WINTER QUARTER 1999 Discussion Board     Nov 17 Announcements

In this seminar we will focus on three eras in modem Japanese history, 1) the 1880's, 2) the teens into the 1920s, and 3) the decade spanning the 1980s and 1990s, as we think about how to conduct historical investigation into the relationship of love to revolution in the lives of modern Japanese women. Our definitions of love and revolution will both be broad -encompassing differing forms of intimacy and both the revolutionary policy of the Japanese state at the turn of the century and women's organized and more personal protests regarding the family-state ideology of the emperor system, and gendered presumptions of the post-war years involving such figures as the housewife and the "cutie." Our course will have a strong historiographical component as we discuss how we can use varied sources to interpret the past. As we put together a history of Japanese feminism that focuses both on how love enabled the revolutionary activity of Japanese women leaders and their followers and on how affective ties worked against political action we will discover how autobiographical writing, interviews, and even the lyrics of contemporary Japanese women rock stars can be tools aiding our investigation.

January 12 Introduction:

Japanese Women in Love and Revolution/
Japanese Women in Japanese History/
Japanese Women in History

(M) "The Good Wife of Tokyo"

(R) Geisha, by Liza Dalby.
Preface, Chptrs 1, 3, 4,5,6,7,8,9,12
 "Preface"
 1. "Sisters"
 3. "Ties That Bind"
 4. "Pontocho of Long Ago"
 5. "Geisha Renovation"
 6. "The Beginning of Things"
 7. "Generations"
 8. "Geisha Parties"
 9. "The Elusive Geisha"
 12. "Art and Life"
(remaining chptrs. optional)

Note: pay special attention to chptrs. 4-6 regarding the question of historical change

Putting the Geisha (and the "Geisha Girl') into Japanese history. How to historicize her?

January 26 People's Rights as Women's Rights: the Meiji Restoration

(R) Flowers in Salt: The Beginnings of Feminist Consciousness In Japan, by Sharon L. Sievers

 Introduction and Chptrs 1, 2, 3
  1. "Impressions, 1860"
  2. "The Early Meiji Debate on Women"
  3. "Women in the Popular Rights Movements"
  (Optional) 4. "The Textile Workers"

(R) Reflections on the Way to the Gallows, Ed. Mikiso Hane Chptr. 2. Peoples Rights and National Rights: Fukuda Hideko
(R) Recreating Japanese Women, 1600-1945, Ed. Gail Bernstein Chptr. 7: "The Meiji State's Policy Toward Women, 1890-1910," Sharon Nolte and Sally Hastings.

(H) Factorygirl song lyrics

(M) "My Love Has Been Burning"

(Optional): Christine Marran "'Poison Woman': Takahashi Oden and the Spectable of Female Deviance in Early Meiji"

Discussion Problem: How revolutionary were Meiji Women activists? In other words, what forms of resistance were possible?

February 2 Kaneko Fumiko: Love, Empire, and Revolution

(R) The Prison Memoirs of a Japanese Woman, by Kaneko Fumiko
(R) Reflections on the Way to the Gallows. Ed. Mikiso Hane

Chptr. 4. The Road to Nihilism: Kaneko Fumiko

What made Kaneko Fumiko Do What She Did? Your essay should include the interpretation(s) implied and stated by your 2 sources. Consider not only the additional material provided by the interrogation record in the Hane anthology (pp. 119-124), but the effects of two different translations. Also be sure to include an analysis of attitudes toward love (including family ties) in your discussion of Kaneko Fumiko's political views.

(R) Beauty in Disarrray, by Setouchi Harumi

(R) Flowers in Salt, Ch 8. "The Bluestockings"

(H) Blue Stocking Manifesto by Hiratsuka Raicho

(Optional), Recreating Japanese Women, Bernstein, Ed. Chpr. 8 "Yosano Akiko and the Taisho Debate over the "New Woman, by Laurel Rodd

February 16 The Modern Girl

(R) Recreating Japanese Women, Bernstein, Ed. Chptr. 11 "The Modern Girl as Militant", by Miriam Silverberg

(R) Reflections on the Way to the Gallows: Rebel Women In Prewar Japan, Ed. Mikison, Hane

Chptrs. 5, 7
Chptr. 5. "The Sekirankai
 The Red Wave Society
 Sakai Magara
 Hashiura Haruko
 Kutsumi Fusako"
 Yamakawa Kikue

Chptr. 7. "The World of the Stars"

(S) Slideshow of the Modern Era of the Sekirankai
 

Discussion Problem: How can we relate the Modern Girl to the individual Sekirankai members (and to the Sekirankai as a group) and how can we relate all of these figures to the "New Woman." (Note: you might think about the emergence of alternative attitudes toward love, including new definitions of family.)

