Education About Asia: Online Archives

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Online Supplement

Modeling Asia: An East China Sea Simulation

by Lauren McKee

Editor’s Note: After the essay, readers can examine the simulation prep sheet Professor McKee uses in her course, two country studies Berea College student groups wrote as part of the simulation assignment, and three student reflection papers class members wrote after the simulation’s conclusion. Tensions in the East China Sea have risen dramatically in the last decade between China, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and a number of Southeast Asian countries. This conflict has been driven prim...

Book Review Essay, Resources

A Concise History of Korea From Antiquity to the Present, Second Edition

by Mary Connor

Michael Seth’s A Concise History of Korea: From Antiquity to the Present provides readers with a clear, comprehensive, objective, and illuminating survey of Korean history from ancient times to the present. Readers will be inspired by Seth’s extensive knowledge of Korean history combined with his understanding of East Asian and world history. Throughout, comparisons are drawn between developments on the Korean peninsula and those in neighboring regions, especially China and Japan. Seth discu...

Book Review Essay, Resources

The Osamu Tezuka Story: A Life in Manga and Anime

by William M. Tsutsui

By Toshio Ban and Tezuka Productions Translated by Frederik L. Schodt Berkeley, California: Stone Bridge Press, 2016 928 pages, ISBN: 978-1611720259, paperback Reviewed by William Tsutsui Tezuka Osamu is hardly a household name in the United States, even in the fan communities that so eagerly consume the products of the Japanese pop culture industry that Tezuka was instrumental in building after World War II. In Japan, however, Tezuka is revered as a “god of manga,” a pi...

Book Review Essay, Resources

China’s Geography: Globalization and the Dynamics of Political, Economic, and Social Change, Third Edition

by Craig R. Laing

By Gregory Veeck, Clifton W. Pannell, Youqin Huang, and Shuming Bao Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2016 422 pages, ISBN: 978-1442252561, Paperback Reviewed by Craig R. Laing I must disclose at the outset of this review that I have a special attachment to this text. As an undergraduate student majoring in geography in the 1980s, the textbook for my Geography of Asia class was a 1983 book titled China: The Geography of Development and Modernization by Clifton W. Pannell and ...

Book Review, Resources

Foundations of Chinese Civilization The Yellow Emperor to the Han Dynasty (2697 BCE–220 CE) Understanding China through Comics, Volume 1

by Ward Fleissner

Understanding China through Comics, Volume 1 By Jing Liu Berkeley, California: Stone Bridge Press 168 Pages, ISBN: 978-1611720273, Paperback Reviewed by Ward Fleissner Here’s the opening line: “After 17,434 disasters, 3,791 wars, 663 emperors, and ninety-five dynasties, the 5,000-year-old Chinese civilization marches on.” What an entrance onto the world history stage! This nonfiction “graphic novel,” an informational comic book of 168 pages, combines breezy style with historical...

Resources, Teaching Resources Essay

Teaching with Kristin Stapleton’s Fact in Fiction: 1920s China and Ba Jin’s Family

by Robert W. Foster

Fact in Fiction: 1920s China and Ba Jin’s Family By Kristin Stapleton Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2016 296 pages, ISBN 978-1503601062, Paperback Historian Lawrence Stone once noted that “a diet of statistics makes a dry and unpalatable meal unless washed down with the wine of human personality.”1 History courses often come alive when personal narratives are assigned. Even so, sometimes those narratives lack the verve to maintain the reader’s interest (ask anyon...

Resources, Teaching Resources Essay

In Search of a Universal Language: Past, Present, and Future

by John F. Copper

Ever since the Tower of Babel, humans have pursued developing a universal language to use to communicate with more—ideally all— people. However, they have been only marginally successful, as indicated by both the history of a large number of failed efforts and the current situation. Also, these efforts have their detractors. A language becomes larger when it weakens or replaces another language. This often involves “language genocide” and/or represents “language imperialism.” Atta...

Asia: Experiential Learning, Resources

Asia: Experiential Learning (Guest Editor, Tommy Lamont) The Power of Food: Students and Local Women Cooking Together in Rural Japan

by Stephanie Assmann, Susanne Klien

All of us have several meals a day, yet few among us have thought about the power of food and how it affects a region’s culture, history, and people. Different people like different food—something we noticed during our program titled Local/Global Food as Revitalization in a small rural town called Shintotsukawa, located two hours northwest of Sapporo, a city with a population of 1.9 million and located in the center of Japan’s northmost island Hokkaidō. Local/Global Food as Revitalizat...

Columns, Web Gleanings

Web Gleanings: The Best of Web Gleanings

by Judith S. Ames

A Tribute to Judith Ames It is with some regret, but enormous gratitude, that I share the news that Judith Ames, who almost certainly holds the record for the most number of words published in EAA, recently informed me that she decided to retire as the columnist for “Web Gleanings.” Back in 1995 when I posted announcements for EAA editors, Judith, who previously was associated with the Japan Society in New York and has worked, among other endeavors, as an editorial and computer consultant, ...

Columns, Resources

In Memorial: James M. Becker

by Linda S. Wojtan

A tireless champion for international understanding, often cited as the “Father of Global Education,” James M. Becker (Jim) passed away at age ninety-seven. He is survived by his four children, seven grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. Professor emeritus at Indiana University’s School of Education, Jim was extolled by many at a memorial service January 28, 2017, at the education building. Friends and family recounted numerous academic accomplishments, as well as a wicked sense of h...

