New Books Network
Japanese Studies
East Asian Studies February 26, 2021

The Sea and the Sacred in Japan

Aspects of Maritime Religion

Fabio Rambelli

Hosted by Daigengna Duoer
In The Sea and the Sacred in Japan: Aspects of Maritime Religion (Bloomsbury 2018), Fabio Rambelli invites various fifteen scholars of Japanese religions to reflect on a well taken-for-granted fact: although the sea …

Subscribe to

Japanese Studies

on the NBN

RSS Spotify Stitcher Apple
East Asian Studies February 24, 2021

A Roundtable on the History of the Japanese Student Movement

A Discussion with Naoko Koda and Chelsea Szendi Schieder

Naoko Koda and Chelsea Szendi Schieder

Hosted by Nathan Hopson
Chelsea Szendi Schieder’s Co-Ed Revolution: The Female Student in the Japanese New Left and Naoko Koda’s The United States and the Japanese Student Movement, 1948-1973: Managing a Free World provide new …
Japanese Studies February 24, 2021

African Samurai

The True Story of Yasuke, a Legendary Black Warrior in Feudal Japan

Geoffrey Girard and Thomas Lockley

Hosted by Jingyi Li
The remarkable life of history's first foreign-born samurai and his astonishing journey from Northern Africa to the heights of Japanese society. When Yasuke arrived in Japan in the late 1500s …
Chinese Studies February 19, 2021

Forgotten Ally

China's World War II, 1937–1945

Rana Mitter

Hosted by Keith Krueger
If we wish to understand the role of China in today’s global society, we would do well to remind ourselves of the tragic, titanic struggle which that country waged in …
East Asian Studies February 17, 2021

Comfort Women Activism

Critical Voices from the Perpetrator State

Eika Tai

Hosted by Nathan Hopson
Eika Tai’s Comfort Women Activism: Critical Voices from the Perpetrator State (Hong Kong University Press, 2020) tackles the complex histories of Japanese “military sexual violence” and the activism by women …
Japanese Studies February 12, 2021

Embracing 'Asia' in China and Japan

Asianism Discourse and the Contest for Hegemony, 1912-1933

Torsten Weber

Hosted by Samee Siddiqui
Embracing ‘Asia’ in China and Japan: Asianism Discourse and the Contest for Hegemony (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018) by Torsten Weber examines how Asianism became a key concept in mainstream political discourse between China …
Law February 8, 2021

Asia's New Geopolitics

Essays on Reshaping the Indo-Pacific

Michael R. Auslin

Hosted by Jane Richards
Is the Indo-Pacific already the most dominant in terms of global power, politics, and wealth? In his newest book, Michael R. Auslin considers the key issues facing the Indo-Pacific which have ramifications …
Japanese Studies February 8, 2021

Dangerous Memory in Nagasaki

Prayers, Protests and Catholic Survivor Narratives

Gwyn McClelland

Hosted by Takeshi Morisato
On 9th August 1945, the US dropped the second atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Of the dead, approximately 8500 were Catholic Christians, representing over sixty percent of the community. In Dangerous …
Japanese Studies February 5, 2021

The Films of Kore-eda Hirokazu

An Elemental Cinema

Linda C. Ehrlich

Hosted by Takeshi Morisato
The Films of Kore-eda Hirokazu: An Elemental Cinema (Palgrave MacMillan, 2019) draws readers into the first 13 feature films and 5 of the documentaries of award-winning Japanese film director Kore-eda Hirokazu …
Japanese Studies January 29, 2021

Seeking Sakyamuni

South Asia in the Formation of Modern Japanese Buddhism

Richard M. Jaffe

Hosted by Samee Siddiqui
Though fascinated with the land of their tradition’s birth, virtually no Japanese Buddhists visited the Indian subcontinent before the nineteenth century. In the richly illustrated Seeking Śākyamuni: South Asia in the …
Japanese Studies January 29, 2021

Scripting Japan

Orthography, Variation, and the Creation of Meaning in Written Japanese

Wesley C. Robertson

Hosted by Jingyi Li
Imagine this book was written in Comic Sans. Would this choice impact your image of me as an author, despite causing no literal change to the content within? Generally, discussions …
East Asian Studies January 25, 2021

Constructing Empire

The Japanese in Changchun, 1905–45

Bill Sewell

Hosted by Daigengna Duoer
What happens to everyday-life in a city when it becomes subsumed into an empire? Who becomes responsible for the everyday building and management of the new imperial enclave? How do …
Japanese Studies January 14, 2021

Creativity in Tokyo

Revitalizing a Mature City

Matjaz Ursic and Heide Imai

Hosted by Jingyi Li
In Creativity in Tokyo: Revitalizing a Mature City (Palgrave, 2020), Heide Imai and Matjaz Ursic focues on overlooked contextual factors that constitute the urban creative climate or innovative urban milieu in …
Japanese Studies January 11, 2021

Cinema of Ozu Yasujiro

Histories of the Everyday

Woojeong Joo

Hosted by Takeshi Morisato
One of the most well regarded of non-Western film directors, responsible for acknowledged classics like Tokyo Story (1953), Ozu Yasujiro worked during a period of immense turbulence for Japan and …
Science, Technology, and Society January 8, 2021

An Anthropology of the Machine

Tokyo's Commuter Train Network

Michael Fisch

Hosted by John Traphagan
With its infamously packed cars and disciplined commuters, Tokyo’s commuter train network is one of the most complex technical infrastructures on Earth. In An Anthropology of the Machine: Tokyo's Commuter …
Japanese Studies January 7, 2021

The Japanese Discovery of Chinese Fiction

The Water Margin and the Making of a National Canon

William C. Hedberg

Hosted by Jingyi Li
The classic Chinese novel The Water Margin (Shuihu zhuan) tells the story of a band of outlaws in twelfth-century China and their insurrection against the corrupt imperial court. Imported into …
Japanese Studies January 7, 2021

Immigrant Japan

Mobility and Belonging in an Ethno-nationalist Society

Gracia Liu-Farrer

Hosted by Takeshi Morisato
Immigrant Japan? Sounds like a contradiction, but as Gracia Liu-Farrer shows in Immigrant Japan Mobility and Belonging in an Ethno-nationalist Society (Cornell University Press, 2020), millions of immigrants make their …
Anthropology January 5, 2021

The Sportsworld of the Hanshin Tigers

Professional Baseball in Modern Japan

William W. Kelly

Hosted by John Traphagan
Baseball has been Japan's most popular sport for over a century. In The Sportsworld of the Hanshin Tigers: Professional Baseball in Modern Japan (University of California Press, 2018), anthropologist William …
East Asian Studies December 30, 2020

China's Muslims and Japan's Empire

Centering Islam in World War II

Kelly A. Hammond

Hosted by Ed Pulford
The 1930s-40s expansion of the Japanese empire was marked by significant interest among Japan-based scholars and policy-makers in China’s Muslim population and how best to write them into a new …
East Asian Studies December 22, 2020

Seeds of Control

Japan’s Empire of Forestry in Colonial Korea

David Fedman

Hosted by Nathan Hopson
David Fedman's Seeds of Control: Seeds of Control: Japan’s Empire of Forestry in Colonial Korea (University of Washington Press, 2020) is hard to categorize. In a good way. Put simply, it is …