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Fantastic Tales in Late Imperial China & Tokugawa Japan
A review of “The Peony Lantern” and Fantastic Tales in Late Imperial China and Tokugawa Japan: Local History, Religion, and Gender, by Fumiko Jōo. On a festival night one year in mid-fourteenth...
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Japan Editor Dennis Frost Moving On
It is with gratitude, and not a little sadness, that we bid a fond farewell to Dennis Frost, who has been editing the Japan Studies series here on Dissertation Reviews for more than two years. Dennis...
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New Faces on Japan Dissertation Reviews
We are very excited to welcome two new editors to “Japan Studies Dissertation Reviews,” Akiko Takenaka (University of Kentucky) and Niels van Steenpaal (University of Tokyo), as we bid a very fond...
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The Ishii Brothers’ Vendetta in Genroku Japan
A review of The Violent Virtue: First Narratives of the Ishii Brothers’ Late Genroku Katakiuchi, by Drake Langford. Drake Langford’s dissertation examines multiple iterations of the story of the Ishii...
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Proto-Genbun Itchi in Edo & Early Meiji
A review of A Heteroglossic Theory of Proto-Genbun Itchi in Edo and Early Meiji Writings, by Kelly J. Hansen. Historians and historiographers of modern Japanese literature have long debated the...
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Fragile Kinships & Child Welfare in Japan
A review of Fragile Kinships: Family Ideologies and Child Welfare in Japan, by Kathryn Goldfarb. It is to Kathryn Goldfarb’s credit that her dissertation includes a series of emotionally difficult...
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National Diet Library & Waseda University Library, Tokyo
A review of Modern Japanese Political History Materials, National Diet Library, Tokyo and Special Collections Room, Waseda University Library, Tokyo. The research I have been conducting in Tokyo for...
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Taiko Drumming in North America
A review of Drumming Asian America: Performing Race, Gender, and Sexuality in North American Taiko, by Angela Kristine Ahlgren. Drumming Asian America: Performing Race, Gender, and Sexuality in North...
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Another Tale of the Heike
A review of Another Tale of the Heike: An Examination of the Engyōbon Heike monogatari, by Amy Christine Franks. Amy Franks’s meticulously researched and persuasively written dissertation is a study...
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Harvard Yenching Library Rare Books Collection
A review of the Harvard Yenching Library Rare Books Collection, Harvard University, Cambridge MA, USA. The Harvard-Yenching Library holds more than 1.3 million volumes. This review won’t bore readers...
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Colonialism, Gender & Okinawa in Modern Japan
A review of Performing Embodied Histories: Colonialism, Gender, and Okinawa in Modern Japan, by Valerie Holshouser Barske. Divided into six chapters with an Epilogue and Appendix, Valerie Barske’s...
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Japanese Colonial Tourism in Manchuria, Korea & Taiwan
A review of The Boundaries of the Interesting: Itineraries, Guidebooks, and Travel in Imperial Japan, by Kate L. McDonald. In a beautifully written dissertation, Kate McDonald tells a story of...
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Eiko & Koma: Choreographing Spaces
A review of Eiko and Koma: Choreographing Spaces Apart in Asian America by Rosemary Candelario. Rosemary Candelario’s dissertation, Eiko and Koma: Choreographing Spaces Apart in Asian America,...
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Our Japan Studies Series
The fourth season of Dissertation Reviews begins this Fall and, as always, we are bringing you plenty of fresh reviews of recently filed dissertations, latest updates on archives and libraries, and...
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Japanese Children’s Literature 17-19c
A review of Visualizing the Child: Japanese Children’s Literature in the Age of Woodblock Print, 1678-1888, by Kristin Holly Williams. Although certainly not spoiled with attention, the early modern...
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Male Sexuality in Japan’s Prostitution Debate
A review of From the Brothel, to the Body: The Relocation of Male Sexuality in Japan’s Prostitution Debate, 1870-1920, by Craig Colbeck. Craig Colbeck’s dissertation is an historical investigation of...
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Chinese Literary Studies & Waka Studies
A review of Ōe no Masafusa and the Convergence of the “Ways”: The Twilight of Early Chinese Literary Studies and the Rise of Waka Studies, by Saeko Shibayama. During the insei 院政 period (1086-1221) of...
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Chinese Vernacular Fiction in 18th-c. Japan
A review of Locating China in Time and Space: Engagement with Chinese Vernacular Fiction in Eighteenth-Century Japan, by William Christopher Hedberg. William Hedberg’s dissertation considers a diverse...
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Spain, China & Japan in Manila 1571-1644
A review of When Political Economies Meet: Spain, China and Japan in Manila, ca. 1571-1644, by Birgit Magdalena Tremml. Birgit Magdalena Tremml’s study on the encounter between the “political...
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Clocks & Time in Edo Japan
A review of Clocks and Time in Edo Japan, by Yulia Frumer. The logic of mechanical clock faces is seemingly obvious. We look at them several times a day never questioning their rationality despite the...
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