
On Inazō Nitobe's "Bushido: The Soul of Japan"
New Books in East Asian Studies
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Nitibe's "Warrior Ethics"
I don't read him as advocating that others adopt bushito. I think he sees himself as explaining a world view to others. In his explanations of bushito in the context of japanese history and society, he is a little bit cagy. He doesn't talk about china or other estatian countries, but he would have been keenly aware that people were stead of lumping all these stations and beyond into the general category of oriental. i think he wanted to find a way to pull japan out of that mix and have his readers see it as a unique and certainly special culture and society.
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