DOCSLIB.ORG

Cultural Property and Heritage in Japan

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Cultural Property and Heritage in Japan Russell, James Edward (2011) Cultural Property and Heritage in Japan. PhD Thesis, SOAS, University of London http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/14043 Copyright © and Moral Rights for this thesis are retained by the author and/or other copyright owners. A copy can be downloaded for personal non‐commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the copyright holder/s. The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. When referring to this thesis, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given e.g. AUTHOR (year of submission) "Full thesis title", name of the School or Department, PhD Thesis, pagination. Cultural Property and Heritage in Japan James Edward Russell Thesis submitted for the degree of PhD in September 2011 Department of Anthropology School of Oriental and African Studies University of London 1 Declaration for PhD thesis I have read and understood regulation 17.9 of the Regulations for students of the School of Oriental and African Studies concerning plagiarism. I undertake that all the material presented for examination is my own work and has not been written for me, in whole or in part, by any other person. I also undertake that any quotation or paraphrase from the published or unpublished work of another person has been duly acknowledged in the work which I present for examination. Signed: ____________________________ Date: _________________ Word count: 94,808 2 Abstract This thesis examines the nature of cultural property and heritage in Japan, primarily on the basis of fieldwork conducted in the Iwami Ginzan World Heritage site in 2007-2009, which was immediately after its designation by UNESCO. The impact of the designation on the local community of Ōmori is examined. The site, located in the mountains of Shimane Prefecture, contains many items that are administered under various schemes of classifying objects that have been determined to be valuable on the national and regional levels. It thus provides a microcosm of cultural property policy and conflicting interests. Although the resident population is only four hundred, the village contains the ruins of extensive silver mines dating from the sixteenth century, and has maintained a core of buildings from the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries that have been recognized for their outstanding value. Official recognition changes the property relationship between residents and their built environment by exposing the objects to the reinterpretation of administrators and tourists, but establishes these objects as having unique characteristics worthy of preservation. At a time when technology allows exact reproduction, the identification of unique things of value is a process that converts symbolic to economic capital through branding, which is a method of staking a claim to a resource by restricting its use. Even though those in a community such as Ōmori may not want to engage themselves in this process and prefer to maintain taste preferences and property arrangements that differ from urban standards, the legal regime of cultural property transformation implicates them in its operation. Examples of cultural property from elsewhere in Japan are given, particularly to show how it is used in community improvement programs (machizukuri). The history and language involving cultural property and heritage are discussed. 3 Table of Contents Abstract 3 Acknowledgements 6 Introduction 7 The illusive dialectic of analysis 12 Property under law: Western background 15 Iwami Ginzan: the setting 21 The village of Ōmori-chō 27 Demographic ‘problems’ and the economy 30 World Heritage 37 Japanese cultural property law as derivative: classification schemes 48 Branding in the built environment – spatial designations 61 Methods of intrusion: restoration practice 74 In search of fundamental landscapes 88 Cartesian plots unfold: print-making and geography 94 Making a safe and convenient life: contested visions 102 Orientation in the village space 107 Phantom visions 114 Disciplining perspectives 118 The forces of change 122 Adventures in planning 126 Community improvement: machizukuri 136 Seikatsu bunka: the genealogy of a concept and the lifestyle business 150 Seikatsu bunka as gendered domain 159 Commercial organization 162 Making a business out of a lifestyle 168 4 Local rootedness as a brand 183 Place branding – image and reality 186 Intangible property as a valuation tool – geographical indicators and the new sumptuary law 188 Dreams come true 193 Consumption perspectives 197 Retro-chic 200 Home improvement