In this course we will explore the nature of contemporary urban society and culture in Japan, focusing especially on Tokyo, the world’s largest urban concentration. In the course we will explore the origins and spatial characteristics of Japanese cities, the formation of cities through rural-urban migration, new postwar patterns of communications (especially the railways), changing social composition, neighborhoods and spatial organization, the social structures of differing localities, contemporary urban popular and consumer cultures and urban social problems in Japan. Class work will be supplemented by field study excursions and observational exercises. (3 credits)
Prerequisites:
None
Additional student cost:
None
Learning outcomes:
By the end of the course students will be able to:
Explain the nature of contemporary urban society and culture in Japan
Summarize the historical development of Japanese cities
Analyze and report on urban popular and consumer cultures and urban social problems in Japan
Present information, debate, and mutually critique opinions
Method of presentation:
Lectures, class discussion, field trips, and student presentations
Required work and form of assessment:
Class Participation and Discussion (10%): Class attendance is compulsory. Students will be evaluated on the bases of how professionally they participate in class discussions and demonstrate their understanding of the subjects that are covered in the course.
Field Study Reflection Papers (10%): Two organized reports (3-4 pages each) that indicate the student’s experiences, finding and reflections from two field study excursions (May 7th & June 4th ) that will take place during the semester. Each report could either be handwritten or typed, but it must be of a single-spaced, typewritten quality.
Mid-term Research Paper (30%): One, organized 10-15 page paper on proposed research theme, which consists of introductory statements on the academic significance of the student’s research theme; description of research methods; ethnographic analyses; and conclusive remarks.
Final Project/ Presentation (30%): While the mid-term paper will be based primarily on library and secondary sources, the final project will be based mainly on primary ones and will be expected to embody your own observations and research. By mid-term it is expected that each student will have identified a topic suitable for ethnographic investigation and the final project will take the form of a project based on first hand investigation and observation. The project might take the form of a paper, but you are also encouraged to think about mixed media forms, such as utilizing video, recordings, photographs and other media, in addition to the written word.
Final Exam (20%): The final examination will test your overall comprehension of the material covered in the course, your knowledge of the literature and your ability to express a comprehensive understanding of both the ethnographic issues covered and of the theoretical and policy implications of these.
content:
1. Course Introduction and Opening Lecture
A brief introduction to Japanese urban history and discussion of the formation of cities, their distribution within Japan, their spatial characteristics and the ways in which cultural patterns in the society have shaped their form.
REQUIRED READING: Cybriwsky, Chap.3
2. Social Change and the Japanese City
Rural-urban migration and the postwar "reinvention" of the Japanese city. The cities during the era of high economic growth, of the expansion of communications and economic reconstruction to the "consumer cities" of the present. The emergence of the global cities of Tokyo and Osaka and the regional and local hierarchies of Japanese towns and cities.
3. The Sociology of the Japanese City
Spatial and human ecology; the economy of Japanese cities and their political organization at the macro and micro levels. Patterns of transportation and the social, ethnic, class, gendered, class, age structure and occupational geography of Japanese citis and towns. Urban families and their lifestyles. Neighborhoods - their social organization, associations, religious festivals and local level economies and politics.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky, Chaps. 2, 4 and 5; Clammer Chaps. 2, 4 and 5. Bestor, Chap. 7. Further readings can be taken from Vogel, Chaps.1 & 2, Ben-Ari Chap. 2 and Robertson Chaps. 2 &
4.and LeBlanc Chaps. 1-3 depending on your interests.
4. FIELD STUDY #1 Edo Tokyo Museum
5. Urban Cultures: Popular Cultures in the City, Youth Culture and the Consumer City
The media and formation of city images. Space, sub-cultures and spaces of consumption. Popular urban cultures, the cyber-city and small town culture. Coexistence and layering of cultural forms.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky,Chap.7, Clammer, Chaps. 4 & 5; depending on your interests Kato and Powers, Chap.1 and selections, Treat, Chap.1 and selections.
FIELD STUDY RELECTION PAPER #1 DUE
6. Cities and Regions
The emergence of Japanese world cities and new directions of urban change, new towns, commercial/industrial suburbs and spatial and technological development. Cities and their hinterlands and the ecological, social and cultural footprints of Japanese cities in Japan and in Asia. Regional cities and their changing role in relation to Japan and the wider region. New communication hubs. The controversy over moving the capital.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky, Chap. 6; Clammer, Chap. 8; Fujita and Hill, Chaps. 1 & 3.
7. Social Problems, Social Forces and Social Movements in the City
Issues of health and environment, transport, hollowing out and suburbanization. Housing markets and the "new poverty". Urban stress, the problems of an aging society. Foreign workers, population decline and migration. Urban social movements and attempts to "reclaim" the city and redefine citizenship.
8. FIELD Study #2 : Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum
9. Culture and Social Form: The Intersection of Architecture, Culture and Social Organization
Spatial cultures and concepts of space in Japanese culture. Theory and practice in Japanese architecture. Architecture and culture. Why do Japanese cities appear to be so ugly, yet work very efficiently sociologically?
