Japan's Nationalism and The Age of the Gods: Challenges to Scholarship (original) (raw)
Related papers
Patriotism, Secularism, and State Shintō: D.C. Holtom’s Representations of Japan
Wittenberg University East Asian Studies Journal, 2011
This paper explores the ideology of religious studies with respect to early 20th century studies of Japan. Since 1945, “State Shintō” has been defined in academicliterature as a state religion which was enforced by the Japanese government froman undetermined date after the Meiji Restoration until it was disestablished by theAllied Occupation. In fact, the Japanese government took concrete steps to separatetheir patriotic ceremonies from religion. Our current definition of the term “State Shintō” was produced by the religious scholar D.C. Holtom.
Kami Ways in Nationalist Territory: Shinto Studies in Prewar Japan and the West.
Bernhard Scheid, Kate Wildman Nakai (eds.), Kami Ways in Nationalist Territory: Shinto Studies in Prewar Japan and the West. Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, 2013
Shinto, literally the way of the kami (gods), is often regarded as Japan’s indigenous religion retaining archaic elements of animism and nature worship. At the same time, Shinto is sometimes seen as nothing else than a nationalistic political ideology. After all, in 1868 Japan turned into a modern nation state and worship at Shinto shrines became a national cult. This so-called State Shinto was eventually abolished under the Allied Occupation in 1946 but the historical links between Shinto and Japanese nationalism led to an ambivalent attitude towards Shinto not only at the popular level but also at the level of scientific research. The present volume comprises eight essays by leading experts of Japanese intellectual history from Japan, Europe, and the USA who tackle this issue from the point of view of research history: What is the impact of State Shinto on Shinto research before and after the Second World War? How did Japanese and international scholars contribute and/or react to the ideological framework of Japanese nationalism? How did nationalist discourses of other countries (in particular German National Socialism) influence the conception of Shinto? As each essay addresses these issues from a specific angle, it becomes clear that there never was just one ideology of State Shinto. Moreover, from the 1880s onward the political authorities emphasized shrine ritual at the cost of Shinto theology. This so-called nonreligious-shrine doctrine also weakened the significance of academic research of Shinto as a tool of propaganda. Regarding the concept of Shinto proper, the impact of modern, “westernized” religious studies seems at least as important as traditional, “nativist” approaches. Table of contents * Introduction: Shinto Studies and the Nonreligious-Shrine Doctrine (Bernhard Scheid) * Religion, Secularity, and the Articulation of the “Indigenous” in Modernizing Japan (Isomae Jun’ichi) * Nationalism and the Humanities in Modern Japan: Religious, Buddhist, Shinto, and Oriental Studies (Hayashi Makoto) * Colonial Empire and Mythology Studies: Research on Japanese Myth in the Early Shōwa Period (Hirafuji Kikuko) * Coming to Terms with “Reverence at Shrines”: The 1932 Sophia University–Yasukuni Shrine Incident (Kate Wildman Nakai) * Shinto Research and Administration in the First Half of the Twentieth Century: The Case of Miyaji Naokazu (Endō Jun) * The Ethnographer, the Scholar, and the Missionary: French Studies on Shinto at the Beginning of the Twentieth Century (Jean-Pierre Berthon) * “A Living Past as the Nation’s Personality”: Jinnō Shōtōki, Early Shōwa Nationalism, and Das Dritte Reich (Michael Wachutka) * In Search of Lost Essence: Nationalist Projections in German Shinto Studies (Bernhard Scheid)
This chapter revises my article published in 2010. It analysed 30 Japanese middle school history textbooks approved for use between 1951 and 1995 and compared them with the controversial neo-nationalist textbook approved in 2001. The sections on antiquity consistently articulated the essence of Nihonjin-ron, theories of Japanese cultural nationalism, without posing students questions about the fundamental distinction between the Japanese people, nation, and territories. This chapter compares those textbooks with eight textbooks in current use to ascertain the effects of recent educational reforms since 2006. Whilst these textbooks have consistently presented the same range of facts about the antiquity, I identify a gradation between hard and soft Nihonjin-ron. Hard Nihonjin-ron uses emotional language to celebrate the cultural achievement of ancient Japan. Soft Nihonjin-ron articulates an ethnocentric vision without resorting to emotional language. The minority textbooks amplify its hard Nihonjin-ron message by adhering to the recent educational reform to a great extent. This is a draft copy for peer review. Please do not cite or quote. I have not had this manuscript edited by a native-English speaker. Will amend errors in grammar and word usage later.