and land valuation 204 Counter-culture 210 References 213 Table Table 1: National Cultural Property by Type 57 5 Acknowledgements At SOAS, Lola Martinez advised me at every step of the process from potential student through course work, fieldwork and the final thesis submission. Her unfailing encouragement and guidance was a blessing. Steve Hughes and Kevin Latham read a preliminary outline of the thesis at the MPhil stage. Johan Pottier, David Mosse, Louella Matsunaga and Trevor Marchand provided feedback and useful comments during my years of research. Prior to SOAS, I was fortunate to have acquired from several great teachers many of the tools that allowed me to produce this document: Carroll Quigley (Georgetown, History), Michael Zarechnak (Georgetown, Linguistics), Jim McCawley (Chicago, Linquistics), Zbigniew Gołąb (Chicago, Slavic), Akira Komai (Chicago, Japanese), Hal Williams (SMU, History) and Ed Countryman (SMU, History). Two friends at Chicago influenced me far beyond anything we could have imagined at the time. Dave Blanchard introduced me to anthropology and James Lee casually suggested I might try Japanese to fill my non-Western language requirement. Tom and Joyce Seaman provided crucial support while I lived in London and Oxford. In Ōmori, Daikichi, Tomi and Yukiko Matsuba did so much to help I will not be able to repay their kindness for several lifetimes. What follows is really a story of their family, although they might not recognize it. Amy Katoh provided the initial introduction to them, when I was looking for a place to send my daughter to practice her Japanese without the distractions of big city life. Little did they suspect where this would lead. My thesis readers and viva examiners, Michael Rowlands (UCL) and Christoph Brumann (Max Planck - Halle), were a delight and made the whole process seem worthwhile. Finally, my family – Nancy, Dmitri and Saya – allowed me to pursue this program, even though it meant extreme dislocation and disruption to their lives. To the extent I have any sensitivity to personal relationships, and therefore am somehow qualified to investigate anthopological themes, it is because I have lived with them in Tōkyō, Dallas, Princeton and Berkeley. 6 Cultural Property and Heritage in Japan 日本の文化財と遺産 Introduction The genesis of this thesis was a desire to document a set of attitudes and behaviours that I found in a Japanese village which to me, being accustomed to life in Tōkyō, seemed extraordinary; how could people be so engaged with creative activity and the aesthetics of their environment that they appeared to be almost oblivious to the ‘practical’ concerns of economic reality, or if not totally unaware of the forces driving the country at least not much interested in them? They appeared to have decided that there was a better life than accepting the pace and values of urban Japan, and it was based on a return to the strength of their own local traditions – a slow appreciation of community and perception of nature undisturbed by market calculation. I imagined myself eating great meals and taking quiet walks in the mountains. I did end up eating amazingly well, but the rest of the scenario changed abruptly when this peaceful village was designated a World Heritage site. When I arrived in July 2007 to begin proper fieldwork, the train station and several government buildings in Ōda City hung signs reading “Congratulations on World Heritage for Iwami Ginzan!” So, when I got to the village of Ōmori, which is the centre of the designated site, I imagined everyone was thrilled with this news. I began to congratulate people, but was soon told “this is not something to be congratulated about” (omedetai koto-ja nai). The shock of having their world disrupted by becoming famous, accepted as being of ‘universal human value,’ and now a premier tourist destination did not impress them. For the most part, they worried that a way of life was coming to an end, and it was because of the intrusion of a global notion of cultural property. My subject, therefore, changed to examine the nature of this concept from various angles and how it has come to be of increasing importance in the country. There is a formal, legal system that operates to list and define as cultural property those items which are important to various groups. But at the lowest level of community such definitions do not necessarily apply; wholly different values may operate and govern the relationships between people and their environment. Cultural property may be brought forth as a means to control the debate over specific items. This, however, is always a political move that frames a particular narrative and channels social action. 