Frog in a Well

齊芳罷官 (Qi Fang removed from office)

Posted on April 1, 2006 by Alan Baumler / 0 Comment

Qi Fang, China’s contestant for the Miss Universe pagent, has resigned. (abdicated?)

The China Daily story linked to above gives most of the sordid details. China has been borrowing a lot of the dying refuse of Western culture, and pagents seem to be part of it. It is a typical China mess where she signed a contract and it is not clear what the contract says and what exactly the law is. China daily suggests that the whole affiar shows that China needs more regulations. The thing I found interesting is that she claimed that she was unwilling to accept the level of personal control the pagent organizers were planning on exerting over her. 　齊芳今天表示，“在合同內容中，出現了很多讓我很驚訝的條款。如：要求我將所有的親友名單及聯絡方式、背景、住址告訴他們；讓我在每天的24小時內，隨時聽候總部的調遣；安排助理全天跟隨，包括會見親友、包括談戀愛，都有在場；給任何人通電話，都要告訴助理對方是什麼人，且通話時，不得避開助理；同時，必須接受該助理和我住在同一間房間。” In particular she was unhappy that an attendent would be with her 24 hours a day, sleeping in the same room, being there when she talks to her parents and presumably putting a real crimp in her relationship with her boyfriend. She was unwilling to accept this lack of personal freedom and thus gave up a shot at something every little girl dreams of.

Well, of course not every little girl. I suppose that Qi Fang is just young enough that she could be part of the first generation of Chinese girls who could dream of being a beauty queen. One of the problems that western pagents have is that they are trying to portray the contestants as traditional and above all sexually inactive in a time when finding women like that has to be hard. The China version seems to be even more messed up. A careful study of the contestants (I take my blogging responsibilities seriously) reveals that they all at least look like modern women who would persumably not cotton to this frankly Maoist level of control and distrust. Were they afraid she might do something inappropriate with her mom and dad if left unattended? Or is she the bride of the nation who can’t be alone with any man, like the Imperial concubine in Dream of the Red Chamber? Maybe we will be lucky, and it will turn out that the historical window in which you can have these pagents will be so small in China it will close before it really opens.

1960s/1970s/Historiography/Korea/Postwar

Duelling histories? part 3

Posted on March 29, 2006 by Owen / 5 Comments

I thought I would revive this title once more and add another post to the series on recent historiographical clashes in South Korea since I recently came across another interesting example that actually fits rather nicely with some of the posts made here by Jiyul and Noja.

I came across this report on a debate on the Park Chung-hee era between Im Chi-hyŏn and Cho Hŭi-yŏn in the pages of the Donga Ilbo newspaper. Apparently the debate between the two has been going on since 2004, particularly in the pages of the journal Historical Criticism (역사비평) and the Professors’ Newspaper (교수신문).

Basically, the main protagonist, Im Chi-hyŏn, argues that Park’s rule was an example of a ‘mass dictatorship’ (대중독재), in other words, the idea that Park was able to rule by creating some degree of consent for his dictatorship. Cho counters that “the mass dictatorship theory is problemmatic because it expands the accommodating silence of the masses into a general and active agreement with the dictatorship, thus justifying it.”

Im on the other hand responds that “Cho’s understanding makes the people into heroes and demonises the dictator, creating a moralistic duality. If we are to prevent a new dictatorship from arising we need to go beyond moralistic dualism and provide a dispassionate analysis.”

Going a bit further, Cho argues that both Im Chi-hyŏn’s views and those of Yi Yŏng-hun (who edited two recent books I’ve mentioned here: 해방 전후사의 재인식 and 수량경제사로 다시 본 조선후기) are part of a general attempt to create a revisionist history that takes advantage of the current crisis of ‘democratic progressive discourse’. He argues that while Yi’s critique comes from the viewpoint of the so-called ‘New Right’, Im’s comes from a postmodernist (탈근대적) position. Funnily enough I’m planning to translate a review of 해방 전후사의 재인식 by a Korean Marxist historian whom I rate highly, who makes almost exactly the same point, titling his review: ‘A reactionary duet between the right and the postmodernists.’ When I actually have some time to do the translation I’ll be sure to make it available to readers here.

More on the debate here at the Chosun Ilbo. And something in English I found here on Im’s theory of mass dictatorship.

