New Books in Japanese Studies

On November 12, 1588, five young Asian men—led by a twenty-one-year-old called Christopher—traveled up the River Thames to meet Queen Elizabeth I. Christopher’s epic sea voyage had spanned from Japan, via the Philippines, New Spain (Mexico), Java and Southern Africa. On the way, he had already become the first recorded Japanese person in North America. Now Christopher was the first ever Japanese visitor to England, and no other would leave such a legacy for centuries to come. The story of Christopher is almost utterly forgotten and has never been fully told before. Thomas Lockley's A Gentleman from Japan: The Untold Story of an Incredible Journey from Asia to Queen Elizabeth’s Court (Hanover Square Press, 2024) is a fast-paced, historical narrative of adventure, cross-cultural endeavor, intellectual exchange, perseverance, espionage and conflict in the Age of Exploration. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

In the sixteenth century, members of the Ouchi family were kings in all but name in much of Japan. Immensely wealthy, they controlled sea lanes stretching to Korea and China, as well as the Japanese city of Yamaguchi, which functioned as an important regional port with a growing population and a host of temples and shrines. The family was unique in claiming ethnic descent from Korean kings, and-remarkably for this time-such claims were recognized in both Korea and Japan. Their position, coupled with dominance over strategic ports and mines, allowed them to facilitate trade throughout East and Southeast Asia. They also played a key cultural role in disseminating Confucian texts, Buddhist sutras, ink paintings, and pottery, and in creating a distinctive, hybrid culture that fused Japanese, Korean, and Chinese beliefs, objects, and customs.Kings in All But Name: The Lost History of Ouchi Rule in Japan, 1350-1569 (Oxford UP, 2024) illustrates how Japan was an ethnically diverse state from the fourteenth through the sixteenth centuries, closely bound by trading ties to Korea and China. It reveals new archaeological and textual evidence proving that East Asia had integrated trading networks long before the arrival of European explorers and includes an analysis of ores and slag that shows how mining techniques improved and propelled East Asian trade. The story of the Ouchi rulers argues for the existence of a segmented polity, with one center located in Kyoto, and the other in the Ouchi city of Yamaguchi. It also contradicts the belief that Japan collapsed into centuries of turmoil and rather proves that Japan was a stable and prosperous trading state where rituals, policies, politics, and economics were interwoven and diverse. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

In July 2021, Naomi Osaka—world number 1 women’s tennis player—lit the Olympic Cauldron at the Tokyo Olympic Games. The half-Japanese, half-American, Black athlete was a symbol of a more complicated, more multiethnic Japan—and of the global nature of high-level sports.Osaka is now about to start her comeback, after taking some time off following the birth of her child. She’s not just an athlete: She’s a media entrepreneur, venture investor, and mental health advocate—with that latter label coming with difficult conversations about the wellbeing of high-performance athletes, and their obligations to the media.Just in time for her comeback tour, tennis writer Ben Rothenberg is here with a new biography of the tennis star: Naomi Osaka: Her Journey to Finding Her Power and Her Voice (Dutton, 2024).Ben Rothenberg is a sportswriter from Washington, D.C. who has covered Naomi Osaka around the world since she emerged onto the WTA Tour in 2014, both in print for The New York Times—for which he covered tennis from 2011-2022—and on his podcast, No Challenges Remaining. His longform writing has been published in outlets including Slate and Racquet.You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Naomi Osaka. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

With comics franchises getting turned into multi-billion dollar revenue opportunities and consumer technology companies dominating daily headlines — the trappings of “geekdom” have made their way into the global mainstream over the past few days. As part of this trend, Japanese-style anime has also gained immense transnational popularity, arguably becoming part of the “new cool”.It’s against this backdrop that Jinying Li dives into the sociocultural landscape of anime with her book Anime’s Knowledge Cultures: Geek, Otaku, Zhai (University of Minnesota Press, March 2024). However, instead of diving into the “Japaneseness” of anime and otaku culture, Anime’s Knowledge Cultures helps frame anime within a more globalized sense of “geekdom” — especially with the rise of post-80s millennial zhai in China’s cultural and economic spheres.Li is an Assistant Professor of Modern Culture and Media at Brown University. Her research and teaching focuses on media theory, animation, and digital culture in East Asia. She is also a filmmaker who’s worked on various animations, features, and documentaries, including the noted Chinese 2016 animation feature Big Fish and Begonia.With this academic and domain expertise, Li’s book illuminates phenomena like fansubs, danmaku “bullet-style” subtitles, and geek “complexes” to audiences who are interested in the theoretical and practical implications of anime’s global popularity. Tune into this episode about Anime’s Knowledge Cultures to learn more—listen to the end for some special anime and movie recommendations.Anthony Kao is a writer who intersects international affairs and cultural criticism. He founded/edits Cinema Escapist—a publication exploring the sociopolitical context behind global film and television—and also writes for outlets like The Guardian, Al Jazeera, The Diplomat, and Eater. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

