History 14                                                        

Fall 2006

                       

 

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF JAPAN

 

 

 日本史入門

 

 

Lecture hours: TuTh 3:30-5pm

Room: 219 Dwinelle

 

Instructor:  Andrew E. Barshay

Office: 2216 Dwinelle Hall, 642-3121

Office Hours: TuTh 2-3pm

E-mail: abars@berkeley.edu

 

 

I.  Course requirements

Students are to attend all lectures, including films, as scheduled below.  Please note that syllabus is subject to change.  Section meetings are an integral part of the course, and of your grade.  Persistent absence from section meetings will have consequences too awful to contemplate. 

 

Exams:

         mid-term examination (15% of grade), 10/12 (Tu)        

         final examination (25% of grade), 12/19 (Tu), 12:30-3:30

Writing assignments:

         one paper, approximately six-seven pages (20% of grade)     reading reports on section assignments, one-two pages each (typed, double-spaced), on five occasions throughout the term (these + section participation = 40% of grade).  The format, content, and due dates of these assignments will be discussed in section meetings.

 

 

II.  Course texts

The following books (all paperback) are available for purchase:

 

W. G. BEASLEY, The Japanese Experience (UC Press)

MIYABE Miyuki, All She Was Worth (Houghton/Mifflin)

NATSUME Sseki, The Heredity of Taste (Tuttle)

Kenneth RUOFF, Peoples Emperor: Democracy and the Japanese Monarchy

(Harvard University Press)

Thomas C. SMITH, Native Sources of Japanese Industrialization (UC

Press)

Pierre Franois SOUYRI, A World Turned Upside Down: Medieval Japanese

Society (Columbia University Press)

 

In addition, a Course Reader is available through Copy Central, 2560 Bancroft, 848-8649.

 

All course readings will be on closed reserve (2 hrs.) at Moffitt Undergraduate Library. 

 

III.    Course Outline

 

Note: Readings followed by asterisks** are in the Course Reader

 

Week #/ Date                  Lecture Topic / Reading

 

 

1 /    8-29 (Tu)              Administrative stuff

 

         8-31 (Th)              Introductory: When does (Japanese)                                                         history begin?

                                    Beasley, Japanese Experience (JE), preface

                                   

2 /     9-5 (Tu)               Ancient Society: Basic Patterns

                                    Beasley, JE, 1-18

      

         9-7 (Th)               The Myth of Origins

                                    D. Philippi, tr., Kojiki, excerpts** 

 

3 /     9-12 (Tu)              Japan and the Continent (1): The Ritsury State

                                    "Impact of Chinese Civilization"**

                                    Beasley, JE, 19-34

                                     

         9-14 (Th)              Japan and the Continent (2): Buddhism

                                    "The Introduction of Buddhism"** 

                                    W. Aston, tr. Nihongi, excerpts**

                                    Beasley, JE, 41-60

 

       NOTE: BEGIN READING SOUYRI, A WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN

 

4 /     9-19 (Tu)              Nara to Heian: Culture and/as Politics

                                    G. Sansom, "The Rule of Taste"** 

                                    Beasley, JE, 34-40, 61-77

 

         9-21 (Th)              The Karmic Chain

                           M. Ury, tr., Tales of Times Now Past,

                           selections**

                                    Kamo no Chmei, "Account of My Hut"**     

 

5 /     9-26 (Tu)              The Origins and Development of Warrior Rule

                                    Souyri, World Turned Upside Down, 1-64

                                    Beasley, JE, 78-97

 

         9-28 (Th)              Medieval Buddhism: A Japanese                                                                Reformation?

                                    Souyri, World Turned Upside Down, 65-160

                                    Shinran, Tannish (Lamentations over Heresy)** 

                                    Beasley, JE, 98-115

                                     

6 /     10-3 (Tu)              Sengoku: Violence and Culture

                                    Souyri, World Turned Upside Down, 161-217

                                    Beasley, JE, 116-22

 

         10-5 (Th)              Unification

                                    European impressions of the Unifiers** 

                                    Beasley, JE, 122-28

                                     

7 /     10-10 (Tu)            The Kirishitan episode and its                                                               Aftereffects

                                    European writings on Japanese religion and                                             persecution of Christianity** 

                                    Anon., "Instructions on Martyrdom"**  

                                    Kirishitan monogatari, selections**

                                    Beasley, JE, 134-51

                                     

         10-12 (Th)            MIDTERM 

 

8 /     10-17 (Tu)            The Tokugawa Settlement: Transformations                                                Intended and Unintended  

                                    "The Tokugawa Peace"**  

                                    Beasley, JE, 128-33, 152-61, 171-87

      

         10-19  (Th)           Tokugawa as Early Modern

T. C. Smith, The Land Tax in the Tokugawa Period and kura Nagatsune and the

                  Technologists, in Native Sources of Japanese

                  Industrialization (NS)

                                    Ann Walthall, "The Life Cycle of Farm Women in                                       Tokugawa Japan"** 

                                            

9 /     10-24 (Tu)            Tokugawa Society: through a Literary Frame

 

         10-26 (Th)            NO CLASS

T. C. Smith, Merit as Ideology in the Tokugawa Period

 

10/     10-31 (Tu)            The End of Tokugawa: Process and Legacy

                                    T.C. Smith, The Discontented, in NS

                                    Beasley, JE, 188-209

                                     

         11-2  (Th)            The Meiji Restoration

T. C. Smith, "Japan's Aristocratic Revolution," in NS         

                                    Beasley, JE, 210-25

                                                                                                           

