{"title":"Exhibition review: Portraits of Ryukyu","authors":"Travis Seifman","doi":"10.1080/14672715.2022.2128844","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2022.2128844","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The exhibition “Portraits of Ryukyu,” held at the Okinawa Prefectural Art Museum from November 2021 through January 2022, featured works by sixteen artists with close ties to Okinawa, highlighting the diversity of themes, approaches, styles, and media contained within the category of modern and contemporary Okinawan art, and expanding understandings of that canon. The fifteen women and one x-gender artist featured in the exhibition, some of whom were born and raised in Okinawa and some abroad, some with mixed ethnic backgrounds and others with Japanese backgrounds but trained and educated in Okinawa, address not only themes of gender, war, tradition, identity, and the ongoing U.S. military presence in the islands, but also of family, memory, modernity, labor, consumerism, and of historical and contemporary ties with the experiences of people in Taiwan, Vietnam, Hawai’i, and elsewhere.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"26 1","pages":"574 - 593"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74764325","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Okinawan memories in Argentina: between a transnational circulation of memories and migrants’ agency, 1945–1965","authors":"Mariana Alonso Ishihara","doi":"10.1080/14672715.2022.2134160","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2022.2134160","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The destruction of Okinawa after the Pacific War led Okinawans to look for new interpretations of their past to overcome the hardships of the present and imagine a new future. Although scholars have recently examined Okinawans’ memory politics, they have paid little attention to the history of Okinawans in South America and their memory construction during the American occupation of the Ryukyu Islands between 1945 and 1972. To fill this gap, this article analyzes Okinawans’ diasporic memory narratives in Argentina in conjunction with transnational memories circulating between 1945 and 1965. Community leaders in Argentina during this period intended to construct a compelling remembrance narrative that could support their identity claims in the face of an uncertain future for their home islands. While this process was shaped by existing transnational discourses, Okinawan immigrants in Argentina negotiated and accepted only those ideas that fit their local agenda and served as sources of diasporic identity and pride. Even if Okinawan immigrants claimed to be Japanese, these memories need to be analyzed as strategies to rebalance asymmetrical power relationships within Japanese immigrant society.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"18 1","pages":"533 - 551"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74668353","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Islands between empires: the Ryukyu Shobun in Japanese and American expansion in the pacific","authors":"M. Tinello","doi":"10.1080/14672715.2022.2132413","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2022.2132413","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The treaty that the Ryukyu Kingdom signed with the US government in 1854 was crucial for understanding cooperation between the US and Japanese governments when the latter annexed the Ryuku Islands in 1879 (an episode known as the Ryukyu shobun). The article explores how Japan-US negotiations over treaty rights facilitated Japan’s ambitions in the Ryukyus, Ogasawara Islands, and Korea, as well as their confrontation when the US annexed the Kingdom of Hawai’i. By the early twentieth century, these two powers had mutually accepted each other’s territorial acquisitions and, in so doing, built their own empires and brought stability to East Asia and the Pacific. Reviewing the informal agreement between Japan and the US during the annexation of the Ryukyus, we can better appreciate how the first shobun set the stage for later events.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"24 1","pages":"513 - 532"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"91166318","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Decolonizing knowledge of and from Okinawa","authors":"Hidefumi Nishiyama","doi":"10.1080/14672715.2022.2136098","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2022.2136098","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This paper explores the militarized situation of Okinawa Island and the ongoing struggles and challenges that Okinawans continue to confront. Particular focus is placed on how Okinawans challenge dominant colonial forms of knowledge, which assert that the U.S. military presence on the island is beneficial for Okinawan and Japanese people. After contextualizing Okinawa Island within contemporary American imperial geopolitics and outlining the current state of the island, the paper looks at three different, yet closely integrated, ways in which Okinawans, led by activists and progressive local officials, challenge the dominant narrative on the U.S. military. By questioning dominant assumptions about security, a base-dependent economy, and Okinawans’ indigenous status, these movements contribute to the decolonization of knowledge, an important step toward the demilitarization of the island. The paper concludes with a discussion of remaining challenges for decolonial knowledge production.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"109 1","pages":"552 - 573"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"79260331","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Okinawa studies today","authors":"L. Hein","doi":"10.1080/14672715.2022.2125886","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2022.2125886","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The recent explosion of work on Okinawa focuses attention on Okinawans in Japan’s empire, the diaspora, the American postwar order, and the more distant past. Another major topic is the multiple ways that individuals experience their relationship to Okinawan identity. This research matches the energy and creativity of Okinawan culture today. Popular frustration with the presence of U.S. military bases, enabled by the Japanese government, remains an inescapable issue in the background.