Religious nationalism and the making of the modern Japanese state
2008
This article explores the role of religious nationalism in the making of the modern Japanese state. We describe a process of adaptation featuring bricolage, as an alternative to imitation accounts of non-Western state formation that privilege Western culture. The Meiji state, finding it could not impose Shintô as a state religion, selectively drew from religio-nationalist currents and Western models for over two decades before institutionalizing State Shintô. Although we see some similarities to Europe, distinctive features of the Japanese case suggest a different path to modernity: a lack of separation between state and religion, an emphasis on ritual and a late (and historically condensed) development of popular religious nationalism, which was anchored by State Shintô disciplinary devices including school rituals and shrines deifying the war dead. Tôru Kondô, a high school teacher in Tokyo, was recently forced to take a retraining course, lectured on his conduct, and asked to do a written self-examination. He was one of 244 educators punished for refusing to comply with a new Tokyo Board of Education regulation: teachers were to stand, face the flag and sing the national anthem during enrollment and graduation ceremonies; another 67 teachers were warned because they failed to instruct their students to do so. While Tokyo school officials take down the names of teachers who fail to stand and sing, in Fukuoka Prefecture they keep track of how loud students sing the anthem (each school is classified as high, medium, or low). Backers of the rule, who want to expand it nationwide, argue that it is a step in making Japan a "normal" country that can have patriotic pride. However, the teachers object that the government is using the anthem
Shintoism and the Japanese State Culture
2017
A state structure based on sacredness has become one of the most effective mechanisms in order to control and regulate the masses. An example of this was in Japanese history in the 19 th century. In this research, I purpose to explain how pragmatist the Japanese state for the religious issues in the Era of Meiji while implementing its own goals to be stronger and how a religion can be canalized for the states' aims in this context.
Japanese Mythology and Nationalism: Myths of genesis, Japanese identity, and Familism
In the nationalism’s toolbox, mythology is one of the most useful and productive tools for the construction of national identity. Mythic tales provide a sense of “essence” for the nation; in a way, they symbolize the “roots” for the members of nation. Because of this valuable meaning, pre-nationalist /nationalist thinkers revive and reproduce these narratives according to their agenda. By the revival of mythic stories, a discoursal link which works as cement between the nation and the selected ethnic group is created. Among these, especially the myths on genesis are functional for building a family-nation concept which enhances solidarity and unity between the members of the nation. Being a country with a rich culture and strong historical roots, Japan has a great variety of mythic stories in its literature. In an attempt to discover the links between the myths and the discoursal construction of Japanese nation and Japanese national identity, this study focuses on the Tale of Izanagi and Izanami, Amaterasu-ōmikami, Ukemochi-no-kami, and Jimmu Tennō. These myths were revived first by Motoori, who is a pre-nationalist thinker, and then by Yanagito Kunio, who is a Meiji period nationalist; therefore, it is also important to analyze the relations between these myths and the discourses of these nationalist thinkers. Considering that the details of the mythic stories contain many hints about Japanese minzoku (“nation”) and kazoku kokka (“family-nation”) concepts, a review of these tales from the viewpoint of political science can also depict the “nature” of nationalism with more vibrant colors.
Japanese Myths in Modern Nationalism
Nationalism in Japan is a topic of manifold discussions and can be observed from a political point of view, social standpoint or even through the lenses of a modern pop-culture. Some may argue that every country has its own version of this sentiment – and quite rightly. However, what sets Japanese right-wing tendencies apart from other countries is the strong prevalence of mythical motifs in modern discourse. It is a presence so strong and yet natural , that most of the Japanese cannot even perceive it as a nationalistic tendency. For the majority of people, nationalism is linked to somewhat crude imagery – skin-heads, Nazi emblems, open and plain hatred for any foreign element etc. However, nationalism can also be dressed up in cute clothes and can occur as an innocent slip of the tongue or may take the shape of a shrine in calm woods. In this article I will try to outline the main elements of a highly intricate pattern of Japanese nationalism in connection to their mythological roots.
Nationalism and history in contemporary Japan
2015
What are the characteristics of contemporary Japanese nationalism? And is there a “surge of nationalism in Japan,” as so often claimed (Kitaoka 2001; Sasaki 2001; Hasegawa and Togo 2008; NYT 2013), or even a “drift to the right” in the country (Kato 2014; Nakano 2015)? Dist inguishing between el i te maneuverings and popular attitudes, in this article I first identify what I consider to be the major topics of current nationalist discourse, and then introduce the chief proponents of strengthening of nationalist attitudes in society. In the final section, I discuss some recent attempts to instill nationalist attitudes in young people through middle-school education, especially the teaching of history and civics, but also through moral education. I conclude that in light of a political establishment tarnished by never-ending scandals, attempts to force moral education into the curriculum as a way of fostering nationalist and patriotic attitudes among young people is a particularly dupl...