To Live and to Write, Ed. Tanaka Yukiko

Paper II: A script -- Japanese Women In Conversation (directions to be distributed)

March 2 Takarazuka: Gender Politics, Empire and its Aftermath

(R) Takarazuka, by Jennifer Robertson

Introduction, Chptrs 3, 4, 5
Chptr. 3 Performing Empire
Chptr. 4. Pan Pathology
Chptr. 5. Writing Fans
(Optional:: Chptr. 2 for some historical context)

Discussion Problem: How does the study of Takarazuka tell us about changing notions and uses of gender ?

March 9 Japanese Feminism in the 1980s: After Ribu

(R) "Japanese Feminism in the 1970s and 1980s," by Ehara Yumiko, lU.S. Japan Women's Journal, No. 4 (January 1993)

(R) Broken Silence: Voices of Japanese Feminism, Sandra Buckley, Ed.

Aoki Yayoi: Independent Scholar and Critic
Kanazumi Fumiko, Lawyer, Women's Lawyer Cooperative
Matsui Yayori, Senior Staff Editor, Asahi Shimbun
Miya Yoshiko, Freelance Writer and Critic

(M) "Ripples of Change"

Historical Problem: What Continuities (if any) Do You See Between Pre-War and Post-War Japanese Feminist Concerns?

March 16 Housewives, Cuties, and Shonen Knife: "Tasty History"?

Broken Silence, Sandra Buckley, Ed. Nakanishi Toyoko, Owner-Manager, Shokado Women's Bookstore, Osaka

"The 'Good Wife and Wise Mother' Ideology in Post-World War I Japan," Koyama Shizuko, U.S. Japan Women's Journal, English Supplement, Number 7, 1994

"Collapse of Japanese Mothers," by Ueno Chizuko, U.S.-Japan
 Women's Journal, English Supplement, Number 10,
 1996

Women Media and Consumption In Japan, Lise Skov and Brian Moeran, Ed., Chptr. 6 "Cuties in Japan," by Sharon Kinsella

(H) Shonen Knife Interview
(H) Shonen Knife Lyrics from "Happy Hour" (1999)

(Optional) "The Emergence of the Japanese Shufu Why is a Shufu is More than a Housewife"

Historical Problem: Thinking about Spaces for Protest in Recent Japanese History. (Note: pay special attention to changing conceptions of motherhood)

Reading (all books to be purchased at UCLA book-store)
(Optional) Bernstein, Gail. Ed. Re-Creating Japanese Women
Buckley, Sandra. Ed. Broken Silence
Dalby, Liza. Geisha
Hane, Mikiso. Reflections on the Way to the Gallows
Kaneko, Fumiko. The Prison Memoirs of Japanese Woman
Robertson, Jennifer. Takarazuka: Sexual Politics and Popular Culture in Modern Japan.
Setouchi, Harumi. Beauty in Disarray
(Optional) Sievers, Sharon. Flowers in Salt: The Beginnings of Feminist Consciousness
Tanaka, Yukiko To Live and to Write

all books, assigned articles, and optional articles will be on reserve at Powell

Please Note: A knowledge of Japanese history is not required. Two textbooks are on reserve for those who wish to read up on the History:

The Rise of Modern Japan, Peter Duus.
Modern Japan: A Historical Survey, Mikiso Hane

(All films will be on reserve except for "My Love Has Been Burning")

Writing
-Two Papers (3-5 pages in length)
     Due February 2
     Due February 23

--Time-Line of the history of women in revolution in modern Japan
     (See Broken Silence Time-Line); directions in class
     (Time-Line will be grades as part of the take-home final)

-Take-home exam (due in Professor's Office March 23)

Talking
-dialogue
-discussion
-interpretation
-argument (?!)

note: grading will be based 50% (each assignment approximately 1/3 of that 50%) on written work and 50% on classroom participation. Hesitancy about speaking in front of a group will be taken into consideration and treated with respect.

"Let's have a good time. Catch Your Bus"
     -Shonen Knife (1999)

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