- Department: History
- Credit value: 40 credits
- Credit level: H
- Academic year of delivery: 2022-23
One of the most enduring tropes about Japan is that it is a homogenous society characterised by a unique blend of ancient traditions and hypermodernity. Geisha and castles are juxtaposed with robots and bullet trains in journalistic accounts, tourism materials, and popular culture. By focusing on supposedly unique elements of Japanese culture, this portrayal often obscures the fact that modern Japan developed through an extensive engagement with the rest of the world. Understandings and uses of the past played an important role in this process. Between 1895 and 1945, Japan built a diverse, multi-ethnic empire that rivalled and threatened those of the Western powers. The fifty years of imperial expansion into Asia that dramatically changed the societies of Japan and the countries it occupied, and have had a lasting global impact.
This module examines the development of Japanese society from the late nineteenth century to the Second World War through a range of primary and secondary materials. We will consider especially how the past was used to construct new identities, and how ideas of gender, race, and nation were contested and disseminated within Japan, in spheres including culture, religion, politics, sport, and the military. We will explore these developments in light of Japan’s relationship with the wider world. As was the case with other imperial powers, even as Japan was constructing its empire, the empire was simultaneously constructing Japan.
Occurrence | Teaching period |
---|---|
A | Autumn Term 2022-23 to Spring Term 2022-23 |
The aims of this module are:
Students who complete this module successfully will:
Teaching Programme:
Students will attend a 1-hour briefing in week 1 of the autumn term. Students prepare for and participate in fifteen three-hour seminars. These take place in weeks 2-5 and 7-9 of the autumn term and weeks 2-5 and 7-10 of the spring term. Both the autumn and spring terms include a reading week for final year students and so there will be no teaching in week 6. There will also be a two hour revision session in the summer term. One-to-one meetings will also be held to discuss the assessed essay.
Seminar topics are subject to variation, but are likely to include the following:
Autumn Term
Japan in 1890
Throwing off Asia
Becoming Samurai
Rural Life and Emigration
Religion and the Empire
Constructing Colonies
Democracy and Militarism
Spring Term
(Re)building Japan
Sporting Identity
Modern Girls
Touring the Empire
Industrial Imperialism
Exceptional Times
Defeat and Occupation
The Afterlife of Empire
Task | % of module mark |
---|---|
Essay/coursework | 50 |
Online Exam - 24 hrs (Centrally scheduled) | 50 |
None
For formative assessment, students will be given the opportunity to do two practice gobbets and then are required to write a 2,000-word procedural essay relating to the themes and issues of the module in either the autumn or spring term.
For summative assessment, students complete a 4,000-word essay which utilises an analysis of primary source materials to explore a theme or topic relating to the module, due in week 5 of the summer term.
They then take a 24-hour online examination for summative assessment in the summer term assessment period comprising: one essay question relating to themes and issues, but showing an awareness of the pertinent sources that underpin these AND one ‘gobbet’ question (where students attempt two gobbets from a slate of eight).
The essay and exam are weighted equally at 50% each.
Task | % of module mark |
---|---|
Essay/coursework | 50 |
Online Exam - 24 hrs (Centrally scheduled) | 50 |
Following their formative assessment task, students will typically receive written feedback that will include comments and a mark within 10 working days of submission.
Work will be returned to students in their discussion groups and may be supplemented by the tutor giving some oral feedback to the whole group. All students are encouraged, if they wish, to discuss the feedback on their procedural work with their tutor (or module convenor) during student hours. For more information, see the Statement on Feedback.
For the summative assessment task, students will receive their provisional mark and written feedback within 20 working days of the submission deadline. The tutor will then be available during student hours for follow-up guidance if required. For more information, see the Statement of Assessment.
For term time reading, please refer to the module VLE site. Before the course starts, we encourage you to look at the following items of preliminary reading:
Gordon, Andrew. A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014.
Walthall, Anne. The Human Tradition in Modern Japan. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002.
Benesch, Oleg. Inventing the Way of the Samurai: Nationalism, Internationalism, and Bushido in Modern Japan. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014