Activities

【Round-Table Discussion】An Analysis of Transnational Encounters in Private Spaces in Occupied Japan and (West) Germany: A Possibility of Comparative Histories

Discussants Kazuto Oshio, Professor, Sophia University (Japan)
Rowena Ward, Senior Lecturer, University of Wollongong(Australia)
Bettina Blum, Research Associate, Paderborn University (Germany)
Christine de Matos, Associate Dean, Academic Development and Research /Senior Lecturer, University of Notre Dame(Australia)
Mark E Caprio, Professor Emeritus, Rikkyo University
Date September 20, 2022 (Tue.),15:00-17:00 p.m.
  This event was held on demand.

This roundtable discussed our research project, funded by German Research Foundation DFG (BL 1691/2-1) on the trans-national movement of persons to and from occupied Japan and Germany. It includes the examination of cultural experiences that arose at the site of “private sphere,” or residential areas constructed or obtained in occupied Japan and Germany for occupying military personnel and their families. This project is worthy because it delves into the definition and meaning of the cultural and personal boundaries that are reinforced or transgressed in domestic or informal spaces. The historiography of occupation studies is interdisciplinary and mainly covers areas such as national “rebuilding,” policy-making, legal issues, media/censorship, education “reform” and literature and film topics. Most of the studies are placed in a national framework generally ignoring the housing situation and daily experiences of the military/civilian personnel and their families in occupied Japan and Germany. For one, exploring the history and cultural experiences of dependent housings generates discussion between occupation studies, cold war cultural studies, gender studies, transpacific studies, and postcolonial studies. The recent works of trans-national and postcolonial studies offer valuable frameworks that encompass multi-national activities of diverse subjects that emphasize personal, national, organizational, and group agency.
Jointly hosted by Japan Foundation, Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)
Language English