Modernizing the Tradition: Identities and Cultural Self-Portraits of Japan and the Ottoman Empire in the Universal Exhibitions (original) (raw)
Related papers
2019
The interdisciplinary joint seminar will compare the perceptions of Japan and the Ottoman Empire in the Holy Roman Empire in a workshop taking place at the University of Kyoto from May 31st to June 3rd, 2019. The research situation is as diverse as the focused regions: In the German-speaking lands research on the perceptions of the Ottoman Empire in the Holy Roman Empire has long been established and is increasingly being promoted. More systematic investigations as well as new methods are being undertaken, which in particular use the new possibilities of digitization and digital humanities: FWF projects “The Mediality of Diplomatic Communication: “Habsburg Envoys in Constantinople in the middle of the 17th Century“, (2017–2021); “Perceptions of the Other in Travelogues 1500–1875 – A Computerized Analysis”, (2018–2021); “Continent Allegories in the Baroque Era”, (2012–2016). While perceptions of the Ottoman Empire are increasingly being investigated, those of Japan have so far hardly been analyzed. The research interest is recent and first results are published in highly selective studies. The few studies that deal with relations between early modern Japan and Europe focus on the missionary work of the Jesuit order in the 16th and 17th centuries and the work of the Europeans in the wake of the Dutch East India Company in the 17th and 18th centuries in Japan. The Joint Project "Japan on the Jesuit Stage: German-speaking Areas and Beyond" (2017–2019) shows the added value of such international projects as well as their necessity. Within the framework of the joint seminar, the varied material basis of these projects, ranging from diplomatic correspondence to travelogue to sculptural and visual sources, will now be presented comparatively in view of the articulated perceptions of the Ottoman Empire and Japan. Through their systematic and comparative study, the mechanisms of perceptions of otherness and its representations in the Holy Roman Empire can be analyzed much more clearly than before. Ultimately, the joint seminar will enable a deepening of scientific cooperation between Japan and Austria as well as further development of methods and results of each participants. The importance of the seminar also lies in the challenges of today. Each of us is constantly confronted with diversity due to global phenomena such as globalization and international migration. The analysis of the treatment of otherness in the past offers historical orientation for today and tomorrow. The Joint Seminar is financed cooperatively by the Austrian Science Funds FWF and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS).
Encounters with Japan. Japanese Studies in the Visegrad Four Countries. Edited by Melinda Papp (Pappová), Budapest, Eötvös University Press, 2015, pp.51-86, 2015
The debate about Japan's ‘uniqueness’ is central in Japanese public discourse and thus in Japanese studies. Though the Japanese development seems ‘unique’ in certain views, it shows some similar traits, and can be interpreted similarly with some of the European patterns. The Japanese cultural movement of the 18-19th centuries (kokugaku) of defining cultural and national identity before modernization can be compared not to the development of Western Europe (where national identity strongly attached to modern nation states) or other parts of Asia (where these emerged after the Western colonization), but – considering the role of premodern cultural identity in forming modern (national) identity and following mainly Miroslav Hroch’s comparative theory of national development – it can be examined compared to the ‘national awakening’ movements of the peoples of East Central Europe. In the shadow of a cultural and/or political ‘monolith’ (China for Japan and Germany for Central Europe), before modernity, ethnic groups or communities started to evolve their own identities with cultural movements focusing on exploring or even inventing their own language and culture, thus creating a new sense of community, the nation. Similar motives of argument can be identified in these movements: ‘language’ as the primary bearer of collective identity, the role of language in culture, ‘culture’ as the main common attribute of the community; and similar aspirations to explore, search and develop native language, ‘genuine’ culture, ‘original’ traditions. The ‘cultural identity’ played a very important role in the formation of national identity before modernization, and the effect of this (‘cultural nationalism‘) is present even today in Japan and in Central Europe, too.
[conference report] Japan and the Ottoman Empire in the Eye of the European Beholder: A Comparison
2019
The interdisciplinary joint seminar, which took place at the University of Kyoto on 1st and 2nd June 2019, compared perceptions of Japan and the Ottoman Empire in the Holy Roman Empire during the Early Modern Period. By doing so, the seminar responded to a researched desideratum: While perceptions of the Ottoman Empire have been the focus of research for decades, interest in the perception of Japan is recent and research has focused mostly on Jesuit missions and the Dutch East India Company (VOC). Comparisons of Japan and the Ottoman Empire, however, are lacking. Organised by Haruka Oba (Kurume University, Japan), Arno Strohmeyer (ÖAW, INZ, Vienna and University of Salzburg), Marion Romberg and Doris Gruber (both ÖAW, INZ, Vienna), the seminar brought together specialists from Europe and Japan as well as their broad material base, ranging from diplomatic correspondence to travelogues, plays, and sculptural and pictorial sources.
