New Directions in the Study of Meiji Japan

Abstract

This volume of proceedings from the Conference on Meiji Studies presents a rare multinational interchange among professors, researchers, and graduate students investigating Japan. The essays reflect both an appreciation of past scholarship and a determination to destabilize existing paradigms about Meiji Japan in favor of a multiplicity of perspectives that privilege subjectivity and non-elite groups. Attention to relations of power challenges the notions of modernization as the master narrative in Japan's recent history and of consensus as the primary characteristic of social interaction in Japan. The authors present an array of intellectual perspective on topics in the social sciences, humanities, and arts, employing a variety of theories and methodologies. The book will be welcomed by readers interested in the Meiji era, contemporary Japan, and postmodern theories of power.