Marks

This fascinating publication showcases the Saint Louis Art Museum’s collection of Japanese military prints and related materials—one of the largest collections of such works in the world. The 1,400 objects in the collection are mostly...

Onnagata

A Labyrinth of Gendering in Kabuki Theater

By Maki Isaka

Kabuki is well known for its exaggerated acting, flamboyant costumes and makeup, and unnatural storylines. The onnagata, usually male actors who perform the roles of women, have been an important aspect of kabuki since its...

The Anguish of Surrender

Japanese POWs of World War II

By Ulrich A. Straus

On December 6, 1941, Ensign Kazuo Sakamaki was one of a handful of men selected to skipper midget subs on a suicide mission to breach Pearl Harbor’s defenses. When his equipment malfunctioned, he couldn’t find...

Legal Reform in Taiwan under Japanese Colonial Rule, 1895-1945

The Reception of Western Law

By Tay-sheng Wang

Taiwan’s modern legal system--quite different from those of both traditional China and the People’s Republic--has evolved since the advent of Japanese rule in 1895. Japan has gradually adopted Western law during the 19th-century and when...

Shaping the Lotus Sutra

Buddhist Visual Culture in Medieval China

By Eugene Y. Wang

The Lotus Sutra has been the most widely read and most revered Buddhist scripture in East Asia since its translation in the third century. The miracles and parables in the "king of sutras" inspired a...

Toxic Archipelago

A History of Industrial Disease in Japan

By Brett Walker. Foreword by William Cronon

Every person on the planet is entangled in a web of ecological relationships that link farms and factories with human consumers. Our lives depend on these relationships -- and are imperiled by them as well....

Koizumi Diplomacy

Japan's Kantei Approach to Foreign and Defense Affairs

By Tomohito Shinoda

Japan's policymaking strategy in foreign and defense affairs changed dramatically in 2001 after Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi took the helm of the long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party. Following a series of bland and short-lived prime ministers,...

Wrongful Deaths

Selected Inquest Records from Nineteenth-Century Korea

By Sun Joo Kim, Jungwon Kim

This collection presents and analyzes inquest records that tell the stories of ordinary Korean people under the Choson court (1392-1910). Extending the study of this period, usually limited to elites, into the realm of everyday...

A Year in the Life of a Shinto Shrine

By John K. Nelson

What we today call Shinto has been at the heart of Japanese culture for almost as long as there has been a political entity distinguishing itself as Japan. A Year in the Life of a...

Law in Japan

A Turning Point

By Daniel H. Foote

This volume explores major developments in Japanese law over the latter half of the twentieth century and looks ahead to the future. Modeled on the classic work Law in Japan: The Legal Order in a...

Japan Supernatural

Ghost, Goblins, and Monsters, 1700 to Now

By Melanie Eastburn

From the pioneering work of eighteenth-century painter Toriyama Sekien to contemporary superstar Takashi Murakami, Japan Supernatural presents wildly imaginative works by Japanese artists past and present and takes readers on a journey of discovery through...

The Constitutional Case Law of Japan

Selected Supreme Court Decisions, 1961-70

By Hiroshi Itoh and Lawrence W. Beer

The Constitutional Case Law of Japan, 1970 through 1990, contains translations of 47 Japanese judicial decisions, selected after consultation with leading Japanese constitutional lawyers and judges. Landmark decisions, cases considered legally, socially, or politically importatn,...

Village “Contracts” in Tokugawa Japan

Fifty Specimens with English Translations and Comments

By Dan Fenno Henderson

There are assembled here the Japanese (sorobun) originals and English translations of over fifty private agreements, mostly dating from the 19th century and selected from eighteen different villages scattered about the main island of Japan....