Online Supplement

How Free Are Postcolonial Polities? Select Nation Profiles

by EAA Staff

Freedom House is an independent organization that advocates for increased freedom and democracy around the world. Partnering with frontline human rights activists to advance democratic change, Freedom House recognizes that freedom is only possible within the context of a democratic government that is accountable to its own people. Established in New York City in 1941, Freedom House has expanded to include offices in a dozen countries. Furthermore, among its goals include collaboration with li...

Feature Article

The Legacy of the Chinese Empires Beyond “the West and the Rest”

by Magnus Fiskesjö

It is commonplace in the West, and especially in America, to hear people talk about the world as “the West and the Rest,” with the “Rest” at the receiving end of Western imperialism, colonialism, and other forms of exploitation. There is a lot of truth to this, but it is also a misleading view of how the world works. Not only are imperialism and colonialism not new, they also are not confined to the West. This is very much true of Asia, where imperial Japan’s late nineteenth- and tw...

Feature Article

Who Did What in a Chinese Lady’s Autobiography?: A Text and Lesson Plan on Li Qingzhao’s Ambiguous Narrative

by Sarah Schneewind

Students eagerly ask about women in Chinese history and literature. The Ming and Qing Dynasties (1368–1911) provide plenty of primary sources in translation, but only one woman poet and critic of Song times (960–1279) has won lasting fame, Li Qingzhao (1084–1150s). Her autobiography touchingly portrays her relationship with her husband, his untimely death in 1129 amidst the Jin invasion of Northern Song, and her troubles thereafter, including a failed second marriage. Yet because Classical...

Feature Article

More Than a Meal: School Lunch in Japan

by Alexis Agliano Sanburn

For many children in school, little compares to the hunger felt waiting for lunch. Breakfast is a memory, and it is the promise of the midday meal that strengthens the spirit through the morning lessons. In some corners of the world, the lunch hour is considered a time of respite, a chance for students and teachers to enjoy a break from their classes, scarf down a meal, and socialize with friends. In Japan, by contrast, lunchtime is an important part of shokuiku, or food education. The midday ho...

Feature Article

Building Nationhood through Broadcast Media in Postcolonial India

by Coonoor Kripalani

The role of broadcast media in building patriotism and nationhood in postcolonial India is enormous. While television is a latecomer, radio was an essential vehicle from the early twentieth century onward in promoting the culture that would define the new nation, so most of this essay is devoted to radio. Although the recent rise of private TV is briefly discussed in this essay, in the case of both radio and TV, the role of government media in nation-building receives center stage. To unify a...

Feature Article, Film Review Essay

So Long Asleep: Waking the Ghosts of a War

by Franklin Rausch

Produced and Directed by David Plath D VD, 60 minutes, Color An MPG Production, 2016 Documentary available through Documentary Educational Resources beginning July 2017. Visit www.der.org to order a copy and for more information on the documentary Reviewed by Franklin Rausch So Long Asleep: Waking the Ghosts of a War is a well-produced documentary that traces the finding, excavation, and repatriation in 2015 of the remains of 115 Korean conscript laborers whom the Japanese forced to work in...

Feature Article

Out of a War’s Ashes

by Byung-ho Chung

A chance encounter drew me into the work of repatriating the remains of Korean men who died doing forced labor in Hokkaidō during the Asia–Pacific War. In 1989, I was engaged in field research for a doctoral dissertation on Japanese day care centers. People suggested that I visit the center directed by Tonohira Yoshihiko, chief priest of a rural Buddhist temple. There, I learned that Reverend Tonohira was also leading local volunteers excavating the remains of victims from wartime constructio...

Feature Article

Taiwan’s Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)

by Irsan Prawira Julius Jioe, Tzong-Ru Lee

This essay is a basic introduction to Taiwan’s vibrant small and medium enterprises (SMEs). In what follows, we define SMEs, provide an overview of their importance to Taiwan’s economy, explain SME organization and management, and share case studies of two successful SMEs. SMEs are businesses whose employees are below a certain limit. The European Union limits small enterprises to fifty people and medium-sized enterprises to 250 people. In contrast, Taiwan’s government separates SMEs in...

Feature Article

Postcolonial Religious Conflict in Southeast Asia

by Matthew Kosuta

“All religions teach people to be good people,” or so the Thai saying goes. This fits in with the general belief throughout Southeast Asia that religion is a good thing—though of course each person believes his/her religion to be the highest good. It is not surprising, then, that religious belief and practice remain key elements in Southeast Asian private and public life, with secularism little more than a theory. Religion continues to define the majority of people’s sense of self in Sou...

Feature Article

Understanding Democracy, Security, and Change in Post-2015 Myanmar

by Moe Thuzar

Developments in Myanmar, epitomized by images of long-oppressed Nobel Peace Prize recipient Aung San Suu Kyi, now in high office, have recently attracted great interest in how the country is emerging from decades of slow decline under authoritarian rule. When the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) government initiated wide-ranging reforms in 2011, a number of potential foreign investors began to conceptualize Myanmar as a “last frontier” market replete with promise...

New to EAA?

Before viewing the full archives, view Editor’s Choice Articles, handpicked by EAA Editor, Lucien Ellington, which provide a good overview of EAA and introduction for new readers.