7 The anthropology of Japan, although being concerned with rural life at its inception (Embree 1969 [1939]), has increasingly become pre-occupied with urban issues and viewpoints. But the understanding of such issues has neglected the perspective which can be achieved when rural input is added. This dichotomy between the countryside and the city is very much a central part of cultural property. How can we understand, for example, the way the landscape of Kyōto has been altered over the past thirty years? The pattern of development there has depended on legal practices and community improvement efforts that also apply on a smaller scale in Ōmori, where attitudes on what is lost or gained by change puts into relief what has happened elsewhere.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • A Set of Japanese Word Cohorts Rated for Relative Familiarity
    A SET OF JAPANESE WORD COHORTS RATED FOR RELATIVE FAMILIARITY Takashi Otake and Anne Cutler Dokkyo University and Max-Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics ABSTRACT are asked to guess about the identity of a speech signal which is in some way difficult to perceive; in gating the input is fragmentary, A database is presented of relative familiarity ratings for 24 sets of but other methods involve presentation of filtered or noise-masked Japanese words, each set comprising words overlapping in the or faint signals. In most such studies there is a strong familiarity initial portions. These ratings are useful for the generation of effect: listeners guess words which are familiar to them rather than material sets for research in the recognition of spoken words. words which are unfamiliar. The above list suggests that the same was true in this study. However, in order to establish that this was 1. INTRODUCTION so, it was necessary to compare the relative familiarity of the guessed words and the actually presented words. Unfortunately Spoken-language recognition proceeds in time - the beginnings of we found no existing database available for such a comparison. words arrive before the ends. Research on spoken-language recognition thus often makes use of words which begin similarly It was therefore necessary to collect familiarity ratings for the and diverge at a later point. For instance, Marslen-Wilson and words in question. Studies of subjective familiarity rating 1) 2) Zwitserlood and Zwitserlood examined the associates activated (Gernsbacher8), Kreuz9)) have shown very high inter-rater by the presentation of fragments which could be the beginning of reliability and a better correlation with experimental results in more than one word - in Zwitserlood's experiment, for example, language processing than is found for frequency counts based on the fragment kapit- which could begin the Dutch words kapitein written text.
    [Show full text]
  • Analysis of Japanese and Finnish Furniture
    University of Lapland, Faculty of Art and Design Name of the Pro gradu thesis: ANALYSIS OF JAPANESE AND FINNISH FURNITURE DESIGN: A consideration for product identity and the relativity of industrial development and cultural context Writer: Akiko Nakatani Degree programme: Industrial Design Type of the work: Pro gradu thesis Number of pages: 97 pages, 3 attachments Year: Spring 2011 Summary In a globalized product design market, firms take national identity into consideration to survive among the competitors, because a particular identifying feature can be the decision making factor for customers to buy a particular product. In such a situation, you may realize something as “Japanese-like” or “Finnish-like” in designs as you hold the product in your hand. But why do you think like that? The aim of this study is to clarify the factors that characterize these ideas, in terms of furniture design, with a focus on industrial development and the cultural contexts of Japan and Finland. The study is twofold, with a theoretical framework and an empirical framework. The theoretical analysis works with cultural industrial context and also argues that the transition of industrial development significantly affects national product design orientation and helps characterize products. The empirical analysis works with questionnaires concerning product image. The results conceptualize cultural references in both Japanese and Finnish furniture design. However, the results also present the realistic difficulty of recognizing products. The paper concludes by arguing that factors affecting customer’s decision making are also influenced by not only product design but the socio-culture they belong to. Therefore, measuring product image is not the only way to define national product identity, and the image is formed by both customers and product design factors.
