This unique volume comprising writings and memoirs covering the half century since the end of the Pacific War, offers the reader a fascinating and remarkable collection of personal experiences of Japan across a wide spectrum.

11 portraits from rural Japan to inspire choices in meaningful work, art, and sustainable living

In fall 1997 the Center for Japanese Studies at The University of Michigan celebrated its fiftieth anniversary. The November symposium featured more than fifty speakers, moderators, and musicians who celebrated the occasion and offered reminiscences on the Center's multifaceted scholarly and professional missions, discussions of the accomplishments of its al-umni/ae, and perspectives on wartime and postwar Japan-U.S. relations. As the first American interdisciplinary institute devoted to education and research on Japan, The University of Michigan Center for Japanese Studies has a path-making legacy. This volume, which includes the public presentations from the November 1997 symposium, reflects that legacy and the university's long and continuing involvement in Asia, which dates back to the 1870s.

Following the end of World War II, 500,000 American troops occupied every prefecture of Japan and interracial marriages occurred. The sudden influx of 50,000 Japanese war brides during 1946-1965 created social tension in the United States, while opening up one of the country's largest cross-cultural integrations. This book reveals the stories of 19 Japanese war brides whose assimilation into American culture forever influenced future generations, depicting love, strength, and perseverance in the face of incredible odds. The Japanese war brides hold a unique place in American history and have been called ambassadors to the United States. For the first time in English these women share their triumphs, sorrows, successes, and identity in a time when their own future was tainted by social segregation. This oral history focuses mainly on women's lives in the period following World War II and the occupation of Japan. It illuminates the cultural expectations, the situations brought about by the war, and effects of the occupation, and also include quotes from various war brides regarding this time. Chapter interviews are set up in chronological fashion and laid out in the following format: introduction of the war bride, how she met her husband, her initial travels to America, and life thereafter. Where needed, explanations, translations, and background history with references are provided.

This book presents a comprehensive overview of EU-Japan relations from 1970 to the present. It charts developments over the period, analyses key specific areas of importance to the relationship, and concludes by assessing how the relationship is likely to develop going forward. Throughout, the book discusses the factors on both sides which motivate the relationship, including Japan’s concern to secure markets for its advanced industrial products, and the factors motivating current negotiations for a deeper and more comprehensive economic and cooperative partnership.

Ongoing arguments over how histories are honoured – as evidenced by the conflict between South Korea and Japan over the opening of Tokyo's Heritage Information Centre in June 2020 – reveal the extent to which heritage processes enable states to assert legitimacy and power on a global stage. Here, Contesting Memorial Spaces of Japan's Empire shines a timely spotlight on the complicated histories and disputed legacies of various sites associated with Japan's empire in Asia and the Pacific. Bringing together a team of international scholars, this transnational study sees contested memorial spaces as windows for us to explore how borders are created, moved and altered in everyday life. From the Asan Bay Overlook Memorial Wall in Guam and the Puppet Emperor Palace in China to Japan's Ainu Museum and the Cowra War Cemetery in Australia, the diverse range of case studies examined here foreground the complex relationship Japan and its neighbours have with their imperial past and reveal how these relations stand at the intersection of individual actions, societal choices and memory collectives. In doing so, this innovative collection of essays bridges history, geography and heritage studies to provide an invaluable new approach to the study of imperial conflict and memory politics in modern Japan.