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"54 1","pages":"495 - 512"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"77933246","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Reviewing “The Chinese Question” in Southeast Asia","authors":"Yong Han Poh","doi":"10.1080/14672715.2022.2122525","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2022.2122525","url":null,"abstract":"These books share a common interest – overseas Chinese political, social, and economic fates and identities, and are broadly focused on three key questions: what was the position of Chinese people in Southeast Asia during the twentieth century?What images circulated about Chinese Diaspora communities in the region, and how was “Chineseness” defined by themselves, the states and societies in which they lived, and their ancestral homelands? Finally, how did domestic political agendas, bilateral diplomacy, and global geopolitics mediate notions of Chineseness, whether viewed as culture and/or citizenship?","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"17 1","pages":"136 - 145"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83788944","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Subject making with Chinese characteristics: gender, sexuality, and Chineseness in neoliberal popular and public imaginaries","authors":"Jamie J. Zhao","doi":"10.1080/14672715.2022.2119594","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2022.2119594","url":null,"abstract":"Center for Gender and Media Studies, Department of Journalism and Communication, NingboTech University, Ningbo, People’s Republic of China Televising Chineseness: gender, nation, and subjectivity, by Geng Song, Ann Arbor, University of Michigan Press, 2022, 252 pp., $29.95 (e-book), ISBN: 9780472220045 Dreadful desires: the uses of love in neoliberal China, by Charlie Yi Zhang, Durham and London, Duke University Press, 2022, 280 pp., $26.95 (paperback), ISBN: 9781478017998","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"25 1","pages":"635 - 646"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"81243539","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Before and After Comparative Philosophy","authors":"Hans-Georg Moeller","doi":"10.4312/as.2022.10.3.201-224","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4312/as.2022.10.3.201-224","url":null,"abstract":"This paper traces the history of comparative philosophy and points to a transition toward post-comparative philosophy. It is argued that, theoretically speaking, comparative philosophy was created by making a distinction between Western and non-Western philosophy and then re-entering this distinction into one of its sides, namely non-Western philosophy. Historically speaking, comparative philosophy was preceded by Orientalist academic disciplines such as Indology and Sinology founded in the 19th century, as well as by the establishment of disciplines like “Chinese Philosophy” in non-Western countries. With the emergence of the field of comparative philosophy in the 20th century, two camps developed: one focusing on difference and the other on sameness. Post-comparative philosophy, it is argued, moves beyond difference and sameness and engages in diverse philosophical endeavours by employing sources from various traditions without constituting a specific field based on culturalist distinctions.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"194 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83099729","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Desire Versus Ego","authors":"Sašo Dolinšek","doi":"10.4312/as.2022.10.3.241-272","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4312/as.2022.10.3.241-272","url":null,"abstract":"Kaneko Fumiko (1903–1926) was an anarchist rebel during the Taishō era of modern Japan. She was arrested in 1923 and charged with high treason for participating in a plot to attack the imperial family. She also had connections with members of the Korean national liberation movement, most notably her partner Park Yeol. Her experience of abuse, abandonment, and exploitation growing up led her to form a highly critical and dismissive attitude towards established norms and institutions, which she saw as hypocritical, self-serving and oppressive. She describes her position as anarchist, nihilist and egoist and cites Max Stirner, the founder of egoism, as her most significant influence. Egoism is a radical individualism that denies any authority and espouses that the individual pursues her self-interest unhindered.\u0000Kaneko strived to always live by her egoist principles by following her wishes. However, in one of the letters she gave to the court during her imprisonment, she doubts a past decision. Namely, she felt that Park was at one point making decisions unilaterally and not respecting her will. Hence, she wrote that, according to her egoism, she should have left Park. Nonetheless, in the same letter, she reaffirms her love for Park and defiantly accepts all the consequences of their relationship, including the death sentence. Using psychoanalytic theory from the Lacanian tradition, I argue that Kaneko’s confirmation of her love for Park indicates fidelity to her desire. This fidelity opens up a dimension where she can be more faithful to herself than through Stirnean egoism.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"25 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"81961170","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Looking Back on Problems of Transcultural Methodology in Asian Studies","authors":"Jana S. Rošker","doi":"10.4312/as.2022.10.3.275-280","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.4312/as.2022.10.3.275-280","url":null,"abstract":"In previous issues of the journal, its authors have often made it clear that creative philosophers will always seek to improve their own methods. Even those who sincerely respect other cultural values, epistemologies, and methodologies will always retain some of their own preferences, subjective insights, and blind spots (Bunnin 2003, 352). What really matters is only their equality of opportunity, their evaluation regardless of the seemingly pervasive economic, political, and cultural power relations. Regardless of where they originate, and of their individual originators, such subjective inclinations should be checked by an equally reliable culture of academic critique and discussion, rather than silenced by demands for strict conformity in methods, theories, and doctrines.","PeriodicalId":46839,"journal":{"name":"Critical Asian Studies","volume":"19 6 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2022-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"89387100","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}