    [Show full text]
  • View Oirase’S Fresh Greenery in Spring and the Changing Colors of Tsutanuma in Autumn
    Aomori’s Nature Parks Majestic & Breathtaking Aomori Nature Parks Website http://www.shirakami-visitor.jp/aomoris-nature-parks The eternal colors of the four seasons continuing into future 01 The Milky Way at the Kayano Highlands Towada-Hachimantai National Park Aomori is an unexplored location in the north with flowers blossoming in spring and the blue ocean shining in summer. When the trees turn a burning red in autumn, it will soon be winter, a world of white and silver. The incredible scenery of mother nature will steal your heart. Be in awe of nature As one interacts with nature, slowly walking along a mountain road or shore, one begins to feel in awe of nature’s majesty. Enclosed by the ocean on three sides, Shimokita Hanto Aomori’s the climate differs between the Sea of Japan side and Quasi-National Park the Pacific Ocean side, allowing Aomori to boast of a wide variety of landscapes and plants. Nature Parks Aomori has 11 nature parks with outstanding scenery. Sanriku Fukko Towada-Hachimantai Tsugaru (Reconstruction) Quasi-National Park National Park National Park Asamushi-Natsudomari Ashino Chishogun Prefectural Natural Park Prefectural Natural Park National Park Iwaki Kogen Prefectural Natural Park Towada-Hachimantai National Park Shimokita Hanto Tsugaru Quasi-National Park Quasi-National Park Shirakami-Sanchi Natural World Heritage Site Kuroishi Onsenkyo Prefectural Natural Park Sanriku Fukko Tsugaru Shirakami (Reconstruction) Prefectural Natural Park Quasi-National Park National Park Owani Ikarigaseki Onsenkyo Nakuidake Prefectural
    [Show full text]
  • Catazacke 20200425 Bd.Pdf
    Provenances Museum Deaccessions The National Museum of the Philippines The Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University New York, USA The Monterey Museum of Art, USA The Abrons Arts Center, New York, USA Private Estate and Collection Provenances Justus Blank, Dutch East India Company Georg Weifert (1850-1937), Federal Bank of the Kingdom of Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia Sir William Roy Hodgson (1892-1958), Lieutenant Colonel, CMG, OBE Jerrold Schecter, The Wall Street Journal Anne Marie Wood (1931-2019), Warwickshire, United Kingdom Brian Lister (19262014), Widdington, United Kingdom Léonce Filatriau (*1875), France S. X. Constantinidi, London, United Kingdom James Henry Taylor, Royal Navy Sub-Lieutenant, HM Naval Base Tamar, Hong Kong Alexandre Iolas (19071987), Greece Anthony du Boulay, Honorary Adviser on Ceramics to the National Trust, United Kingdom, Chairman of the French Porcelain Society Robert Bob Mayer and Beatrice Buddy Cummings Mayer, The Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA), Chicago Leslie Gifford Kilborn (18951972), The University of Hong Kong Traudi and Peter Plesch, United Kingdom Reinhold Hofstätter, Vienna, Austria Sir Thomas Jackson (1841-1915), 1st Baronet, United Kingdom Richard Nathanson (d. 2018), United Kingdom Dr. W. D. Franz (1915-2005), North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany Josette and Théo Schulmann, Paris, France Neil Cole, Toronto, Canada Gustav Heinrich Ralph von Koenigswald (19021982) Arthur Huc (1854-1932), La Dépêche du Midi, Toulouse, France Dame Eva Turner (18921990), DBE Sir Jeremy Lever KCMG, University
    [Show full text]
  • Hachinohe Martial Arts Center About 15 Min
    Access A Maeda Arena About 35 min. by car from Aomori Airport (New Aomori Prefecture Sports Park) About 25 min. by car from Shin-Aomori Station (JR Tohoku Shinkansen Line/Ou Line) B Michinokubank Dream Stadium About 30 min. by car from Aomori Airport (Aomori City Sports Complex) About 15 min. by car from Shin-Aomori Station (JR Tohoku Shinkansen Line/Ou Line) C Aomori Martial Arts Hall About 50 min. by car from Aomori Airport Hirosaki Athletic Park About 10 min. by car from Hirosaki Station (JR Ou Line/Konan Railway Konan Line) About 70 min. by car from Aomori Airport Mt. Iwakisan Synthesis Park About 40 min. by car from Hirosaki Station (JR Ou Line/Konan Railway Konan Line) D The right choice to train About 70 min. by car from Aomori Airport Iwaki Seishonen Sports Center About 45 min. by car from Hirosaki Station (JR Ou Line/Konan Railway Konan Line) AOMORI E About 70 min. by car from Aomori Airport Iwaki River Canoe Center About 30 min. by car from Hirosaki Station (JR Ou Line/Konan Railway Konan Line) About 55 min. by car from Misawa Airport Takamori Yama Sports Park About 30 min. by car from Shichinohe-Towada Station (JR Tohoku Shinkansen Line) F About 45 min. by car from Misawa Airport Towada City Wakaba Stadium About 25 min. by car from Shichinohe-Towada Station (JR Tohoku Shinkansen Line) About 40 min. by car from Misawa Airport Hachinohe Martial Arts Center About 15 min. by car from Hachinohe Station (JR Tohoku Shinkansen Line/Hachinohe Line/Aoimori Railway Line) G About 50 min.
