The Sōka Gakkai 1968 Youth Movement: The Creation of Conviviality and Friendship in Sino-Japanese Relations

This article discusses an episode in the history of Sōka Gakkai that began as alternative youth movement under Ikeda Daisaku who came to advocate “people’s diplomacy” (minkan gaikō) as a way to foster goodwill between China and Japan. Why would Sōka Gakkai, a legally constituted “religious corporation” (shūkyō hōjin) be so serious about engaging with a Communist regime that did not recognise religion? The article discusses what “religion” or “religious behaviour” means in Sōka Gakkai, and questions the usefulness of such a classification on a qualitative level. Ikeda’s interpretation of Nichiren Buddhism highlights his approach to something seemingly very “unreligious”—namely, the normalisation of Sino-Japanese relations. Unlike the more traditional “reactive revolution” of protest movements that constructed politics as primarily a binary, ideological choice to achieve its aims, Ikeda prioritised finding ways to transcend that very ideology-centric, counter-politics approach. By appealing to conviviality, a sense of shared humanity and humility on the part of the Japanese towards their past history of colonialism, a new social imaginary and attitude that differed from politics of opposition between left and right entered as a historical force that continues to be promoted by Sōka Gakkai today.

In the Tortuous Shadows of Ethnic Policies: Two Case Studies of Chinese Cultural Heritage in Indonesia and Malaysia

Concurrent with the inception of the nation states of Indonesia and Malaysia in the middle of the twentieth century, ethnic policies were put into practice to destroy the Chinese cultural heritage that had hitherto been regarded as a vital part of the region’s heterogeneous cultural landscapes. Chinese language, organisations, and religious practices were banned, and architecture and artefacts with Chinese symbols or insignia either looted or destroyed. To what extent have these discriminatory agendas further influenced and shaped contemporary Chinese cultural heritage discourse? To answer this question this article starts with an introduction to the anti-Chinese agenda from Independence onwards, which is followed by two case studies from the field of cultural heritage: the organisation Boen Hian Tong in Semarang on Java in Indonesia, and the NGO Penang Heritage Trust in Malaysia. The research is based on fieldwork carried out in Indonesia and Malaysia in 2014–2015.

Kyara in Japanese Religious Spaces

Mascots in Japan are called kyara. They are utilised by almost all organisations, institutions, and administrative divisions and are accepted, embraced, and consumed by people of all walks of life, making them immensely popular. Although constituting an element of Japanese popular culture, they are also embedded in certain religious spaces in Japan, making them an interesting topic of research. This article will examine the reason behind the embeddedness of kyara in certain religious spaces in Japan and their impact on the practice of religion in those spaces.

The “Aum Incident” as a Catalyst for Societal Critique: An Analysis of Letters to the Editor of Asahi Shinbun on Aum Shinrikyō

This article analyses the discussion of Aum Shinrikyō in letters to the editor of one of the major Japanese newspapers, Asahi Shinbun, through the method of qualitative content analysis. The examination focuses on two aspects of the letters in order to uncover how Aum is understood and localised in a bigger context: first, how Aum itself is discussed, and second, what topics are brought up in relation to the group. The analysis reveals that Aum was rarely referred to as a cult or a false religion, but more often merely as a religion, which is subsequently associated with negative notions. The majority of letters, however, did not specify the nature of Aum at all. This is congruent with the topics covered in the letters, since the content of a large portion of them is not concerned with Aum directly but with a more abstract critique of society and authorities. Letters to the editor of Asahi Shinbun for a large part do not make use of sensationalist wording, all the while expressing a critical stance towards the movement, and additionally they focus on a critique of the dealings with Aum prior to and after the subway attack in 1995.

Ambivalent Identity: Kusama Yayoi’s Intersectional Body Art of the 1960s

The article discusses how identity was negotiated by the intersectional Japanese artist Kusama Yayoi. I focus on her body-centred works of the 1960s to showcase how she addressed various aspects of identity during her time in the U.S., and how she expressed social critique by means of bodily performance. In this article I will analyse and interpret one photograph by the artist previously discussed in my master’s thesis, an image of the so-called Presidential Orgy, a series of happenings staged in Kusama’s studio in 1968. I apply the method of visual analysis and draw on a variety of sources, both literary and visual, to give insight into the historical background, since it is crucial not to look at Kusama’s artworks as isolated objects. Rather, we need to understand that rapid changes in the art world, as well as in gender relations, the rise of popular media, and major societal events like the changes in the aftermath of World War II on the one hand, and the ongoing Vietnam War on the other, were pivotal factors causing cultural upheavals that became important themes in Kusama’s art in the 1960s.