Blogs and Carnivals/Colonial/Korea/Korea-Japan

Popular Gusts on the turn-of-the-century Japanese spin operation

Posted on March 27, 2006 by Owen / 1 Comment

Matt of the blog ‘Gusts of Popular Feeling‘ has produced two excellent posts in a row on apologist views of Japan’s colonisation of Korea. The latest one specifically concerns Japan’s ‘cultivation of foreign apologists’ during its bid to gain control over the Korean peninsula, using what one contemporary commentator called a “carefully organized […] claque in Europe and America, especially in America.”

It’s a fascinating look at what the Japanese government were up to that raises one particular question in my mind: how did they learn so quickly to be masters of spin and successfully develop an influential lobby in the ‘West’. (Arguably, Japan still manages to benefit from a certain sort of untouchable ‘cool’ status among many people in Europe and the US, although not so much the generation that remembers WWII). I guess that one answer to this question is that the arguments used by the Japanese government and promoted by their foreign friends were the exact same ones being used by European governments about their colonial possessions or by the US about the Philippines (ie the natives can’t look after themselves and must be saved by us). It wasn’t hard to find a model for propaganda and it wasn’t hard to convince people in other parts of the world of its rightfulness as they already believed it.

Academia/Cultural/Current/Recent Events/English/General/Intellectual/Japan/US-Japan

Our Future, more or less

Posted on March 26, 2006 by Jonathan Dresner / 4 Comments

The head of the Japan Foundation (to whom I, like so many, owe thanks) has made some comments on the state and future of Japan Studies. It’s his job, after all.

Ogoura has divided up the issue into “trends” and “recommendations.” First, the Trends:

The transition from “area studies” to interdisciplinarity, and increasing integration of Japan into studies of global phenomena through comparative approaches.

The lack of economic or military threat from Japan means that there’s less policy-driven interest. There’s a corresponding shift, which Ogoura calls a separate trend, towards studies of the Middle East and China, both of whom represent significant ongoing policy issues, though the importance of the Japan-US relationship remains a valuable tool in pushing Japan studies.

Finally, the ever-popular academic-commoner “gap,” though pop culture studies might fill the role that dignitaries like E.O. Reischauer used to fill, bringing people into interest in Japan and to more substantial Japanese studies courses.

Then come the recommendations, mostly targeting “foundations and grant-issuing institutions” and which assume that the trends listed above are necessarily bad things….

Encourage young people to follow their interests into deeper study, instead of just sticking with what interests them.

Encourage comparative, international, transnational and other broader scholarship rather than sticking with an orthodox and limited view of Japanese Studies

Link university and High School programs, to broaden the minds of manga/anime-infected youth towards “real” Japanese culture and history.

Without a hint of irony, he then goes on to recommend “courses that focus on subjects of greater interest to young people, such as sports, fashion and food” preferably with cool show-and-tell cultural events.

As you can imagine, I’m not entirely sure that this analysis hits the mark. What do you think is the future of Japanese Studies, and what would you like to see groups like the JF putting effort into?

China/English/General/Language

Earliest Chinese Writing?

Posted on March 24, 2006 by Jonathan Dresner / 0 Comment

People’s Daily Online is reporting that 7000 year old characters have been found which seem to be direct precedents to known Chinese characters. [via]

The symbols include rivers, animals and plants, and activities such as hunting, fishing and arable farming, as well as symbols recording events, said Han Xuhang, a research fellow with the Anhui Provincial Archaeological Research Institute.

…Xu said the symbols are carved in pairs and also in groups, which express comparatively complete meanings and show the characteristics of sentences and paragraphs.

…

Many of the symbols are similar to the inscriptions on bones or tortoise shells of the Shang Dynasty (1766-1122 BC) and many are still conserved in characters used by ethnic groups today, said Xu.

It’s not immediately clear to my how this is terribly important, since it’s been pretty obvious for a long time that Chinese characters evolve from pictographic origins. Still, it’s interesting.

In other news: The metal used to make Great Britain’s highest military honor, the Victoria Cross, came from China. Apparently the tradition is to use cannon captured in battle: since 1914, the metal used has been from Chinese armaments taken in the Second Opium War. These cannon were used for medals because they were not considered high quality material for recasting cannons, which is what was done with a great many other seized weapons.