    NOTE: BEGIN READING RUOFF, PEOPLES EMPEROR

 

                                     

11/     11-7  (Tu)            The Modern Emperor System             

                             It Hirobumi, "Reminiscences of the Grant of

                             the New Constitution"** 

                             Meiji Constitution (1889)**

                                    Uchimura Kanz, selections** 

                                    Beasley, JE, 225-29

 

         11-9  (Th)            Empire

                                    Sseki, The Heredity of Taste

                                    Beasley, JE, 230-40

                                     

12/     11-14  (Tu)           Japanese modern 

                             Jay Rubin, "Sseki on Individualism" and

Natsume Sseki, "My Individualism"**

T.C. Smith, "The Right to Benevolence," in NS 

                             Laurel Rasplica Rodd, "Yosano Akiko and the                                    Taish Debate over the 'New Woman'"**

 

         11-16  (Th)           The 1930s                                        

                                    Mishima Yukio, "Patriotism"**

                                    Beasley, JE, 241-46 (para. 1)

                                   

                                                                                

 NOTE: BEGIN READING MIYABE, ALL SHE WAS WORTH

 

 

13/     11-21  (Tu)           The Pacific War

                                    Maruyama Masao, "Theory and Psychology of                                              Ultranationalism"**

                                    Beasley, JE, 246-50

                                     

         11-23  (Th)           THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY

 

14/     11-28 (Tu)            Defeat and Occupation

                                    1946 Constitution**

                                    Ruoff, Peoples Emperor,

                                    Beasley, JE, 251-57

 

         11-30 (Th)            Shwa Genroku

                                    Ruoff, Peoples Emperor,

                                    Beasley, JE, 257-68

                                     

15/     12-5 (Tu)              Japan Since You Were Born

                                    Miyabe, All She Was Worth

                                     

         12-7 (Th)              Course review


History 14

Fall 2006

 

Reader--Table of Contents

 

 

1.  Kojiki, excerpts, D. PHILIPPI, tr.  (Tokyo UP, 1968), pp. 37-86.

 

2.  Nihongi, excerpts, W. ASTON, tr. (George Allen and Unwin, 1956), pp. 121-56.

 

3.  "The Introduction of Buddhism," from W.T. de BARY, W. CHAN and B. WATSON, comp., Sources of Chinese Tradition (Columbia UP), vol. 1, pp. 266-72.

 

4.  "Impact of Chinese Civilization," from D. J. LU, comp., Sources of Japanese History, vol. 1  (McGraw-Hill, 1974), pp. 19-35.

 

5.  George SANSOM, "The Rule of Taste," from A History of Japan to 1334 (Stanford UP, 1963), pp. 178-96.

 

6.  KAMO NO CHMEI, "Account of My Hut," tr. D. KEENE, from D. KEENE, ed. Anthology of Japanese Literature (Columbia UP), pp. 197-212.

 

7.  The Tale of the Heike, tr. H. McCULLOUGH (Stanford UP, 1988), selections.

 

8.  Text of Tannish, from Tannish: A Primer, tr. D. HIROTA (Kyoto: Ryukoku UP), pp. 21-45.

 

9.  MONGAKU, "Prayers for the Shogun," in R. TSUNODA, W.T. deBARY and D. KEENE, comp., Sources of Japanese Tradition (Columbia UP), vol. 1, pp. 165-71.

 

10.  Europeans writings on Japan, from M. COOPER, comp., They Came to Japan: An Anthology of European Reports on Japan, 1543-1640 (UC Press, 1965).

 

11.  ANON., "Instructions on Martyrdom," tr. A. BARSHAY, from Barshay, "Commitment and Denial: Aspects of the Suppression of Christianity in Tokugawa Japan," UCB Masters Thesis, 1980, pp. 93-97.

 

12.  "Kirishitan monogatari--An Anonymous Chapbook," trans. in George Elison, Deus Destroyed: The Image of Christianity in Early Modern Japan (Harvard UP, 1973), pp. 321-74, 475-88.

 

13.  "The Tokugawa Peace," from D. J. LU, comp., Sources of Japanese History, vol. 1  (McGraw-Hill, 1974), pp. 199-220.

 

14.  Ann Walthall, "The Life Cycle of Farm Women in Tokugawa Japan," from Recreating Japanese Women, ed. G. Bernstein (UC Press, 1991), pp. 42-70. 

 

15.  IT Hirobumi, "Reminiscences of the Grant of the New Constitution," in KUMA, ed. Fifty Years of New Japan (Dutton, 1909), volume I, pp. 122-32.

 

16.  UCHIMURA Kanz, "Justification of the Corean War" (1894) and other selections from The Complete Works of Kanzo Uchimura (Kyobunkwan, 1973).

 

17.  Jay RUBIN, "Sseki on Individualism" and NATSUME Sseki, "My Individualism," Monumenta Nipponica 34, no. 1 (1979).

 

18.  Laurel Rasplica RODD, "Yosano Akiko and the Taish Debate over the 'New Woman'," in Recreating Japanese Women, pp. 175-98.

 

19.  Yukio MISHIMA, "Patriotism," in id., Death in Midsummer and Others Stories, tr. M. WEATHERBY (New Directions), pp. 93-118.

 

20.  Masao MARUYAMA, "Theory and Psychology of Ultranationalism" (1946), in id., Thought and Behviour in Modern Japanese Politics (Oxford UP, 1963), pp. 1-23.  

 

21.  Text of Japan's Two Constitutions (1889 and 1946).