August 4 - Session 1 - Pitelka - Postwar Growth and Crisis

[Rob_Hugo@PortNW]

Hi everyone,

Please share your thoughts about our August 4 morning session on "Postwar Growth and Crisis" in Japan by Professor Morgan Pitelka by replying to this post.

-Miranda

[Anonymous]

I loved this mornings session on Japan's "Economic Miracle" and the rise of consumerism. I found it particularly amusing that the postal system in Japan is also used for banking. This might explain some of their economic success. Consumerism in Japan sounds much like the experience in the U.S., especially the purchase of new and cool time-saving devices and the importance of the car in Japanese culture. Finally, I didn't know about the student protest movements in Japan. The protest movements might have developed because of the momentum of student movements elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Post war Japan:

Very good job of explaining the “Economic Miracle” however I really enjoyed the discussion regarding the Trends of youth of the 1990’s… the concept of the Shut-ins was interesting to me, but hundreds of thousands, actually scared me…I know of a few students at my high school that have gotten into this lifestyle; Where they sleep in, then spend the entire day and all hours of the evening playing games, go to bed in the wee hours of the morning. Wake up and do it all over again. Some of these students have gone to independent study and it is getting harder for them to maintain relationships with their friends I personally blame the parents but I wonder what the correlation is between them and the young people in Japan.

For four years I have been the advisor for a Anime club at my school, each week the students came into my room and watched these cartoon films…I never paid attention to what was on the screen, I usually graded paper and made sure that what was in the screen was appropriate for a school setting…After today’s talk about the films and the message presented I think I missed out on an entire genre that I could use to teach about the environment…missed opportunities but a learning opportunity. Guess what I will incorporate into my Geography class when talking about Human Environmental interaction…yep Spirited Away! Thanks for an informative and interesting session.

[Anonymous]

I have watched many anime films, but I had no idea there was an environmental message to them. I have seen Spirited Away many times and had no clue as to the connection there. Yes, I understood that there was pollution but I had no idea that there was so much of a message to the movie. Also the part about cleaning the souls kind of relates to what Morgan said yesterday about people having tainted souls. The bathhouse is a way for those souls to be cleansed. I am definitely going to have to watch the movie again with the new insight.
As for the other information about Japan post WW II…
Education: I can’t imagine what our society would be like if education was nationalized, would we all be cookie cutter? Maybe not because obviously there are many diverse types of (adult) people in Japan, but how are the kids.
Shut-ins: I have to internally laugh at this one because it reminds me so much of our own present day culture where 20somethings go back home and live with their parents when before they used move out on their own.

[Anonymous]

I am very interested in the increasing popularity of Japanese pop culture. I have never seen such a large number of students embrace something that is so "foreign" to them (with the exception maybe of Bob Marley) as anime and manga. When I was in Japan in the early 80s, I remember being surprised to see adults reading "comic books" (manga) on the trains and buses. In the U.S., comics are considered low-brow to most people. Stick a bunch of them together, bind it and you now have a "graphic novel," which has become slightly more acceptable. And while the book industry has seen a decline due to books on the internet and in electronic form, at least at the Barnes and Nobles and Borders near my house, the manga section always has several browsers. In fact, the local Borders just increased the floor space that it's giving to graphic novels and teen books.

Thanks in part to anime and manga, the teens I teach are much more adventurous eaters as well. About 10 years ago, if I said I was going out to dinner to eat sushi, I would have heard either "What's that?" or "Yuk, raw fish." Today if I say that it turns into a classroom discussion of everyone's favorite type. And what about Pink Berry and its spin-offs? I heard it was Korean but I don't know for certain. At my school, eating this tart, frozen yoghurt seems to be a bit of a status symbol, surplanting Starbucks frozen machiatto. 😀

I'd like to know more about the Hello Kitty phenomena, which is another Japanese pop culture icon many of my students have latched on to. Are these cute cats and the other related animal goodies just as popular in Japan as they seem to be here?

[Anonymous]

re.: Consumerism - The mark of status with material products is not that much different than our own. I remember when the first family on our street got a color tv. We all went over to see it. Interestingly, the father was not the most educated on the street; he had a high school diploma and worked in a factory, but this tv was important, and we as kids thought it was. Some of the twenty and thirty somethings that my husband works with are amazed that we do not have a flat screen tv yet, and have never owned a video game machine. I guess we lack status with them. With my students today, many who do not have much money, it has moved past iPods to what kind of phone they have. Many of them don't mind laughing about their cheap phones, but love to talk about which ones they will get next.

I liked the explanation about Manga and Anime. I knew there were some strong heroines, but didn't know about the enviornmental themes that spring up. I'll have to find out more from my students.