China-Japan/Cultural/General/Intellectual/International Affairs/Japan/Japanese/大正/昭和

はじめまして

Posted on March 23, 2006 by saikawa / 1 Comment

皆さん、はじめまして。斉川貴嗣（Saikawa Takashi）と申します。

ずいぶん前にローソンさんからこのブログへお誘いいただいていたのですが、ここ１、2ヶ月忙しくしておりましたので書き込みが遅れました。これからは積極的に参加していきたいと思いますので、どうぞよろしくお願いいたします。

まずは簡単な自己紹介。現在、早稲田大学大学院政治学研究科の学生（博士課程）です。専門は国際関係論なのですが、理論研究ではなく歴史研究を行なっています。具体的には、両大戦間期に活動を展開した知的協力国際委員会（International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation）を研究対象としています。この委員会は、1922年に国際連盟の一機関として設立され、当時の世界的な知識人が数多く参加しました。教育交流、文化交流など現在で言えば国際交流を実践した機関で、その理念や活動は今のユネスコに継承されています。私としては、この委員会に非西洋諸国の知識人や政府がどのように関わったのかということに興味があり、特に当時の日本と中国の関与を調べています。日本では新渡戸稲造、田中館愛橘、姉崎正治、中国では呉稚暉、林語堂などの知識人が関わっていて、これら人々の思想研究も行なうつもりです。先月から今月にかけて4週間ほど、ジュネーブの国際連盟アーカイブスに研究調査に行ってきました。結構面白い史料が見つかりましたので、早いうちに何らかのかたちで成果を示すことができればと考えています。

というわけで、私は決して日本史のプロパーではないのですが、皆さんからいろいろ勉強させていただいて、また私が皆さんのお役に立つことがあれば幸いです。

Academia/bibliography/Books and Articles/China-Japan/English/General/Japan

Denis Twitchett and the Cambridge Histories

Posted on March 22, 2006 by Jonathan Dresner / 0 Comment

Denis Twitchett, author of the groundbreaking Financial Administration Under the T’ang Dynasty and a strong guiding force behind the Cambridge History series for China and Japan, has passed away. [via]

The Cambridge History series has sometimes struck me as an odd duck sort of publication — I think I’m channeling one of Berry’s reviews here — a mix of “state of the art” and “timeless reference” which never quite succeeded at either. But they remain very powerful tools for students, especially graduate students, in getting a baseline on a period or a topic. They remain particularly useful, I think, as syntheses of material and findings that is otherwise only found in monographs, because most of it hasn’t been integrated into most textbooks on Asia.

I’ve never had very good luck assigning the chapters — the Japan histories, anyway — to undergraduate classes, but they have been good for students doing research.

Books/China/China-Japan/English/General/Historiography/Japan/Teaching

Denis Twitchett and the Cambridge Histories

Posted on March 22, 2006 by Jonathan Dresner / 0 Comment

I’ve never had very good luck assigning the chapters — the Japan histories, anyway — to undergraduate classes, but they have been good for students doing research.

China/General

Where are the Chinese women?

Posted on March 21, 2006 by Alan Baumler / 2 Comments

From IHT via some blog I forgot, here is a little review of a book on “Chick Lit” Chick Lit is a marketing category full of books about young women trying to have a career and find love. Did you see the Bridget Jones movie? Me neither, but that’s the basic idea. The interesting thing about the book is that the trend has spread all over the world, with some rather weird permutations in different places. This type of things is not very popular in Japan, since Japanese women seem to prefer fiction that deals with adolecent romance or the hell of being a Japanese wife, and skip over the independent phase. Not sure why.

Does Chick Lit exist in China? I ask because it sounds a lot like the butterfly fiction of the 20’s and 30’s, novels and such intended to be read by a new group of women and used in part as a guidebook to a strange new world. I would be very interesting in knowing if the genre has made a comeback. Are any of our countless readers up on current Chinese women’s fiction?

China/General

The Chinese are everywhere

Posted on March 21, 2006 by Alan Baumler / 0 Comment

From Granta via Reason here is a little thing by Lindsey Hilsum on Chinese businesses in Africa. It’s really just a little journalistic squib mostly about how the author was surprised to find Chinese in Africa. The author has clearly not read The Star Raft. She points out, correctly, that the Chinese economy is expanding all over the place and that the Chinese demand for raw materials is being felt all over. The author points out that the Chinese are popular with charming governments like that of the Sudan because they are not all hung up on human rights.

It occurred to me that another reason the Chinese may be doing so well is that the chief barriers to doing business in Africa are supposedly corruption, chaos and a kleptocratic state. I would suspect that these would be things that would not frighten a Chinese businessman the same way they would an American.

General

Recent Downtime

Posted on March 21, 2006 by K. M. Lawson / 0 Comment

I want to apologize for the recent few days of instable contact with Frog in a Well and some downtime. I’ll expand this post with more of an explanation later but in the meantime, I hope that things will gradually get back to normal around here. We have moved web hosts and I’m still ironing somethings out. Leave a comment here or email me at konrad [at] lawson.net if you continue to have problems with some feature of the weblogs here, I will try to work out any remaining issues this weekend.

