Modern Japan

Prof. Edwin E. Moise
Office: Hardin 102
Cell Phone: 650-8845
e-mail: eemoise@clemson.edu

Messages can be left in my mailbox in Hardin 126, or in the box on my office door.

Office Hours: I will try to be in my office at the following hours, but it won't always be possible. On the other hand, I will be in my office, and available to you, for much more of the week than my official office hours. E-mail me, or just check and see if my door is open.

    Monday                  2:30-3:20
    Tuesday    11:00-12:00, 2:00-3:15
    Wednesday  10:10-11:00, 2:30-3:20
    Thursday   (none)
    Friday     (none) 

Course Objectives

Learning Objectives

• Students will be required to think about, and formulate and justify opinions on, in a short paper and on tests, the extent to which Japan was westernized from the 1860s onward, and the ways this occurred.
• Students will write papers analyzing the way Japan was perceived, with particular emphasis on possible biases in those perceptions, during various recent historical periods. These papers will be based on contemporary sources.

What goes into your grade

I do not emphasize trivial factual details in this course. On tests and quizzes I will NOT ask you to name the Prime Ministers who served during the 1950's, much less tell me the exact dates they served. There are some facts you need to know, but they are more important things than names and dates.

The written work will be:
    --Three short papers, on assigned topics, worth 40 points each, two of which will be newspaper research exercises.
    --A test (70 points) and the final exam (120 points), which will be mostly essay questions.
    --One minor essay quiz, which will be announced in advance. 20 points.

This adds up to 330 points. I use a 90%, 80%, 70% scale, sometimes modified in favor of students but never against them. In other words, 297 points (90% of 330) is guaranteed to be an A, 264 points is guaranteed to be a B, 231 points is guaranteed to be a C. But 295 or 294 points might quite possibly become an A, depending on how the class as a whole is doing.

Any student who has an average of 90% or better, for work up to the final exam, will be permitted to exempt the final.

Academic Integrity Policy

Academic integrity requires that we not try to pass other people's work off as our own.

As far as I can recall, I have not caught any students committing plagiarism in this course, in past years. But experience with plagiarism in other courses at Clemson suggests that if there were to be a plagiarism case in this course, it would probably take the form of one student copying another student's 40-point short paper, maybe changing a few words and substituting synonyms, but leaving the two papers still so similar that it is obvious the resemblance could not be coincidence. I would be likely to bring charges both against the student who copied and the student who allowed his or her paper to be copied.

There are some ways in which it is perfectly all right for student to help each other. If two students want to study together getting ready for a test, great. Only if help were still being given after I had handed out the questions would the help become improper. But if two people work together on a newspaper research exercise, and turn in papers that are very similar because each has been getting a lot of help from the other in writing it, both will be in deep trouble. If one of your fellow students asks to look at your paper, to get a better idea of how the assignment was to be done, please say no. They should come to me to ask for further explanations of the assignment, rather than looking at a completed paper to give them their clues. If too papers are so similar it is obvious the author of one must have seen the other, I will file charges.

Disability Access Statement

Students with disabilities requesting accommodations should make an appointment with Dr. Margaret Camp (656-6848), Director of Disability Services, to discuss specific needs within the first month of classes. Students should present a Faculty Accommodation Letter from Student Disability Services when they meet with instructors. Accommodations are not retroactive and new Faculty Accommodation Letters must be presented each semester.

Title IX (Sexual Harassment) Statement

Clemson University is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender, pregnancy, national origin, age, disability, veteran's status, genetic information or protected activity in employment, educational programs and activities, admissions and financial aid. This includes a prohibition against sexual harassment and sexual violence as mandated by Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. This policy is located at http://www.clemson.edu/campus-life/campus-services/access/title-ix/. Mr. Jerry Knighton is the Clemson University Title IX Coordinator. He also is the Director of Access and Equity. His office is located at 110 Holtzendorff Hall, 864.656.3181 (voice) or 864.565.0899 (TDD).

