@apjjf.bsky.social
In-depth critical analysis of the forces that shape the Asia-Pacific and the world. Edited by Tristan R. Grunow (Nagoya University) and Mary M. McCarthy (Drake University). Find us at: https://apjjf.org/.
A new essay from me synthesizing the rich body of media criticism in Japanese focused on the practice of "August journalism" (八月ジャーナリズム): the tendency for rehearsed, compressed, and hollowed-out coverage of war memory each August.
apjjf.org/2025/9/fedman
ICYMI: Re-upping our special collection on the 100th Anniversary of the Great Kanto Earthquake, which occurred on September 1st, 1923: apjjf.org/2023/8/toc
01.09.2025 21:16 — 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
Kawanishi Hideya argues that the symbolic emperor serves as a custodian of Japan's remembrance of WWII, standing in marked contrast to conservative security policies while reviving public awareness and transmitting wartime memory to future generations. apjjf.org/2025/8/kawan...
31.08.2025 17:55 — 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Xi Min Ling shows how Japan’s recent improving image among the Singaporean public regarding World War II "comes at a time when ordinary citizens are starting to play a larger role in steering the nation’s public history." apjjf.org/2025/8/ling
31.08.2025 17:55 — 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
M.G. Sheftall laments apparent shifts in attitudes towards Japan's actions in World War II and nuclear weapons amongst students and younger generations in Japan: "History has heard rhetoric like this before...and it has never ended well." apjjf.org/2025/8/sheft...
31.08.2025 17:55 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Kevin Blackburn stresses that different national narratives of the war should not be allowed to overshadow the most important shared legacy of World War II: "the hope that the bloodiest conflict in human history not be repeated in the 21st century." apjjf.org/2025/8/black...
31.08.2025 17:55 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Gi-Wook Shin outlines obstacles to reconciliation as "in an era dominated by strongmen who weaponize nationalism and manipulate historical memory for political gain, the distortion of the past has become a common tool of division and confrontation." apjjf.org/2025/8/shin
31.08.2025 17:55 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Tessa Morris-Suzuki points to recent re-definitions of "self defense," increases in defense spending, and the popularity of the far-right Sanseitō in Japan to ask how long until the next world war? apjjf.org/2025/8/morri...
31.08.2025 17:55 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0As we remember the 80th Anniversary of the End of World War II, see our special collection of "Critical Reflections" from a number of prominent scholars of East Asian studies. Look for a second batch of essays appearing soon!
31.08.2025 17:51 — 👍 4 🔁 2 💬 1 📌 0
Fourteen years on from the Northeastern Japan Triple Disaster, see how scholars at Tohoku University & the National Diet Library in Japan are collaborating with the Reischauer Institute at Harvard to document and research the disaster and its aftermaths in the Japan Disaster Archive. apjjf.org/jda
14.03.2025 03:13 — 👍 5 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
More than 25 years after my first visit, I've recently published an article on the long history of the Yushukan military museum at Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo. The article is open access with a large number of illustrations.
apjjf.org/2024/7/benesch
David McNeill and Nao Kato ask what role the media plays in public opinion toward the other in Japan-China relations. apjjf.org/2024/5/mcneill
20.06.2024 22:59 — 👍 6 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 2
This dialogue between Kevin Blackburn, Katharine McGregor, and Sachiyo Tsukamoto introduces the authors' recent books and highlights new research on Comfort Women from Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Japan. apjjf.org/2024/5/black...
20.06.2024 22:49 — 👍 11 🔁 5 💬 0 📌 0
Jessica Jordan questions U.S. military understanding and practice when it comes to bases in Guam and Okinawa, arguing that changing the way recent history is represented at U.S.-controlled public sites could catalyze meaningful change in local relations. apjjf.org/2024/5/jordan
18.06.2024 23:57 — 👍 2 🔁 3 💬 0 📌 0
Do words matter? Can they change the way we think and act? Ulv Hanssen warns they do, with the example of the history of the use (and non-use) of the term "hypothetical enemy" in Japan from the prewar period through today.
apjjf.org/2024/4/hanssen
Michael Bourdaghs explores popular music of Japan’s Cold War era, with a special focus on singing duo The Peanuts and the film Mothra, argues that Japanese culture of the Cold War must be understood as participating simultaneously in all three networks of the Cold War order
apjjf.org/2024/4/bourd...
