Reconfiguring Modernity
Concepts of Nature in Japanese Political Ideology
1st Edition
Will be published approx. on 8. January 2002
Book
Hardback
254 pages
978-0-520-22854-2 (ISBN)
Description
Julia Adeney Thomas turns the concept of nature into a powerful analytical lens through which to view Japanese modernity, bringing the study of both Japanese history and political modernity to a new level of clarity. She shows that nature necessarily functions as a political concept and that changing ideas of nature's political authority were central during Japan's transformation from a semifeudal world to an industrializing colonial empire. In political documents from the nineteenth to the early twentieth century, nature was redefined, moving from the universal, spatial concept of the Tokugawa period, through temporal, social Darwinian ideas of inevitable progress and competitive struggle, to a celebration of Japan as a nation uniquely in harmony with nature. The so-called traditional 'Japanese love of nature' masks modern state power. Thomas' theoretically sophisticated study rejects the supposition that modernity is the ideological antithesis of nature, overcoming the determinism of the physical environment through technology and liberating denatured subjects from the chains of biology and tradition.
In making 'nature' available as a critical term for political analysis, this book yields new insights into prewar Japan's failure to achieve liberal democracy, as well as an alternative means of understanding modernity and the position of non-Western nations within it.
In making 'nature' available as a critical term for political analysis, this book yields new insights into prewar Japan's failure to achieve liberal democracy, as well as an alternative means of understanding modernity and the position of non-Western nations within it.
More details
Series
Edition
First Edition
Language
English
Place of publication
Berkerley
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Cloth over boards
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 25 mm
Weight
544 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-520-22854-2 (9780520228542)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
01/2002
1st Edition
Naval Institute Press
€56.99
Available for download
Person
Julia Adeney Thomas is Associate Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame and winner of the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians' award for best article of 1999.
Content
Preface Acknowledgments Note on Transliteration 1. Introduction: The Trouble with Nature Objections Justifications Outline of Nature's Political History in Japan 2. The Topographical Imagination of Tokugawa Politics Mental Maps China as Imperial Center Japan's Imperial Center Rural Centers Centers of Learning Divorce Proceedings: Space versus Time 3. Early Meiji's Contentious Natures Natural Forms of Contention: Laws and Bodies The Historiography of Meiji Ideologies Nature's Indeterminate Determinism 4. Kato Hiroyuki: Turning Nature into Time Kato Hiroyuki and Tenko Shinsei tai'i and Kokutai shinron Jinken shinsetsu The Reaction to Jinken shinsetsu 5. Baba Tatsui: Natural Laws and Willful Natures The Equilibrium of Forces in Nature and History The Death Wishes of Baba Tatsui and Herbert Spencer Tenpu jinkenron: The Reply to Kato Catalyzing Nature: The Role of Will in Baba's Social Evolution 6. Ueki Emori: Singing the Body Electric The Basic Body of Tenpu jinkenben The Political Problems of Ueki's Bodies A Dance of Loneliness 7. The Acculturation of Japanese Nature Social Evolution's Victory Social Evolution's Defeat: The Political Inadequacy of a Progressive Cosmopolis Nature as Japanese Culture: Bringing the Outside In The Last Vestiges of Social Darwinism 8. Ultranational Nature: Dead Time and Dead Space Shinto's National Nature Economizing Nature Educating the National Family World-Historical Nature 9. Conclusion: Natural Freedom Index