    [Show full text]
  • Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution : Selection of Memories
    Hyunmi Kim s2104768 Master Thesis Asian Studies 60EC Thesis Supervisor: Prof. Ivo Smits Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution : Selection of Memories and the Inscription Process of UNESCO World Heritage Academic year 2017-2018 Leiden University Humanities Faculty, MA Asian Studies Track History, Arts and Culture of Asia Specialization Critical Heritage Studies of Asia and Europe Index Introduction ................................................................................................... 1 Research questions ............................................................................................................................ 2 Theoretical Framework / Preceding Research .................................................................................. 2 Methodology ...................................................................................................................................... 5 Heritage Making in Japan ............................................................................... 6 Industrial Heritage in Japan ............................................................................................................... 6 Inscription History of the Sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution ............................................ 7 Nomination File and Justification ...................................................................................................... 8 Contextualized Memories ...............................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Cultural Properties for Future Generations 〜Outline of the Cultural Administration of Japan〜
    Cultural Properties for Future Generations 〜Outline of the Cultural Administration of Japan〜 Agency for Cultural Affairs, JAPAN Cultural Properties in Japan Monuments Types of Cultural Properties in Japan Monuments include shell mounds, tumuli, sites of fortified capitals, sites of forts or castles, and monumental houses, which are of high Our cultural properties have been created, developed, and preserved historical or scientific value. They also include gardens, bridges, throughout Japan’s long history. They have been passed down from one gorges, seashores, mountains, and other places of scenic beauty which generation to another, and they are now precious assets of the Japanese are of high artistic or scenic value. Moreover they include animals, people. plants, and geological and mineral formations which are of high Cultural properties include (i) structures such as shrines, temples, scientific value. and private houses, (ii) Buddhist statues, (iii) paintings, (iv) Cultural Landscapes calligraphy, (v) other skills called waza such as performing arts and Cultural landscapes are defined as those that have evolved with craft techniques, and (vi) traditional events and festivals. Natural the modes of life or livelihoods of people in Japan and with the landscapes that remain after many years of history, historic villages, geo-cultural features of the region. They are indispensable to the and townscapes are also regarded as our cultural properties. understanding of the lifestyles and/or livelihoods of the people of Under the Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties, these Japan. cultural properties are categorized as follows: Groups of Traditional Buildings Tangible Cultural Properties Groups of traditional buildings are defined as those that have high Tangible cultural properties consist of (a) those of high historical value and form historic scenery together with their surroundings.
