Japan’s nationalist right have used the internet to organize offline activism in increasingly visible ways. Hall investigates the role of internet-mediated activism in Japan’s ongoing historical and territorial disputes. He explores the emergence of two right-wing activist organizations, Nihon Bunka Channel Sakura and Ganbare Nippon, which have played a significant role in pressure campaigns against Japanese media outlets, campaigns to influence historical memorials, and campaigns to assert Japan’s territorial claim to the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands. Taking a multi-disciplinary approach, he analyses how activists maintained cohesion, raised funds, held protests that regularly drew hundreds to thousands of participants, and used fishing boats to land activists on disputed islands. Detailing events that took place between 2004 and 2020, he demonstrates how skilled social actors built cohesive grassroots protest organizations through the creation of shared meaning for their organization and its supporters. A valuable read both for scholars seeking insight into the dynamics surrounding Japan’s history disputes and territorial issues, as well as those seeking to compare Japanese right-wing internet activism with its counterparts elsewhere.

Jews in Japan: Presence and Perception. Antisemitism, Philosemitism and International Relations is a study on the history of real and imagined Jews in Japan, which discusses the little known cultural, political and economic ties between Jews and Japan, and follows the evolution of Jewish stereotypes in Japan in the last century and a half. The book begins with the arrival of Jews and their image in late 19th to early 20th-century Japan, when the seeds of later stereotyped visions were sown. The discussion then focuses on wartime Japan, delving into the complex and mixed attitudes of the Japanese Empire toward Jews. In postwar Japan, the partial reception of the Holocaust intertwined with earlier antisemitic and philosemitic manifestations, resulting in instances of both hatred and admiration toward Jews. Finally, the book explores the recent reframing of Japanese-Jewish historical encounters within the context of the growing ties between Japan and Israel. This study sheds new light on the little explored relations between Jews and Japan, offering thought-provoking insights into the coexistence of antisemitism and philosemitism, the political and diplomatic uses of Jewish history, and the perpetuation of Jewish stereotypes in a land devoid of a local Jewish population.

This handbook explores trauma in East Asia from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, assessing how victims, perpetrators and societies have responded to such experiences and to what extent the legacies still resonate today. Mapping the trauma-scape of East Asia from an interdisciplinary perspective, including anthropologists, historians, film and literary critics, scholars of law, media and education, political scientists and sociologists, this book significantly enhances understandings of the region’s traumatic pasts and how those memories have since been suppressed, exhumed, represented and disputed. In Asia’s contested memory-scape there is much at stake for perpetrators, their victims and heirs to their respective traumas. The scholarly research in this volume examines the silencing and distortion of traumatic pasts and sustained efforts to interrogate denial and impunity in the search for accountability. Addressing collective traumas from across East Asia (China, Hong Kong, Japan, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Vietnam), this book is a valuable resource for students and scholars of Trauma and Memory Studies, Asian Studies and Contemporary Asian History more broadly.

Bringing together two voices, practice and theory, in a collaboration that emerges from lived experience and structured reflection upon that experience, O’Mochain and Ueno show how entrenched discursive forces exert immense influence in Japanese society and how they might be most effectively challenged. With a psychosocial framework that draws insights from feminism, sociology, international studies, and political psychology, the authors pinpoint the motivations of the nativist right and reflect on the change of conditions that is necessary to end cultures of impunity for perpetrators of sexual abuse in Japan. Evaluating the value of the #MeToo model of activism, the authors offer insights that will encourage victims to come out of the shadows, pursue justice, and help transform Japan’s sense of identity both at home and abroad. Ueno, a female Japanese educator and O’Mochain, a non-Japanese male academic, examine the nature of sexual abuse problems both in educational contexts and in society at large through the use of surveys, interviews, and engagement with an eclectic range of academic literature. They identify the groups within society who offer the least support for women who pursue justice against perpetrators of sexual abuse. They also ask if far-right ideological extremists are fixated with proving that so called “comfort women” are higaisha-buru or “fake victims.” Japan would have much to gain on the international stage were it to fully acknowledge historical crimes of sexual violence, yet it continues to refuse to do so. O’Mochain and Ueno shed light on this puzzling refusal through recourse to the concepts of ‘international status anxiety’ and ‘male hysteria.’ An insightful read for scholars of Japanese society, especially those concerned about its treatment of women.