Neo-Ottomanism and Cool Japan in Comparative Perspective
New Perspectives on Turkey, 2021
Turkey and Japan have comparable histories of modernization beginning in the nineteenth century. They have since then produced modernities that are considered a mix of “Eastern” and “Western.” Over recent decades, both faced the question of what comes after modernity and began manufacturing their versions of authenticities and cultural exports. This paper comparatively locates two symptoms of this process. “Neo-Ottomanism” refers to the increasing cultural consumption of Turkey’s imperial past while “Cool Japan” emphasizes popular products in entertainment, fashion, youth culture, and food, intending to shift Japan’s image to a “cool” place. Both projects, in different ways, are sponsored by the state; yet their reception in popular culture illustrates the vexed relationship between the state and culture: while states endeavor to colonize culture for their own interests, popular culture provides avenues to outwit the state’s attempts. Popular culture’s autonomy in both contexts has to do with the collapse of traditional hierarchies, which has paved the ways for the promotion and export of new identity claims. Local and global representations of neo-Ottomanism and Cool Japan differ. Internally, they are fragmented; externally, they are linked to international “soft power,” and offer alternatives modernities in Turkey and Japan’s regional areas of influence.
MA Thesis, 2022
In this thesis, I aim to explore the ideology of a new generation of young nationalist intellectuals that rose to prominence in 1930s Turkey, signifying a divergence in Turkish nationalism. I label this group the ‘second-generation Turkists’ in order to distinguish them from the early Turkists who contributed to the foundation of the Republic of Turkey as well as the culturally defined and inclusive Kemalist ideology. The rise of the second-generation Turkists revived the questions that surrounded Turkish national identity since its inception: how to define the basis of Turkishness and how to position it vis-à-vis the West. Doing so, they revealed that Kemalism and the Republic did not necessarily provide a conclusive answer to these issues. To track how the second-generation intellectuals approached to these questions in ways that differ from the early Turkists and the Kemalists, I analyse how they imagined Japan in three of their most prominent periodicals from 1931-1944: Atsiz Mecmua, Orhun, and Cinaralti. Japan was idealized as a role model which managed to modernize while protecting its national culture by the Early Turkist intellectuals. They used the trope of Japan to address the fundamental problems of Turkish identity, particularly its ambivalent position between the East and the West. In this sense, what the Turkists imagined in Japan tells us more about what they thought Turkish identity was ought to be, rather than what Japan actually was. I attempt to see if the references to Japan changed or persisted among the second-generation Turkists. Doing so, based on the study of Atsiz Mecmua and Orhun, I argue that the Turkists used their newfound confidence in the Turkish identity to react to the modernity of the West not by idolizing the Japanese model like their predecessors, but by constructing a ‘Turkish model’ based on a romanticized imagination of the ancient past of Central Asian Turks. The grandiosity they imagined in the lost past of the Turks allowed them to formulate the pan-Turkist national ideal to unite all Turks across Asia. However, I claim that this changed during World War II, which is visible in Cinaralti. The War and the existential threat it brought revealed the Turkists that even after years of westernization under Kemalism, they were still too weak to match the superpowers of the West. Under the shadow of the identity crisis the War brought, I identify a proliferation in the mentions of Japan after the daring Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Japan’s initial success in the War against the most powerful country on Earth garnered the admiration of the second-generation Turkists, who idealized Japan not unlike their predecessors. They imagined the Japanese to be a racially pure nation that showed incredible patriotism and willingness to sacrifice themselves for their country. In essence, the image of Japan in Cinaralti reveals us the stark contrast of what Turkey was and what the Turkists thought it was ought to be, indicating how the fundamental questions that haunted Turkish nationalism continued to persist among the second-generation Turkists.
Oriental by Design: Ottoman Jews, Imperial Style, and the Performance of Heritage
American Historical Review, 2014
This essay proposes that our awareness of the constructed nature of Orientalism, as well as the power of the Orientalist gaze, have made it difficult for us to see individuals who performed their “Orientalness” for international audiences, and in commercial venues, outside of this gaze. It asks, what did the world look like from where they were standing? Can we really assume that their only interlocutors were the Western tourists and travelers they encountered on different occasions? Rather than reject the theoretical insights of the literature on Orientalism, the essay builds upon studies of self-Orientalism, while also suggesting ways for moving that literature in new directions by connecting it to the modern politics of empire. Exploring the example of Ottoman Jews who sold and consumed Oriental goods in various realms, the essay describes their self-Orientalizing gestures as a form of imperial heritage performance resonant with broader trends in the political and cultural landscape of the modern Ottoman Empire and beyond. Indeed, it argues, such performances were part of a global development that witnessed the proliferation of folkloric forms of national or imperial identification during the nineteenth century.
Annali di Ca’ Foscari. Serie orientale, 2024
To what extent does the narrative of Japan's prehistorical origins matter to Italy? In the second half of the twentieth century, Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome hosted two significant exhibitions dedicated to Japanese archaeology and ancient art: Tesori dell'Arte Giapponese in 1958 and Il Giappone prima dell'Occidente in 1995. Both displays provided Italian visitors with an unparalleled framework to engage with early artistic manifestations of the archipelago known today as Japan. Built on a critical analysis of the prehistoric and protohistoric artefacts from the Jōmon to Kofun periods selected for the Italian audience, this paper examines the active application of narrative discourse on Japan's identity by the Japanese government in Italy. Still, it also sheds light on the presence of Japanese archaeology and art in Italian public and private collections throughout the twentieth century. The analysis delves into the textual and visual presentation of exhibits, examining both the venue and catalogues. These sources offer insights into potential instances of orientalism or self-orientalism, revealing a narrative closely tied to stereotypical views. The investigation unravels aspects of Japan's past emphasised in diplomatic shows, evolving alongside groundbreaking archaeological discoveries in postwar Japan.