    [Show full text]
  • Wine, Beer, Whisky, Etc
    Current as of January 1, 2021 Compiled by Sendai Regional Taxation Bureau Brewery Excludes breweries listed on the Aomori Wine, Beer, "Aomori Brewery MAP (SAKE)". MAP whisky, etc. However, breweries that produce continuously distilled shochu (New type or shochu group Ko), specialty shochu (Authentic type or shochu group Otsu), and beer are listed in duplicate. Legend ㉑ 279 Shinkansen Kazamaura JR Line Oma Private Railway Town Village Expressway Major National Highway City Boundary Sai Shinkansen Station JR and Private Railway Stations Village Higashidoori Mutsu City Village Ominato Station Shimokita Station 279 Ominato Line Imabetsu 338 ⑳ Town Sotogahama Town Nakadomari Okutsugaru-Imabetsu Station Town 338 Sotogahama Yokohama Goshogawara TsugaruTown Line Town City Kanita Station Yomogita Nakadomari Village Town Hokkaido Shinkansen Rokkasho 339 280 ①② Village 4 Noheji ⑲ Goshogawara Aomori Port Station Tsugaru City Hiranai Town City Shin-Aomori Aomori Station Noheji Town Tohoku Ajigasawa Station 101 Goshogawara Town Station Aoimori Railway394 Line Station Ou Misawa Main 103 4 Line Shichinohe-Towada City Tsuruta 338 Town ⑰ Aomori Airport Station Itayanagi Shichinohe Misawa Airport Itayanagi Town Namioka Station Aomori City Town Tohoku Shinkansen Station 394 Misawa Station Ajigasawa Town Fujisaki Kuroishi Kawabe Station Town Station 394 Oirase Town Fukaura Station Hirosaki Inakadate Hachinohe Port City ④ VillageKonan ③ Railway Kuroishi 102 Rokunohe 45 Gono Line Fukaura ⑤ City Hon- ⑯ ⑦ Hiraka 4 Town Town Towada City ⑱ Hachinohe Same Station ⑧ Station Station ⑪ ⑨ 454 Hachinohe Hirosaki Station Station ⑬ Mutsu-Minato Station Nishimeya Hirakawa Hachinohe Line Village Gonohe Town Owani⑫ City 454 ⑥⑩ Town ⑮ 7 282 Shingo Village ⑭ Hashikami Nanbu Hachinohe Town Town City Sannohe Town Name of City, Town, and Village No.
    [Show full text]
  • Download .PDF
    Yale university press Fall/Winter 2020 Marcus Carey Batchelor Bate Under the Red White A Little History of The Art of Solitude Radical Wordsworth and Blue Poetry Hardcover Hardcover Hardcover Hardcover 978-0-300-25093-0 978-0-300-16964-5 978-0-300-22890-8 978-0-300-23222-6 $23.00 $35.00 $26.00 $25.00 Unwin/Tipling Delbanco Leibovitz Campbell Flights of Passage Why Writing Matters Stan Lee Year of Peril Hardcover Hardcover Hardcover Hardcover 978-0-300-24744-2 978-0-300-24597-4 978-0-300-23034-5 978-0-300-23378-0 $40.00 $26.00 $26.00 $30.00 Van Engen Reynolds Taylor Musonius Rufus City on a Hill Allah Sons of the Waves That One Should Hardcover Hardcover Hardcover Disdain Hardships 978-0-300-22975-2 978-0-300-24658-2 978-0-300-24571-4 Hardcover $30.00 $30.00 $30.00 978-0-300-22603-4 $22.00 RECENT GENERAL INTEREST HIGHLIGHTS Yale university press FALL/WINTER 2020 GENERAL INTEREST 01 JEWISH LIVES® 24 MARGELLOS WORLD REPUBLIC OF LETTERS 26 SCHOLARLY AND ACADEMIC 56 PAPERBACK REPRINTS 73 ART + ARCHITECTURE A 1 front cover illustration: Via Roma, Genoa, Italy, ca. 1895. From Stories for the Years, page 28 “This book is superb, utterly FROM TAKE ARMS AGAINST A SEA OF TROUBLES: convincing, and absolutely invigorating. Bloom’s final argument with mortality What you read and how deeply you read matters almost as much as how you ultimately has a rejuvenating love, work, exercise, vote, practice charity, strive for social justice, cultivate effect upon the reader, kindness and courtesy, worship if you are capable of worship.