Hashtag Activism Interrogated and Embodied analyzes the ways that hashtags repurpose and reclaim societal narratives, considering how these digital interactions carry over into external spaces and are embodied by both participants and spectators alike. A diverse set of contributors from a range of disciplines utilize a variety of methodologies to interrogate the lifespan and trajectories of specific hashtag campaigns, study rhetorical strategies engaged by online communities, and analyze how hashtags are employed for particular purposes. The chapters capture twenty-first-century digital activism unfolding in different social and geopolitical climates. Delving into hashtag activism in various forms (tweets, memes, and personal narratives) and spaces (Twitter, Facebook, and in-person protests), these chapters reveal how participants question and construct online and offline identities and imagined and actualized communities. They also showcase the complicated ways hashtag activism intersects with consumer, popular, and celebrity cultures. Hashtag Activism Interrogated and Embodied calls for broader inclusion in what is considered hashtag activism, such as digital fandom, how hashtags are co-opted for nefarious purposes, the effects of anti-activism, and the role of journalism and the media. It will appeal to a range of disciplines including rhetoric and composition, internet studies, communication studies, media studies, feminist studies, affect studies, cultural studies, technical communication, and sociology. Contributors: Robert Barry, André Brock, Elizabeth Buchanan, Rosemary Clark-Parsons, Gabriel I. Green, Neha Gupta, Jeffrey J. Hall, Kyesha Jennings, Morgan K. Johnson, Salma Kalim, Megan McIntyre, Sean Milligan, Avishek Ray, Sarah Riddick, Stephanie Vie, Erin B. Waggoner, Holly M. Wells, William I. Wolff You can use only one pair of em dashes in a sentence. :(

Geo-Politics in Northeast Asia focuses on the dynamics of Northeast Asia as a region. The chapters in this book offer a nuanced approach for understanding the geo-politics of this strategically critical area of the world. Focusing on China, Japan, Russia, and the Koreas, as well as the involvement of the United States, the contributors to the volume offer a timely and critical analysis of Northeast Asia. They collectively emphasize the different scales at which the region holds significance, and particularly note how the region is often granted significance by local political forces as well as national interests. Borderlands and sub-regions are especially important in this perspective, and the contributors show both how regionalism influences the people living in these areas and how they in turn shape the political priorities of states. At the same time, the worsening of relations between Japan and the Koreas and the increasing assertiveness of both China and Russia make it essential to understand the dynamics of the region, as well as how they have changed during and following the Trump era. Geo-Politics in Northeast Asia is essential reading for students and scholars of Political Geography, International Relations and Strategic Studies, as well as for those with a research focus on Northeast Asia, or the wider Asia-Pacific and Indo-Pacific regions.

This book examines how the young in Northeast Asia engage with the political, especially in terms of the production, reformulation, or contestation of their national identities. Through case studies covering China, Japan, South Korea, North Korea and Taiwan, the contributions provide a study of the online spaces where youth engage with current debates regarding national identities. The book also unpacks the distinctive forms of expression and negotiation of national identities favoured by younger generations across Northeast Asia and asks questions specifically raised by their political mobilisation. For example, how their public mobilisation for a given cause has forced them to rethink their place in national and global communities. This book will be a valuable resource for scholars and students of East Asian culture and politics, media studies and youth studies. The Introduction of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

This book represents an in-depth analysis of journalism in Japan during the golden era of the daily press and the gradual introduction of digital technology starting from the mid-1980s to the late 2010s. By presenting firsthand testimony from journalists and field notes collected from fieldwork in the newsroom of one of the country's largest newspapers, this book provides a unique insight into Japan’s highly active yet relatively under-institutionalized journalistic profession. It also explores the changes experienced by the organizational development of Japanese journalism in response to broader changes in Japanese society, such as the emergence of social networks, the evolution of reading practices, the demographic situation, and the new aspirations of the Japanese youth. Based on an extensive ethnographic fieldwork carried out by the author over several years, this book will be of huge interest to students and scholars of Japanese society, journalism, and media studies.

This handbook presents a comprehensive survey of the formation and transformation of nationalism in 15 East and Southeast Asian countries. Written by a team of international scholars from different backgrounds and disciplines, this volume offers new perspectives on studying Asian history, society, culture, and politics, and provides readers with a unique lens through which to better contextualise and understand the relationships between countries within East and Southeast Asia, and between Asia and the world. It highlights the latest developments in the field and contributes to our knowledge and understanding of nationalism and nation building. Comprehensive and clearly written, this book examines a diverse set of topics that include theoretical considerations on nationalism and internationalism; the formation of nationalism and national identity in the colonial and postcolonial eras; the relationships between traditional culture, religion, ethnicity, education, gender, technology, sport, and nationalism; the influence of popular culture on nationalism; and politics, policy, and national identity. It illustrates how nationalism helped to draw the borders between the nations of East and Southeast Asia, and how it is re-emerging in the twenty-first century to shape the region and the world into the future. The Routledge Handbook of Nationalism in East and Southeast Asia is essential reading for those interested in and studying Asian history, Social and Cultural history, and modern history.

With a background of technological and communication innovations, socialization research, particularly as it refers to cultural and academic learning, has become increasingly connected with the business and economic aspects of global societies. Nationalism, Cultural Indoctrination, and Economic Prosperity in the Digital Age examines the doctrines that society is expected not to question, particularly the influence these beliefs have on business and the prosperity of the world as a whole. This book is an essential resource for business executives, scholar-practitioners, and students who need a multidisciplinary approach to the effects of culture on cognitive strategies and professional methodologies.