Japan is often imagined as a nation with a long history of whaling. In The Gods of the Sea: Whales and Coastal Communities in Northeast Japan, c.1600-2019 (Cambridge UP, 2023), Fynn Holm argues that for centuries some regions in early modern Japan did not engage in whaling. In fact, they were actively opposed to it, even resorting to violence when whales were killed. Resistance against whaling was widespread especially in the Northeast among the Japanese fishermen who worshiped whales as the incarnation of Ebisu, the god of the sea. Holm argues that human interactions with whales were much more diverse than the basic hunter-prey relationship, as cetaceans played a pivotal role in proto-industrial fisheries. The advent of industrial whaling in the early twentieth century, however, destroyed this centuries-long equilibrium between humans and whales. In its place, communities in Northeast Japan invented a new whaling tradition, which has almost completely eclipsed older forms of human-whale interactions. This title is also available as Open Access. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

A Danish hero, Bernhard Sindberg, saves thousands during the Nanjing massacre in 1937, resembling Oskar Schindler. The podcast explores his courageous acts, the tragedy of Nanjing, Japan's air raids, and Sindberg's early life and influences. It sheds light on his rebellious nature, commercial relations, and impact on women and children. The story unveils a forgotten hero's remarkable journey amidst war-torn China.

The podcast discusses the forgotten Battle of Shanghai in 1937, involving a million soldiers and 3 million civilians. Key figures like Chiang Kai-shek, Matsui Iwane, Claire Chennault, and Alexander von Falkenhausen emerge. It explores Japan's imperial ambitions, the intense battle in Shanghai, and the evolving treatment of prisoners of war. The horrors of the Nanjing Massacre and the myth of Japanese soldiers' discipline are also discussed.

In 1864, on a midsummer’s day, Kawai Koume, a 60-year old matriarch of a samurai family in Wakayama, makes a note in her diary, which she had dutifully written in for over three decades.There are reports of armed clashes in Kyoto. It’s said that the emperor has ordered the expulsion of the foreigners, and it’s also said that a large band of vagabond soldiers has gathered in Senju in Edo. It’s said that in Edo people are wearing their [winter] kimono linings, and in Nikko it has been snowing. I don’t know if it’s true. But really, every day we hear nothing but disturbing rumors.The Meiji Restoration, which ousts the shogun and restores the emperor’s power, happens four years later.Koume’s diary is the central document in Simon Partner’s latest book Koume’s World: The Life and Work of a Samurai Woman Before and After the Meiji Restoration (Columbia University Press, 2023)In this interview, Simon and I talk about Kawai Koume, her diary, and everything she witnessed in the decades covered by her journal.Simon Partner is professor of history at Duke University. He is the author of three previous books that chronicle modern Japanese history through the lives of ordinary people such as farmers, shopkeepers, and housewives, including most recently The Merchant’s Tale: Yokohama and the Transformation of Japan (Columbia University Press: 2018).You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Koume’s World. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia.Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

Max Ward’s Thought Crime: Ideology and State Power in Interwar Japan (Duke University Press, 2019) analyzes the trajectory and transformations of the implementation of Japan’s 1925 Peace Preservation Law from its conception until the early years of the 1940s. The law, which began as a state effort to tamp down radicalism and “dangerous thought” (mostly Marxism) and preserve and protect imperial sovereignty, spawned a massive apparatus populated by both state and nonstate actors dedicated to ideologically converting and rehabilitating thought criminals. In addition to being a case study of the nature and ideology of punishment and repentance for thought crimes in late Imperial Japan—and the way in which the emperor functioned as a “ghost in the machine” animating the pursuit of political repression—Ward’s book also provides insight into the policing of ideological threats and its relationship to national identity politics. Thought Crime follows the evolution and transformation of the Peace Preservation Law and its attendant social and institutional structures from interwar attempts to repress dangerous thought to a system of mass ideological conversion, and finally to the consequences of its integration into practices of total mobilization during wartime. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies

In his new book, Transnational Nazism: Ideology and Culture in German Japanese Relations, 1919-1936 (Cambridge University Press, 2019), associate professor of history at Carnegie Mellon University Ricky W. Law examines the cultural context of Tokyo and Berlin’s political rapprochement in 1936. This study of interwar German-Japanese relations is the first to employ sources in both languages. Transnational Nazism was an ideological and cultural outlook that attracted non-Germans to become adherents of Hitler and National Socialism, and convinced German Nazis to identify with certain non-Aryans. Because of the distance between Germany and Japan, mass media was instrumental in shaping mutual perceptions and spreading transnational Nazism. This work surveys the two national media to examine the impact of transnational Nazism. When Hitler and the Nazi movement gained prominence, Japanese newspapers, lectures and pamphlets, nonfiction, and language textbooks transformed to promote the man and his party. Meanwhile, the ascendancy of Hitler and his regime created a niche for Japan in the Nazi worldview and Nazified newspapers, films, nonfiction, and voluntary associations.Craig Sorvillo is a PhD candidate in modern European history at the University of Florida. He specializes in Nazi Germany, and the Holocaust. He can be reached at craig.sorvillo@gmail.com or on twitter @craig_sorvillo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/japanese-studies