New Books in Japanese Studies

Feb 01 2025 420 ep. 59 mins 358
New Books in Japanese Studies Podcast artwork

Interviews with Scholars of Japan about their New Books

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Lionel Barber, "Gambling Man: The Wild Ride of Japan’s Masayoshi Son" (Atria, 2024)

Feb 01 2025 33 mins  
As Wall Street swooned and boomed through the last decade, our livelihoods have—now more than ever—come to rely upon the good sense and risk appetites of a few standout investors. And amidst the BlackRocks, Vanguards, and Berkshire Hathaways stands arguably the most iconoclastic of them all: SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son. In Gambling Man: The Wild Ride of Japan’s Masayoshi Son (

Book Chat: The Life Story of Father Nguyễn, a Vietnamese Refugee Who Migrated to Taiwan, with Lin Shu-fen

Jan 26 2025 36 mins  
In this podcast, the host, Lara Momesso, introduces a book she co-edited with Dr Polina Ivanova (University of Bremen) titled Refugees and Asylum Seekers in East Asia: Perspective from Japan and Taiwan (Palgrave MacMillan, 2024), and she interviews one of the authors of the book, Dr Shu-fen Lin, at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University. In this chat, Shu-fen Lin explores the lif

Catherine Butler, "British Children's Literature in Japanese Culture: Wonderlands and Looking-Glasses" (Bloomsbury, 2023)

Jan 20 2025 73 mins  
Whether watching Studio Ghibli adaptations of British children's books, visiting Harry Potter sites in Britain or eating at Alice in Wonderland-themed restaurants in Tokyo, the Japanese have a close and multifaceted relationship with British children's literature. In British Children's Literature in Japanese Culture: Wonderlands and Looking-Glasses (Bloomsbury, 2023), Catherine But

Katharine E. McGregor, "Systemic Silencing: Activism, Memory, and Sexual Violence in Indonesia" (U Wisconsin Press, 2023)

Jan 19 2025 48 mins  
The system of prostitution imposed and enforced by the Japanese military during its wartime occupation of several countries in East and Southeast Asia is today well-known and uniformly condemned. Transnational activist movements have sought to recognize and redress survivors of this World War II-era system, euphemistically known as "comfort women," for decades, with a major wave be

Marc Gallicchio, "Unconditional: The Japanese Surrender in World War II" (Oxford UP, 2020)

Jan 04 2025 87 mins  
Signed on September 2, 1945 aboard the American battleship USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay by Japanese and Allied leaders, the instrument of surrender formally ended the war in the Pacific and brought to a close one of the most cataclysmic engagements in history, one that had cost the lives of millions. VJ―Victory over Japan―Day had taken place two weeks or so earlier, in the wake of

James Welker, "Transfiguring Women in Late Twentieth-Century Japan: Feminists, Lesbians, and Girls' Comics Artists and Fans" (U Hawaii Press, 2024)

Dec 28 2024 56 mins  
Transfiguring Women in Late Twentieth-Century Japan: Feminists, Lesbians, and Girls' Comics Artists and Fans (U Hawaii Press, 2024) examines three dynamic and overlapping communities of women and adolescent girls who challenged Japanese gender and sexual norms in the 1970s and 1980s. These spheres encompassed activists in the ūman ribu (women’s liberation) movement, members of t

Hannah Gould et al., "Death and Funeral Practices in Japan" (Routledge, 2024)

Dec 20 2024 42 mins  
Death and Funeral Practices in Japan (Routledge, 2024) is an essential introductory text an often overlooked element of cultural expression. The books offers a succinct history to the development of funeral practices over time, and describes a typical contemporary funeral in detail. Japanese funerals reflect the strength of continuing ancestor veneration (senzo kuyō), but face the

Pascal Lottaz and Ingemar Ottosson, "Sweden, Japan, and the Long Second World War: 1931-1945" (Routledge, 2021)

Dec 08 2024 76 mins  
Lottaz and Ottosson explore the intricate relationship between neutral Sweden and Imperial Japan during the latter's 15 years of warfare in Asia and in the Pacific. While Sweden's relationship with European Axis powers took place under the premise of existential security concerns, the case of Japan was altogether different. Japan never was a threat to Sweden, militarily or economic

Kerry Smith, "Predicting Disasters: Earthquakes, Scientists, and Uncertainty in Modern Japan" (U Pennsylvania Press, 2024)

Dec 07 2024 71 mins  
Predicting Disasters: Earthquakes, Scientists, and Uncertainty in Modern Japan (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2024) takes seriously attempts to reduce uncertainty around the timing, magnitude, and location of earthquakes in postwar Japan. Covering the period between early warnings about earthquakes in 1905 right up until the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, Kerry Smith expl

Russell Thomas, "Tofu: A Culinary History" (Reaktion Books, 2024)

Dec 04 2024 51 mins  
To the untrained eye there’s nothing as unexciting as tofu, normally regarded as a tasteless, beige, congealed mass of crushed, boiled soybeans. However, tofu more than stands up on its own. Reviled for decades as a vegetarian oddity, the brave, wobbly block has made a comeback. Tofu: a Culinary History (Reaktion, 2024) by Russell Thomas is a global history of bean curd stretches