1/16/10 -Session 6a - Pitelka - Japan: The Meiji Transition

The item that struck me the most in the morning session was "Householdism rather than Individualism". Families during this era were focussed on maintaining the business. If one of their heirs were not capable of adequately taking over the business, the parents would "adopt" another person who would be capable. Also, they might have someone marry their daughter and that person would give up their family name and assume the family name of the adoptive family. This practice was new to me. I always thought that the Japanese family was focussed on family but did not realize that this could involve adopting someone else to "save" the strength of the family.[Edit by="ktarvyd on Jan 19, 8:52:56 AM"][/Edit]

What I came away thinking about most from this session was the idea of perspective. In the morning, the idea came up with Japan being forced to open when Perry sailed in with gunships and how this event was portrayed differently by the German artist on board as compared to the images of the same event done by Japanese artists. It came up later in the afternoon with the Japanese perspective on the events leading up to and including the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The next day I watched Letters from Iwo Jima, which tells the story of this battle from the Japanese perspective and the idea was reinforced for me.

In fact, I'd been thinking a lot about perspective and relativity already and I believe I'll make this the locus of my lesson plan. Teaching point of view and perspective is a language arts standards. It would be a unit that would build on the curriculum I already do. I was thinking of including a chapter from John Gardner's novel Grendel, which tells the epic poem Beowulf from the monster's perspective. The wife of Bath in the Canterbury Tales also references a tale by Aesop--in a footnote we learn about a painting depicting a man killing a lion and the comment that a leonine artist would have portrayed this event very differently. In the Renaissance and Romantic poetry we do, this idea can be examined through the two poems, "the Passionate Shepherd to His Love" and "the Nymph's Reply" as well as the cycle of poems, Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience by Blake.

I'm envisioning this unit as coming toward the end of the year and that would touch on a lot of curriculum we'd already examined through the lens of perspective. And I thought I could use the vehicle of Asian history and culture and the different genres that this might afford to teach the idea of perspective in a different way--show the images from the Visualizing Cultures website and show the Iwo Jima film. The culminating assignment I have in mind now would be a kind of copy change whereby students rewrite a poem, short story, or chapter from a piece of literature they already know from a different perspective.

I came across an interesting documentary on manga as a literary genre. In Japan, comics are regarded as their own genre equal to novel, poetry, and drama. Manga Mad traces it back to the wood block prints of the Edo Period. Western culture did not have such easy access to easily and cheaply reproduced books of essays and poetry with images until it was too late. Western culture was conditioned to accept books of text as scholarly where Japanese culture accepts text and images. This became more important during the Meiji Period because these books were a very cheap form of entertainment.

Watch Manga Mad.

I think most of us didn't really know about the early Japanese family structure and were quite surprised by the idea of putting the buisness first, however I'm not so sure it is in stark contrast with our culture. It seems that family businesses are going by the way side, and that whatever it takes to succeed, many people will do. Maybe the Japanese figured this out first? Hence why they are so successful in the business world?

This lecture came at a great time for me. I was able to incorporate much of the information learned on Saturday into my lesson the following week. In world history we are learning about Western imperialism in Asia. The focus was on how Japan became a modern industrial power and how it was able to resist foreign rule. I was able to extend the lesson with much more detail regarding Tokugawa Japan & how the the Meiji emperor was inspired to modernize Japan.

The students were really interested in learning about the social structure and family structure and many who are Japanese could relate to the cultural emphasis on "success" that is put upon them today by their own Japanese families. I hope to include a powerpoint in the lesson for next year with some of the woodblock art, and ancient maps of the region, details about Matthew Perry. This could also be used in U.S. history when students learn about American imperialism in the South Pacific.

I found it interesting that Japanese colonialism and imperialism seemed to begin once they began exploring the rest of the world. Also that there were "rules" of colonization that should be followed. That one was hilarious.

On the occupation of Taiwan, I have relatives who grew up in Taiwan during the 50's and 60's whose parents really admire the Japanese and grew up speaking Japanese. There seems to be a difference between the way that Japan treated those places that it occupied early on in their "Colonial career", and the stories we hear of the Annex of Korea and the Nanjing.

There was a novel that my school used to teach entitled "Clay Walls" concerning Koreans and the Annex period. The depictions of life under the Japanese during this time seems brutal.

I also saw The Last Samurai last weekend. Though generally I would have less patience with Tom Cruise and the Hollywood formula aspects of it, given the history I had just learned, it was really enjoyable--as have been other Japan-related movies I've seen recently--Flags of Our Fathers, Letters from Iwo Jima and Ran. Context makes such a difference!

I know Professor Pitelka said the Cruise character was fictional, but I wondered how much of the rest of it was historically accurate. I remember he said that Satsuma was seen as a hero, but I wonder if he was as sympathetic as he was portrayed in the movie, in which the samurai culture seems pretty idyllic, the oligarchs very antipathetic and the emperor totally ineffective and weak.