    [Show full text]
  • An Overview of Overlapping Interests in East Asian and Western Conservation
    Adapt & Evolve 2015: East Asian Materials and Techniques in Western Conservation. Proceedings from the International Conference of the Icon Book & Paper Group, London 8–10 April 2015 https://icon.org.uk/node/4998 An overview of overlapping interests in East Asian and Western conservation T.K. McClintock, Lorraine Bigrigg and Deborah LaCamera Copyright information: This article is published by Icon on an Open Access basis under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (CC BY-NC-ND) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. You are free to copy and redistribute this material in any medium or format under the following terms: You must give appropriate credit and provide a link to the license (you may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way which suggests that Icon endorses you or your use); you may not use the material for commercial purposes; and if you remix, transform, or build upon the material you may not distribute the modified material without prior consent of the copyright holder. You must not detach this page. To cite this article: T.K. McClintock, Lorraine Bigrigg and Deborah LaCamera, ‘An overview of overlapping interests in East Asian and Western conservation’ in Adapt & Evolve 2015: East Asian Materials and Techniques in Western Conservation. Proceedings from the International Conference of the Icon Book & Paper Group, London 8–10 April 2015 (London, The Institute of Conservation: 2017), 168–81. Adapt & Evolve 2015: East Asian Materials and Techniques in Western Conservation. Proceedings from the International Conference of the Icon Book & Paper Group, London 8-10 April 2015 168 T.K.
    [Show full text]
  • Zen War Stories
    ZEN WAR STORIES Following the critically acclaimed Zen at War (1997), Brian Daizen Victoria here explores the intimate relationship between Japanese institutional Buddhism and militarism during the Second World War. Victoria reveals for the first time, through examination of the wartime writings of the Japanese military itself, that the Zen school’s view of life and death was deliberately incorporated into the military’s programme of ‘spiritual education’ in order to develop a fanatical military spirit in both soldiers and civilians. Furthermore, it is shown that D. T. Suzuki, the most famous exponent of Zen in the West, was a wartime proponent of this Zen-inspired viewpoint which enabled Japanese soldiers to leave for the battlefield already resigned to death. Victoria takes us on to the naval battlefield in the company of warrior-monk and Rinzai Zen Master Nakajima Genjō. We view the war in China through the eyes of a Buddhist military chaplain. The book also examines the relationship to Buddhism of Japan’s seven class-A war criminals, hung by the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal in 1948. A highly controversial study, this book will be of interest not only to those studying the history of the period, but also to anyone concerned with the perennial question of the ‘proper’ relationship between religion and state. Brian Daizen Victoria is a Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Asian Studies, the University of Adelaide. THE ROUTLEDGECURZON CRITICAL STUDIES IN BUDDHISM SERIES General Editors: Charles S. Prebish and Damien Keown The RoutledgeCurzon Critical Studies in Buddhism Series is a comprehensive study of the Buddhist tradition.
    [Show full text]
  • Praise for Junana: “In a Society Quickly Shifting Into an Age of Hyper-Connectivity, Junana Is a Timely Read
    Praise for Junana: “In a society quickly shifting into an age of hyper-connectivity, Junana is a timely read. The narrative is as fast-paced and complex as our supermodern, technosocial lives. Caron creates a world so vivid and omniscient that one wonders if Caron is simply reporting on something that is already happening. Caron effortlessly handles multiple perspectives, social classes and age groups. Junana should appeal to educators, marketers, programmers and anyone who is a critical thinker looking for something unique and rich for their cranium to bite into. Junana is an important work that provides a lens with which to greater understand the rapid change we're currently experiencing.” Amber Case, cyborg anthropologist Twitter: caseorganic “Junana was a fabulous book. It was part Snow Crash, part Neuromancer part modern society and the implications of our social networking. It captures what might happen if we had an accelerated learning system, who would be challenged by the notion, who would build on the notion. The is a great story and many deep issues that leave you reflecting about social networking, gaming, learning and the world that we live in or what it might be..........” Dave Toole, CEO Outhink Media, Inc. “Highly recommended!...The very interesting premise is thoughtfully worked out. A bit of techno-speak sprinkled here and there lends verisimilitude, but non-techies can ignore it in favor of the story.” Jeff deLaBeaujardiere, NOAA geek and musician Also by Bruce Caron Snoquask: The Last White Dancer Community, Democracy, and Performance Inside the Live Reptile Tent (with Jeff Brouws) Global Villages (DVD, with Tamar Gordon) Junana: Game Nation Junana: Game State Junana Junana by Bruce Caron Yanagi Press Disclaimer: Junana is a work of fiction.
    [Show full text]