Forty-Seven Years of Discourse: An Analysis of Japanese Journal Articles about Shimao Toshio’s Concept of Yaponeshia

This article analyses the discourse around Shimao Toshio’s concept of Yaponeshia, which addresses Okinawa’s relationship to mainland Japan. This concept, first outlined in Shimao’s essay “Yaponeshia no nekko” (The Roots of Yaponeshia) (1961), provides a whole new perspective from which this relationship can be viewed. To gain an understanding of the discourse which subsequently has evolved among Japanese scholars and critics, journal articles published between 1970 and 2017 will be analysed using Siegfried Jäger’s method of critical discourse analysis. The analysis will show that Shimao’s Yaponeshia idea has been (re-)interpreted by many academics and critics who expanded it with their own theories. The discourse about the “southern islands” (nantō) and the “reversion” of Okinawa to Japan play a major role in how Okinawa, as shown in the Yaponeshia concept, is portrayed: on the one hand, the culture of Okinawa is seen as a previous stage of the culture of mainland Japan; on the other hand, however, the culture of Okinawa is described as being different from that of Japan and as something that has to be protected from being assimilated by the main islands. By addressing different perspectives on Okinawan culture, over the past decades the Yaponeshia concept has slowly developed into a kind of cultural theory that also finds its way into other academic fields.

The New Right and the 1948 Foundation View: A Failed Revision of South Korean Cultural Memory

The emergence of the South Korean New Right movement in the mid-2000s led to the questions of how to commemorate and evaluate the ROK state establishment in 1948, and when to precisely trace such a “foundation” (1919 or 1948?) to be vividly discussed in South Korean society. Was 1948 primarily a political division? Or was it a “foundation for success”? Following the 2008 Foundation Day Dispute, a significant number of scholarly works on the subject has been produced. This article analyses the conservative side of this discourse, approaching the foundation dispute as a conservative attempt to regain hegemony over South Korean Cultural memory in post-democratisation South Korea. Analysing New Right-authored historiography on the subject of “foundation,” the present study discloses how conservatives narrated the formative years of the South Korean state, arguing that merely dismissing the New Right as historical revisionists is too simple a conclusion. Rather, this article argues that struggles over Cultural memory are rooted in the ideological and institutional polarisation of South Korean intellectuals in contemporary South Korea. Furthermore, by contextualising the Foundation View against progressive historiography within South Korea as well as Cold War history in a global context, this study answers why the Foundation View ultimately failed to gain acceptance.

Energy Security Analysis of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan: A Mix Model Framework

Current energy consumption and how to mitigate the negative environmental effects alongside rising demand have become prominent issues in everyday discourse. Following this trend, the topic of energy security too has stepped back into the spotlight. This article aims to analyse the energy security situation of three East Asian countries, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. All three countries feature similar predicaments, being overly reliant on imports, having minuscule natural reserves, and also being high-tech and service-based economies. In this article the author attempts to determine similarities and differences from an energy security perspective. In order to assess these countries, a framework is created with thirty-five distinct indicators relating to energy security. Each indicator is then systematically compared with each of the three countries. The results are then presented in a table and with graphs to illustrate a comparison of each country’s values. Through these results, the largest differences can be observed in energy efficiency and diversification of energy supply. The concluding remarks offer possible avenues for further studies and deliberate on lessons to be learned from these results.

Speaking to My Ancestors: An Ethnographic Study of Lived Childhood Religion in Rural Gansu

This article provides an overview of the major existing scholarship pertaining to childhood religion in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). More specifically, it examines lived childhood religion in a rural village in Gānsù province. This article challenges the commonly preconceived notion that children in the PRC do not regard religious belief as important and simply mirror the religious practices of their guardians. By utilising ethnographic data, I argue that children in the PRC are capable of constructing their own unique form of lived religion that is informed by, but crucially distinct from, the religious beliefs and practices of adults. The practices and beliefs of this lived religion can be extremely important to children and the evidence from fieldwork suggests that they tend to take both their practice and belief very seriously.

The Role of Internal Migration in Sustaining Rural Communities in Japan: The Case of Aso City in Kumamoto

The shrinking of Japan’s rural areas, caused partly by continuous out-migration of younger people to the major cities, is an amply discussed topic in Japanese society and popular media. Even though a certain trend of counter-urbanisation exists despite larger depopulation patterns, many of these migrants do not stay permanently and therefore cannot contribute to sustaining rural areas in the long term. Previous studies argue that considering each community’s characteristics is important in order to find possible ways to sustain rural areas and attract new residents. Therefore, this study focuses on the case of Aso City, aiming to clarify the criteria that makes migration to Aso City appealing or unappealing, and to identify the factors responsible for enabling (or complicating) the act of permanently settling there. In order to do so, the author conducted a survey in Aso City using semi-structured interviews. While the beauty of the natural surroundings, quality of life, and social connectedness are the main positive qualities of Aso City, its infrastructure, demographic development, and economic situation are assessed more negatively by its residents. Further, this study shows that the better a person’s local social connections upon arrival, the more likely they are to find a place to live and work, and stay on a long-term basis. In order to attract new residents to rural areas and support their permanent settlement, it is important to help them obtain the resources necessary for settling and assist their transition into the social structure of the community.