REQUIRED READINGS: Jinnai, Chaps. 1, 3 & 4. Clammer (Difference book), Chap. 4, Asihara: whole book.
MID-TERM PAPER DUE
10. The Future of the Japanese City
Are Japanese cities models for other countries to follow? Do they represent the "postmodern" form of the city? How is technology changing both the form of cities and the cultures of city dwellers? What is the impact of globalization on Japanese cities and how do they in turn promote certain forms of globalization?
REQUIRED READINGS: Jinnai, Chap. 4; Robertson, Chap. 6; Fujita and Hill, Chaps. 7, 8, 11 & 12; Clammer (Difference book) Chaps. 1-3 and 6.
FIELD STUDY REFLECTION PAPER #2 DUE
11. Presentations of Research Papers and Class Discussion
12. FINAL EXAM & FINAL PROJECT DEADLINE
Required readings:
Ashihara, Y. The Hidden Order. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1989.
Ben-Ari, Eyal. Changing Japanese Suburbia. Kegan Paul International.
Bestor, Theodore C. Neighborhood Tokyo. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1989.
Clammer, John. Difference and Modernity: Social Theory and Contemporary Japanese Society. London and NY: Kegan Paul International, 1995
________. Contemporary Urban Japan: A Sociology of Consumption. Oxford and Malden, Mass: Blackwell, 1997.
* Cybriwsky, Roman. Tokyo: The Shogun’s City at the Twenty-First Century. NY and Chichester: John Wiley, 1998.
Fujita, Kuniko and R.C. Hill, Eds. Japanese Cities in the World Economy. Temple University Press.
Jinnai, H. Tokyo: A Spatial Anthropology. Berkeley. University of California Press.
LeBlanc, Robin. Bicycle Citizens: The Political World of the Japanese Housewife. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1999.
Gill, Tom. Men of Uncertainty: The Social Organization of Day Laborers in Contemporary Japan. New York: State University of New York Press, 2001.
Powers, R.G. and H.Kato (eds) Handbook of Japanese Popular Culture. Greenwood Press.
Robertson, Jennifer. Native and Newcomer: Making and Remaking a Japanese City. University of California Press.
Shimada, H. Japan’s Guest Workers: Issues and Public Policies. Tokyo: Tokyo University Press.
Treat, J.W. (Ed) Contemporary Japan and Popular Culture. London. Curzon Press.
Recommended readings:
Seidensticker, Edward. Low City, High City: Tokyo from Edo to the Earthquake. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1991.
Sugimoto, Yoshio. An Introduction to Japanese Society. Cambridge University Press.
Vogel, E. Japan’s New Middle Class. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Brief Biography of Instructor:
John Clammer is Visiting Professor of Sociology at the United Nations University, Tokyo and was formerly Professor of Sociology and Graduate Professor of Asian Studies at Sophia University. He received his D.Phil. degree from Oxford University and has taught and researched at universities in Germany, the UK, Australia, Korea, Argentina and Singapore. His teaching and research includes the sociology of art and culture, urbanism, development, religion and environment. Amongst his major recent books are Japan and Its Others: Globalization, Difference and the Critique of Modernity, Diaspora and Identity: The Sociology of Culture in Southeast Asia, and a new edition of the established text Contemporary Urban Japan.
Contemporary Urban Society in Japan
In this course we will explore the nature of contemporary urban society and culture in Japan, focusing especially on Tokyo, the world’s largest urban concentration. In the course we will explore the origins and spatial characteristics of Japanese cities, the formation of cities through rural-urban migration, new postwar patterns of communications (especially the railways), changing social composition, neighborhoods and spatial organization, the social structures of differing localities, contemporary urban popular and consumer cultures and urban social problems in Japan. Class work will be supplemented by field study excursions and observational exercises. (3 credits)
None
None
By the end of the course students will be able to:
Lectures, class discussion, field trips, and student presentations
1. Course Introduction and Opening Lecture
A brief introduction to Japanese urban history and discussion of the formation of cities, their distribution within Japan, their spatial characteristics and the ways in which cultural patterns in the society have shaped their form.
REQUIRED READING: Cybriwsky, Chap.3
2. Social Change and the Japanese City
Rural-urban migration and the postwar "reinvention" of the Japanese city. The cities during the era of high economic growth, of the expansion of communications and economic reconstruction to the "consumer cities" of the present. The emergence of the global cities of Tokyo and Osaka and the regional and local hierarchies of Japanese towns and cities.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky, Chap. 1, Clammer, Chap.1, Robertson, Chaps. 1 & 3.
3. The Sociology of the Japanese City
Spatial and human ecology; the economy of Japanese cities and their political organization at the macro and micro levels. Patterns of transportation and the social, ethnic, class, gendered, class, age structure and occupational geography of Japanese citis and towns. Urban families and their lifestyles. Neighborhoods - their social organization, associations, religious festivals and local level economies and politics.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky, Chaps. 2, 4 and 5; Clammer Chaps. 2, 4 and 5. Bestor, Chap. 7. Further readings can be taken from Vogel, Chaps.1 & 2, Ben-Ari Chap. 2 and Robertson Chaps. 2 &
4.and LeBlanc Chaps. 1-3 depending on your interests.
