Civil Society and Social Change in Contemporary Japan

Korakuen Campus, Tuesdays, 4:15~5:45
The course description for this seminar is here.

October 11, October 18: Students are to have selected a reading related to the aims of the seminar and to make a brief presentation on it. The bibliography I promised is still not complete, but has had several books added. That is here.

October 4: Many thanks for the good discussion, and for the critical attitude (in the good sense, of course).

Reading for October 11: Each student should read one or the other (preferably both) of these: 1) Frank Schwartz, “Recognizing Civil Society in Japan” and “What Is Civil Society?,” the Introduction and chapter 1, pp. 1-4, in The State of Civil Society in Japan, edited by Frank J. Schwartz and Susan J. Pharr (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); 2) Yoshio Sugimoto, “The Japan Phenomenon in the Social Sciences,” chapter 1, pp. 1-34, in Sugimoto’s An Introduction to Japanese Society, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge university Press, 2003).

Also, please have a look at the bibliography discussed in class, which in nascent form is here. The periodical material is mainly in place, but I have only just begun to get the books in, and for some of those that are in have not yet added chapter titles. I’ll hope to have this completed by mid-afternoon Friday. Have a glance now if you like, but look again more closely in a few days when the thing is complete. And for now please excuse any typing mistakes: I've done it quickly and haven't spell checked.

September 27: Organizing day, during which it was decided to begin and to end the seminar 20 minutes early, from 4:15 to 5:45.

Reading for October 4: 1) Civil Society, from Wikipedia. This is not a terribly ambitious definition of the key term from the title of the seminar, but it will get us started, and put us on the path to developing our own definition as we proceed. You may also want to have a look at the Wikipedia entry for Antonio Gramsci, whose work on the concept of civil society has been enormously influential. This will be assigned for next week, but if you have time you may want to read ahead.

2) Brian McVeigh, “Self-Orientalism Through Occidentalism: How ‘English’ and ‘Foreigners’ Nationalize Japanese Students,” from McVeigh’s Japanese Higher Education as Myth (London: Sharp, 2002).