Policy on late work

Attendance policy

If I am Late

If Class Is Cancelled Due To Weather

Assigned reading

There will also be reading that I ask you to do online.

Course Outline

The following course outline is tentative. It may be modified slightly because of unexpected events. Items marked >>> are required reading.

January 6: Introduction to the course.

January 8: Traditional Japanese Civilization
>>> Gordon, pp. 3-9
>>> Hane, pp. 3-9

January 11: Japan under Tokugawa Rule
>>> Gordon, pp. 11-34

January 13: The Western Impact
>>> Gordon, pp. 35-57

January 15: The "Meiji Restoration"
>>> Gordon, pp. 57-75

January 18 NO CLASS

January 20: Initial modernization and reactions to it
>>> Gordon, pp. 76-95. (If you have seen the Tom Cruise film "The Last Samurai," notice that the events on which the film was based are covered on pp. 84-85 of Gordon.)

January 22: Rural Life
>>> Hane, pp. 9-33

January 25: Rural Life, continued
>>> Hane, pp. 33-62

                January 25: Quiz

January 27: Rural life, continued; Rural women
>>> Hane, pp. 62-101

January 29, February 1: Urban Life
>>> Gordon, pp. 95-112
>>> Hane, pp. 172-205

February 3: The Growth of the Japanese Empire
>>> Gordon, pp. 113-137

Short paper due February 3. Topic: To what extent had Japan been westernized, by the early 20th century? Length: about 500 words, or more. Obviously, some Japanese had become much more westernized than others, and they had become more westernized in some ways than in other ways. Your essay should consist MOSTLY of discussion of particular ways that particular groups had or had not become westernized. Please do not waste a lot of words on an overall definition of westernization, or on discussion of whether the Japanese people, as a whole, had or had not become westernized. You can focus on the common people, or on the elites, or you can deal with both.

February 5: Rural poverty
>>> Hane, pp. 103-136

February 8: Outcastes
>>> Hane, pp. 138-71

February 10: Poverty and Prostitution; begin the story of woman rebel Ito Noe
>>> Hane, pp. 206-225, 247-52

February 12: Women Rebels, continued
>>> Hane, pp. 252-292

February 15: Economy and Society
>>> Gordon, pp. 139-160

February 17: Coal Miners; review
>>> Hane, pp. 227-245

  TEST February 19

February 22: Politics and International Relations in the 1920s
>>> Gordon, pp. 161-180

February 24: The Depression and the rise of Japanese militarism
>>> Gordon, pp. 181-201

February 26: The Second World War.
>>> Gordon, pp. 202-215

February 29: The Second World War, continued
>>> Gordon, pp. 215-223
>>> Schlesinger, pp. 19-30

March 2, 4: The American Occupation of Japan
>>> Gordon, pp. 224-241
>>> Schlesinger, pp. 30-45

March 7, 9: The New Japan
>>> Gordon, pp. 243-67
>>> Schlesinger, pp. 46-58
>>> Hane, pp. 295-320

March 11: Politics in the New Japan
>>> Gordon, pp. 268-284

SPRING BREAK

March 21: The Cold War in Asia

March 21: Short paper . Newspaper research exercise. Go to the library or go online, and check to see what one or two newspapers or newsmagazines were saying about Japan in 1965. You can deal with Japanese internal affairs, Japanese opinions of international affairs, or both. Use at least four substantial articles (please do not use very short articles, unless you find one that is exceptionally interesting). Write an essay of about two pages (typed double spaced), or more, about what you found. Say what there was in the articles that you found interesting or surprising. Evaluate the attitudes of the authors. Is there anything that leads you to distrust them, or to think that the facts may be being distorted to fit the author's viewpoint? Notice the source; did the reporter say that something was true, or only that somebody else had said it was true? If you say there is bias, please make it clear exactly what was said, that you consider biased. What kind of bias was it (false statements, or use of emotionally loaded language, or just careful selection of facts so that only facts favorable to one side get mentioned)? I want to see one essay based on several articles, not a string of essentially separate mini-essays, each based on a single article. Try to select articles that will allow you to have some unifying themes in your essay.