China/General

Recent Downtime

Posted on March 21, 2006 by K. M. Lawson / 0 Comment

General/Korea

Recent Downtime

Posted on March 21, 2006 by K. M. Lawson / 1 Comment

Articles/Books/China/Civil War/English/Historiography/War

Women on the Long March

Posted on March 16, 2006 by Jonathan Dresner / 1 Comment

Natalie Bennett reports that a new oral history investigation of the Long March experience is being published.

Over 10 months, travelling mainly by bus and train through areas little changed to this day, I found 40 of the march veterans. Talking to them, I learned that their suffering, and what they overcame, was actually much greater than we had been told, especially among the women. Some of the realities they described also sit uneasily with the myth – none more so, perhaps, than the fate of the children of the Long March: the children left behind, children given over for hurried adoption after being born along the way, the young taken on as recruits and sometimes abandoned if they could not keep up.

I can’t tell from the article, which focuses on women and children in the march, if the book will follow that emphasis, nor does it give any clues as to whether there will be any new information on the Luding Bridge incident which features prominently in Chang/Halliday’s attack on Mao’s legacy.

However, if the article is any clue as to the rich detail available in the book, it will be a valuable addition to the history and the pedagogy. Oral history is one of the most accessible sources for students, and well-done oral history is a joy to read and use.

Archaeology/Art/Colonial/Cultural/English/Korea/Korea-Japan/Memory/Nationalism

Monumental Repatriation

Posted on March 13, 2006 by Jonathan Dresner / 0 Comment

A Korean stone memorial commemorating victories over Hideyoshi’s armies has been returned [via]

After decades of negotiations, the Bukgwan Victory Monument was driven through the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas on its circuitous journey back home. Because communist North Korea does not have formal relations with Japan, South Korean diplomats secured its return and then turned it over to their estranged neighbor.

It marks the first time that Seoul has formally intervened on Pyongyang’s behalf to recover a cultural relic, and could set a precedent for the future.

It’s good to see a cultural icon returned, but it raises all kinds of interesting and troubling issues. First, of course, is the location of the piece

Although the stone tablet was less valuable than some other artworks, its presence at a shrine that honors the souls of 2.5 million military dead including those convicted of war crimes was particularly rankling to Korean activists. South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun took up the cause during a meeting last year with Japanese President Junichiro Koizumi.

“There were a lot of psychological factors with this monument. It was about an embarrassing and humiliating defeat for the Japanese, and I think they wanted it hidden away,” said Kang Kyung-hwan, director of the Cultural Heritage Administration’s international division.

Toshiaki Nambu, the head of Yasukuni Shrine, told the media that his board never contested the return of the monument. “The monument is not ours. We are only keeping it temporarily and planning to return it,” Nambu was quoted as saying

Which has to qualify as one of the most bald-faced lies ever uttered, given that Koreans have been trying to arrange repatriation for 27 years. This is not the end, though,

This is only the starting point for a national movement to recover all that they stole from us,” said Choi Seo-myeon, the scholar, now 76, who found the pilfered monument at Yasukuni after a lengthy search.Choi and his fellow Korean scholars say the Japanese were as bad as the Nazis in Europe: Imperial forces plundered treasures during an occupation that ended only with Tokyo’s surrender to the Allies in 1945.

The items range from the exquisite — celadon vases, bronze Buddhas, gold jewelry — to the macabre. Among the latter are as many as 100,000 noses and ears that Japanese samurai sliced off Koreans as trophies during a brutal 7-year war in the late 16th century. The body parts were buried in a mound in Kyoto.

When Japan and South Korea normalized diplomatic relations in 1965, the Japanese returned more than 1,300 items. About 1,700 more have come home through private negotiations. Korean collectors have bought back some pieces on the open market, and some Japanese citizens have donated pieces. But Koreans say it is only a fraction of what remains missing.

One of the interesting questions at this point has to be whether there might be distinction, on repatriation, between items taken by governments (and their agents) by force or by seizure laws later deemed illegitimate versus those held in private hands and acquired through purchase, even under adverse economic conditions. If the latter distinction isn’t made — and the legal situation now is considerably less friendly to the export or purchase of culturally significant achaeological finds — then there will have to be a massive global repatriation out of Western museums. I’m thinking, for example, of the Museum of Fine Art, Boston, which has some astounding collections based in no small part on purchases made in the 19th century, when Japan was at an extreme economic disadvantage to the West.

[Crossposted to Frog In A Well: Japan]