From country to nation : ethnographic studies, kokugaku, and spirits in nineteenth-century Japan
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
From country to nation : ethnographic studies, kokugaku, and spirits in nineteenth-century Japan
(Cornell East Asia series, no. 204)
Cornell University Press, 2021
- : hard cover
Available at 12 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Includes bibliographical references (p. 253-268) and index
Description and Table of Contents
Description
From Country to Nation tracks the emergence of the modern Japanese nation in the nineteenth century through the history of some of its local aspirants. It explores how kokugaku (Japan studies) scholars envisioned their place within Japan and the globe, while living in a castle town and domain far north of the political capital.
Gideon Fujiwara follows the story of Hirao Rosen and fellow scholars in the northeastern domain of Tsugaru. On discovering a newly "opened" Japan facing the dominant Western powers and a defeated Qing China, Rosen and other Tsugaru intellectuals embraced kokugaku to secure a place for their local "country" within the broader nation and to reorient their native Tsugaru within the spiritual landscape of an Imperial Japan protected by the gods.
Although Rosen and his fellows celebrated the rise of Imperial Japan, their resistance to the Western influence and modernity embraced by the Meiji state ultimately resulted in their own disorientation and estrangement. By analyzing their writings-treatises, travelogues, letters, poetry, liturgies, and diaries-alongside their artwork, Fujiwara reveals how this socially diverse group of scholars experienced the Meiji Restoration from the peripheries.
Using compelling firsthand accounts, Fujiwara tells the story of the rise of modern Japan, from the perspective of local intellectuals who envisioned their local "country" within a nation that emerged as an empire of the modern world.
Table of Contents
Introduction
1. Seeing the "Country" of Tsugaru in Northern Japan
2. Visions of Japan and Other "Countries" in the World
3. Hirata Kokugaku and the National Network
4. The Academy and the Tsugaru Disciples
5. Locating Tsugaru within Sacred Japan
6. Sacred Mountain, Landscape, and Afterlife
7. Supporting the Restoration in War and Ritual
8. Modern Society and the Tsugaru Disciples
Conclusion: Ethnography, Kokugaku, and Community in Modern Japan
by "Nielsen BookData"