Please give source notes. I want to be able to tell in each section of your paper which article or articles you are discussing in that section. It is not enough to have a list at the end, if I can't tell as I read the paper which article you are discussing where. Source notes must give page numbers. I don't care about the format of source notes as long as they tell me what I need to know. Any format that allows me easily to discern the name of the author if it was given, the title of the article, the title of the publication, and the date and page, is OK.

There is no requirement that you use The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, or The Times of London, but those papers have the advantage that you can access them online through the Clemson Library's Databases Page. If you want to use newspapers other than those, your best bet is to go to the Microfilm Reading Room on level 2 of the Library, which has quite a few newspapers on microfilm. Or you could use weekly newsmagazines. Some are available bound into volumes, on the shelves on level 1 of the library. The only weekly newsmagazine whose back files are available online, so far as I know, is Time. You can get to it by going through the Clemson Library's online catalog.

March 23: Kakuei Tanaka and his political machine
>>> Schlesinger, pp. 59-90.

March 25, 28: The Strange Victory of Kakuei Tanaka
>>> Schlesinger, Part II

March 30: The Bubble of the 1980s
>>> Gordon, pp. 285-307

April 1: Japan in the 1980s; the changing international environment

April 4, 6: The Second Generation of the Gundan
>>> Schlesinger, Part III

April 8: Major problems for the economy
>>> Gordon, pp. 308-322

April 11: The Gundan in decay
>>> Schlesinger, pp. 229-264

April 13: The possibility of political change?
>>> Gordon, pp. 322-329.
>>> Schlesinger, pp. 264-285

April 15: Aftermath
>>> Gordon, pp. 329-335.

April 18: Hand in short paper . Newspaper research exercise. Go to the library or on the Internet and check to see what one or two newspapers or newsmagazines have been saying about events in Japan in 2016. Use at least four articles. Write an essay of about two pages (typed double spaced), or more, about what you found. Say what there was in the articles that you found interesting or surprising. Evaluate the attitudes of the authors. Is there anything that leads you to distrust them, or to think that the facts may be being distorted to fit the author's viewpoint? Notice the source; did the reporter say that something was true, or only that somebody else had said it was true? If you say there is bias, please make it clear exactly what was said, that you consider biased. What kind of bias was it (false statements, or use of emotionally loaded language, or just careful selection of facts so that only facts favorable to one side get mentioned)? I want to see one essay based on several articles, not a string of essentially separate mini-essays, each based on a single article. Try to select articles that will allow you to have some unifying themes in your essay.

Please give source notes. I want to be able to tell in each section of your paper which article or articles you are discussing in that section. It is not enough to have a list at the end, if I can't tell as I read the paper which article you are discussing where. Source notes must give page numbers if they are available (even when you read a newspaper article online, the web site will usually tell you what the page number was in the newspaper). I don't care about the format of source notes as long as they tell me what I need to know. Any format that allows me easily to discern the name of the author if that was given, the title of the article, the title of the publication, the date and page, and where you found it on the Internet if that is where you found it, is OK.

April 20: Japan since 2008
>>> Gordon, pp. 336-354.
>>> Matt Alt, Japan's Cute Army, New Yorker magazine, November 30, 2015.

April 22: Review

FINAL EXAM Tuesday, April 26, 8:00 a.m.

Other Links

Web site of the Perry-Castaneda Library Map Collection at the University of Texas

Clemson University Academic Success Center, which provides help and tutoring for students encountering academic problems. It does not, however, have tutors specifically for History courses.

The Nikkei 225, Japan's equivalent of the Dow-Jones Average.

Edwin Moïse's homepage

Regional geography

Revised March 8, 2016.