[Anonymous]

The present day trends in the youth culture of Japan was an eye opening experience and can be very effectively used as a comparison and contrast to the trends in the youth culture in the US. Our youth need to be credited for having short and long term goals.

[Anonymous]

It comes as a full circle. One of the Meiji advisors, an educator and an author, Fukuzawa Yukichi, wanted to learn "something western." He not only got his piece of pie, most importantly, he took the best part of western concepts and incorporate them into Japan-made commodities. Now the wind has shifted to the trend that many of our students want to get "something Japanese, something Korean." Many years ago, the famous Japanese automobile Toyoda could not even sell their cars in US; instead the auto industry was dominated by Ford auto industry. And yet now Toyoda has its own "hybrid" cars. Someone told me that the design of making hybrid cars was actually coming from American auto industry. Apparently everyone wants a piece of pie.

I also found that as a child we used to watch tons of cartoons made by Japanese "animate." At that time I just took it for granted because these "timing products" were popular and in a great need. The modern commercial products reveal a lot of what people think. For example, many teens spend time in doing text messaging, playing computer games and playing I-pod. Are they trying to tell the world of what they are thinking? Modernization is a concept and relative to everything and anything. Perhaps just a split of second, or after years, it is no longer considered as something that is worthwhile to pursue. Something more historical, isn't it? julie

[Anonymous]

I wish I could say I'm surprised by the information we learned today about the increased numbers of kids, boys and girls, who stay home with their Manga and anime and online 'friends'. However, this is unquestionably not a phenomenon found only in Japan. I'm quite certain we can all think of a dozen or more kids we've taught who are like this. I had one in particular last year who told me daily how many hours of video games he'd played the previous night and how he seldom went out. While the information on how some girls are not at all interested in jobs or even getting married was somewhat surprising, again it wasn't altogether unexpected. I come across kids like this on a daily basis, thinking they can stay home with mom and dad for several years until they meet someone, get married, and raise kids without a career. I think it's important that we don't point to these kinds of kids as the sole reason Japan's population is declining. Certainly the problem of males working late and not being there to raise kids is not helping the situation, but times change and so does culture. I'm not worried that Japan is going to fall off the face of the earth because no one is having kids. Japan certainly has troubled times ahead with their aging population, but I'm convinced there will be changes in their society to help them to overcome this problem.

[Anonymous]

While listening to how rapidly Japan recoverd and became one of the world's leading economies, I couldn't help wonder why other countries in Africa, Asia or Latin America couldn't replicate this success. Most of these regions are war-torn, suffer under corrupt regimes and receive aid but I think there are a few crucial elements that make Japan unique. These include the values of loyalty and hard work which transfered so easily from the emperor/war effort to the corporation. The other factor is timing- being the USA's capitalistic Asian friend during the Cold War meant a lot more aid then most places get today. I think the last but most important element is the state funded education system. Japan's highly skilled labor force now attracts investment and innovates. I wish other developing countries would prioitize their education systems.

During our current financial meltdown I have heard many economists cite Japan's failed recovery. I would have liked to spend time on this comparison a bit more.

[Anonymous]

The idea that caught myattention the most was the lecture on Anime in Japan and all across the world. I have seen a few of Hayao Miyazaki's films and thought they were great, but I never realized or caught the underlying message of those films. For example, in Spirited Away, our main chartacter is constantly in contact with various ghosts and spirits. This strongly represents the ideas in Shinto belief and even stresses the "cleansing" of the spirtit as well. In addition, the blending of real world problems like pollution in one of the evil spirits was quite clever and unique. It was like a hidden "inconvient truth message" inside the movie! Finally, one thing that I did catch onto was the fact that Girls can succeed and be hero's just as much as boys can be.
When I teach my Japan Unit, I will offer an extra credit assignment that follows Spirited Away and its relation to our text and Calif Content Stds! 😀

Summary Points:
Hayao Miyazaki
All child appropriate films
Pro-Girl Power
My Neighbor Totoro
Animism: Shinto – World inhabited by Spirits
Spirited Away: Cleanse the spirits of Japan
Young Girl: Sailor Moon
Young Boy: Dragonball Z

Mecha/ Ghost in the Shell/ Metaphor of Atomic Bomb, kids inexperienced dealing with technology that went outta control

(6)

[Anonymous]