How do Indonesian Muslim professionals navigate the corporate workplace in Japan? Through in-depth interviews, Firman Budianto uncovers some of their motivations, challenges, and strategies living and working in a non-Muslim society.
apjjf.org/2024/4/budia...
Can physical representations of events, like a monument, change their meaning over time and, if so, how? These are the questions that Thi Gammon and Anh Ngoc Quynh Phan explore through the Hanoi monument to John McCain's capture.
06.05.2024 16:35 — 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
With the embers of the Johnny Kitagawa sexual assault scandal still glowing, more victims of abuse have come forward with disturbing claims about comedy-duo Downtown’s Matsumoto Hitoshi, a towering figure in Japan’s entertainment industry. One of them talks to David McNeill. apjjf.org/2024/4/mcneill
23.04.2024 08:39 — 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 1
In the first article in this ongoing series, Olena Kalashnikova and Fabian Schäfer look at the means by which Russian propaganda enters into the Japanese political and social discourse. Look for new articles each month. apjjf.org/2024/3/schaf...
16.04.2024 23:09 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
New Ongoing Series | The The Online Ecosystem of the Japanese Far Right. Investigating the ever-changing & adaptable ecosystem of multitudinous actors in the digital age linked through shared nativist/racist, anti-feminist & anti-establishment/illiberal discourses. apjjf.org/online-ecosy...
16.04.2024 23:08 — 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 1 📌 0
Hanno Jentzsch & Sebastian Polak-Rottmann investigate the impact of COVID-19 on regional welfare-making in Japan's rural Aso region, revealing how community institutions evolved but also reflected prior (and ongoing) experiences with challenges & resilience after disasters. apjjf.org/2024/3/jentz...
16.04.2024 23:01 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Tessa Morris-Suzuki explores the transnational history of commercial whaling in the 19th Century from the mobile viewpoint of whaleships as they crossed and recrossed the ocean, urging scholars to adopt a “liquid area” approach to transformations in the Asia-Pacific region. apjjf.org/2024/3/morri...
29.03.2024 07:39 — 👍 9 🔁 6 💬 0 📌 0
Barak Kushner reflects on the complex issues & discrepancies between fact & fiction around Japanese war crimes in WWII that clouded postwar justice postwar & continue to render their history open to interpretation, feeding political friction in the region.
apjjf.org/2024/3/kushner
Brian Hurley revisits John Hersey’s controversial reading of "Hiroshima" at the White House in 1965 to show how the premises of cultural freedom at the heart of Cold War American liberalism stirred far more controversy in practice than their placid articulation in theory. apjjf.org/2024/2/hurley
26.03.2024 14:15 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
In the Epilogue, Le Hoang Ngoc Yen reflects on how food-related charity activities reflect social, moral, and economic changes, and provides insights into social phenomena that exemplify the shifting landscape of cuisine and food ethics in modern Vietnam. apjjf.org/2024/2/le2
18.03.2024 06:38 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Sara A. Swenson analyzes how Buddhist groups united in food charity nonetheless develop unique cosmologies with distinct social facts about human subjectivity, ethics, and karma, as seen in their decisions to serve either meat-based or vegetarian meals. apjjf.org/2024/2/swenson
18.03.2024 06:37 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Le Hoang Ngoc Yen examines the use of macrobiotic diets among a Buddhist temple’s patients & followers, unraveling popular discourses of food & health, along with their intertwining relationships with conceptions of chronic disease in contemporary Vietnam. apjjf.org/2024/2/le
18.03.2024 06:36 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
Le Hoang Anh Thu shows how Vietnamese media focuses on the feminine aspect of food charity, portraying it as an act of kindness that increases communal solidarity during adversities such as Covid-19, similar to women’s kitchen work in sustaining families. apjjf.org/2024/2/le-ke...
18.03.2024 06:34 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
#Special: Sara Ann Swenson & Le Hoang Anh Thu guest co-edit a collection of articles examining why food charity has become popular in urban areas in Vietnam like Ho Chi Minh City by exploring how food holds spiritual, moral significance for both donors & recipients: apjjf.org/2024/2/food-...
18.03.2024 06:32 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 0