4. FIELD STUDY #1 Edo Tokyo Museum
5. Urban Cultures: Popular Cultures in the City, Youth Culture and the Consumer City
The media and formation of city images. Space, sub-cultures and spaces of consumption. Popular urban cultures, the cyber-city and small town culture. Coexistence and layering of cultural forms.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky,Chap.7, Clammer, Chaps. 4 & 5; depending on your interests Kato and Powers, Chap.1 and selections, Treat, Chap.1 and selections.
FIELD STUDY RELECTION PAPER #1 DUE
6. Cities and Regions
The emergence of Japanese world cities and new directions of urban change, new towns, commercial/industrial suburbs and spatial and technological development. Cities and their hinterlands and the ecological, social and cultural footprints of Japanese cities in Japan and in Asia. Regional cities and their changing role in relation to Japan and the wider region. New communication hubs. The controversy over moving the capital.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky, Chap. 6; Clammer, Chap. 8; Fujita and Hill, Chaps. 1 & 3.
7. Social Problems, Social Forces and Social Movements in the City
Issues of health and environment, transport, hollowing out and suburbanization. Housing markets and the "new poverty". Urban stress, the problems of an aging society. Foreign workers, population decline and migration. Urban social movements and attempts to "reclaim" the city and redefine citizenship.
REQUIRED READINGS: Cybriwsky, Chap. 5; Gill, Chaps. 1-4; Shimada, Chap.1; LeBlanc Chaps. 3-5.
8. FIELD Study #2 : Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum
9. Culture and Social Form: The Intersection of Architecture, Culture and Social Organization
Spatial cultures and concepts of space in Japanese culture. Theory and practice in Japanese architecture. Architecture and culture. Why do Japanese cities appear to be so ugly, yet work very efficiently sociologically?
REQUIRED READINGS: Jinnai, Chaps. 1, 3 & 4. Clammer (Difference book), Chap. 4, Asihara: whole book.
MID-TERM PAPER DUE
10. The Future of the Japanese City
Are Japanese cities models for other countries to follow? Do they represent the "postmodern" form of the city? How is technology changing both the form of cities and the cultures of city dwellers? What is the impact of globalization on Japanese cities and how do they in turn promote certain forms of globalization?
REQUIRED READINGS: Jinnai, Chap. 4; Robertson, Chap. 6; Fujita and Hill, Chaps. 7, 8, 11 & 12; Clammer (Difference book) Chaps. 1-3 and 6.
FIELD STUDY REFLECTION PAPER #2 DUE
11. Presentations of Research Papers and Class Discussion
12. FINAL EXAM & FINAL PROJECT DEADLINE
Ashihara, Y. The Hidden Order. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1989.
Ben-Ari, Eyal. Changing Japanese Suburbia. Kegan Paul International.
Bestor, Theodore C. Neighborhood Tokyo. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1989.
Clammer, John. Difference and Modernity: Social Theory and Contemporary Japanese Society. London and NY: Kegan Paul International, 1995
________. Contemporary Urban Japan: A Sociology of Consumption. Oxford and Malden, Mass: Blackwell, 1997.
* Cybriwsky, Roman. Tokyo: The Shogun’s City at the Twenty-First Century. NY and Chichester: John Wiley, 1998.
Fujita, Kuniko and R.C. Hill, Eds. Japanese Cities in the World Economy. Temple University Press.
Jinnai, H. Tokyo: A Spatial Anthropology. Berkeley. University of California Press.
LeBlanc, Robin. Bicycle Citizens: The Political World of the Japanese Housewife. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1999.
Gill, Tom. Men of Uncertainty: The Social Organization of Day Laborers in Contemporary Japan. New York: State University of New York Press, 2001.
Powers, R.G. and H.Kato (eds) Handbook of Japanese Popular Culture. Greenwood Press.
Robertson, Jennifer. Native and Newcomer: Making and Remaking a Japanese City. University of California Press.
Shimada, H. Japan’s Guest Workers: Issues and Public Policies. Tokyo: Tokyo University Press.
Treat, J.W. (Ed) Contemporary Japan and Popular Culture. London. Curzon Press.
Seidensticker, Edward. Low City, High City: Tokyo from Edo to the Earthquake. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1991.
Sugimoto, Yoshio. An Introduction to Japanese Society. Cambridge University Press.
Vogel, E. Japan’s New Middle Class. Berkeley: University of California Press.
John Clammer is Visiting Professor of Sociology at the United Nations University, Tokyo and was formerly Professor of Sociology and Graduate Professor of Asian Studies at Sophia University. He received his D.Phil. degree from Oxford University and has taught and researched at universities in Germany, the UK, Australia, Korea, Argentina and Singapore. His teaching and research includes the sociology of art and culture, urbanism, development, religion and environment. Amongst his major recent books are Japan and Its Others: Globalization, Difference and the Critique of Modernity, Diaspora and Identity: The Sociology of Culture in Southeast Asia, and a new edition of the established text Contemporary Urban Japan.