Most have mentioned the Anamie aspect of this morning's class, and everyone has done such an amazing job covering that subject that I would like to mention a second topic that really stands out in my mind, and that was the subject of the OTAKU. The obsessive male figures that have few social skills, appear a bit nerdy, and lock themselves in their bedrooms in their parent's homes and play on line games all afternoon and evenings, with seemingly no concrete plans for their future.
Since most of the readings that we read about Japan's switch to a consumer economy seemed to parallel the US, only trailing by a few decades, but similar in most every way, from the buying of household products to environmental issues, it seems as if the tables may be turning by having the Japanese take the lead in this OTAKU issue. Or perhaps we took the lead during the Atari and Nintendo years, but the Japanese youth (Morgan said, "hundreds of thousands") have taken the obsession with video games to a whole new level. Oh and let's not forget about their female counterparts, the parasites.
I asked him before he left if he had talked with any Japanese teachers of middle or high school students about this and if any of the teachers have seen a disconnect among the students with their "social skills" and he said no. But what the Japanese teachers did talk about was the upturn in Bullying, not cyber, but in person.
I am personally seeing a loss of social skills among our teens. Although our students are not allowed iPod types of electronics within the classroom, my lunch time talk with my fellow teachers at my table revolved around the faact that it is becoming a problem across all of the economic areas represented at our table. I see it more across our campus, especially at lunch. The kids will be eating together, but in most of the groups there are several, if not all, with earphones in their ears. Some will share their music, which I think is kind of nice, but most are shutting out the natural sounds of a lunch time conversation, in my view.
In conclusion, that is what struck me the most from this morning. And what wasn't really discussed was the fact that there are also hundreds of thousands of Japanese parents that are allowing this to happen.

[Anonymous]

Having a child who watches anime and is a Chaotic, Bakugan, and Pokemon card playing kid, I know how popular and widespread it has gotten. I never realized this about anime movies though. On a sidenote, I grew up watching Transformers and Speedracer, is Speedracer from Japan?
Moving beyond anime, the way the post war era was presented with lots or electronics is impressive. I hear my grandparents talk about the first TV they saw and what it took to buy one. Along with the 45s, VHS, 8tracks, and cassettes. Now technology moves so fast to buy the next generation of gadgets is really not that impressive, it'll be outdated the second its home. Total tangent, I was trying to conclude that the post war era of gadgets and gizmos was not only a US thing, apparently, but is worldwide? Plus, the idea is having a washing machine/dryer in one appliance is very space friendly. I like that idea. I know he also mentioned the move into very small apartments, how small are they?

[Anonymous]

yes Speed Racer is from Japan.

In the morning session I was disappointed to by the lack of Ninjas and surprisingly impressed by use of the ingenious use of post office as a rural banking system. What a great way for the govt to get capital for all the infrastructure projects of the 1950's. This not only helped the Japanese citizens, it kept the govt from borrowing money at high interest rates for foreign govts or banks. Definitely something to use in Econ.

I would use this as an example of what happens when one party controls a government for too long. Japan & Mexico are both nominally democratic, but have been ruled by one party since the creation of their modern states. Mexico's PRI and Japan's LDP both start out strong and end up corrupt and willing to do almost anything to kept their power. We saw another parallel between S Korea and Mexico when the ruling party was finally defeated. In both cases it did not go smoothly, but in the end the change to a new party gave the country a chance to clean house a bit. It will be interesting to watch what happens when another political party finally trumps the LDP.

[Anonymous]

After much reflection regarding Professor Patelko’s lecture and my own studies of European history, there were various connections that came to mind. A couple of these connections were the different post war destruction and recovery conditions between post-World War I-II and WWII Germany and post-World War II Japan. Both nations suffered considerable death and destruction due to the fire bombings such as the bombing of Dresden and Berlin and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The economic and structural recovery for Germany and Japan were similarly begun through enormous amounts of loan monies made available from the American banking system. Plus, both countries experienced a walk of shame for different reasons: Germany was blamed for the cause of World War I and was blamed by the European community thereby forcing the Germans to pay huge reparations. Whereas, the Japanese were blamed by the United States for causing the US to enter the war and the Japanese were ashamed of their defeat in World War II along with the illnesses that were a visual reminder of their defeat due to the atomic weapons used upon Japan. Both Germany’s government in post-WWII and Japan’s government in post-WWII goals toward recovery focused upon national recovery not nationalist ideals. Threads of connections and similarities seem to jump out at me during these past two weeks.

There are so many other interesting connections, however that would turn this into a book and for the sake of brevity the other similarities will not be discussed, but I do want to note that now I have more ways to include Asian history by having my students look for connections between countries. Also, the California Standards Testing (CST) does include Asia, but the bulk of the questions focus on Europe and era of the Cold War. Thereby, a lot of emphasis is placed upon these areas just mentioned; so we teach those areas mostly. Now I understand how I can give my students a more complete guide to learning about history. Plus, this is a great strategy to get my students to THINK, not just regurgitate the text book or standards. [Edit by="jbaybo on Aug 5, 8:03:07 AM"]The last sentence in the first paragraph needed distinction between which wars.[/Edit]
[Edit by="jbaybo on Aug 5, 8:17:58 AM"][/Edit]

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