A retrospective analysis of a wartime ?national character? study [1]

Suzuki, Peter T.

doi:10.1007/bf00264699

Cited by 31 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…Because the Japanese American researchers were mostly Nisei (second generation), they were able to draw upon their knowledge of Japanese culture to interpret the feelings of evacuees, while their fluency in English and their familiarity with white academic culture did enable them to transmit those interpretations effectively. As Suzuki (, , 1986) and others have demonstrated, however, the power dynamic was fraught and weighed heavily upon them as well (cf. Ichioka ; Hirabayshi 1999; & Yu, ).…”

Section: Conflicted Identities and Participant Observation In The Intmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This fact is all the more important, since The Spoilage (1946) and The Salvage (1952), two of the first books published after the cessation of hostilities, set the tone for the bulk of future scholarship. Although Thomas’ original goal was to measure various responses to forced migration, The Spoilage became in large part a study of approximately 18,000 so‐called “disloyal” internees located at Tule Lake, many of whom renounced their U.S. citizenship (see also Suzuki, , ; Miyamoto, ). Explicating political and social circumstances, she concentrated on “repressive measures” and the consequent “impairment” of citizenship for internees; she also discussed the “successive protest movements” that arose in response (but not the individuals who spearheaded such measures).…”

Section: Participant Observation and Quantitative Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Such rifts only exacerbated the difficulties that participant observers—as such data collectors were called—faced as part of their work. Indeed, scholars of Asian American history have documented the problems associated with this kind of work, including with respect to internment (see among others, Suzuki, , , ; Ichioka, ; Hirabayashi, ; Yu, ). Less familiar, however, are the subsequent career trajectories of some of these original Japanese American researchers, as well as the accounts of ways that their experience of internment continued to inform their work.…”

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confidence: 99%

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JAPANESE AMERICAN WARTIME EXPERIENCE, TAMOTSU SHIBUTANI AND METHODOLOGICAL INNOVATION, 1942–1978

Inouye¹

2012

J History Behavioral Science

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A case study of how wartime internment reverberated in the life and work of Japanese American intellectuals, this essay discusses the career and interests of Tamotsu Shibutani, a sociologist who began his training as part of Dorothy Swaine Thomas' Japanese American Evacuation and Resettlement Study (JERS). Though recent scholarship has noted some of the ethical problems that attended the use of Japanese American participant observers during the war, this essay concentrates instead on how interned intellectuals responded to their double role of both researcher (and intellectual) and object of study. I argue that in the case of Shibutani, his circumstances and identity shaped his scholarship, both as an academic endeavor and a political project. By tracking Shibutani's postwar scholarly activities, I show that his wartime experiences--as an internee, military officer, and participant-observer--reverberated in his sociological publications long after the war's end.

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Section: Conflicted Identities and Participant Observation In The Intmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Participant Observation and Quantitative Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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JAPANESE AMERICAN WARTIME EXPERIENCE, TAMOTSU SHIBUTANI AND METHODOLOGICAL INNOVATION, 1942–1978

Inouye¹

2012

J History Behavioral Science

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Ruth Benedict's Original Wartime Study of the Japanese

Kent

1994

Int J Japanese Sociology

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Benedict's classic work on Japanese society, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword (1946). is still cited frequently in studies on Japanese society and culture, despite the fact that it is now nearly 50 years since it was published. However, although this book has exerted enormous influence on subsequent generations of scholars, her research into the work on the Japanese that preceded the writing of Chrysanthemum. is virtually non‐existant. This paper first traces the process through which Benedict progressed during her war‐time study of cultures at a distance. It then examines the eventual report she wrote on the Japanese and the significance of this report. Benedict's report, which stresses the importance of “giri to one's name” within the code of Japanese ethics but devotes very little space to the discussion of “shame”. raises questions about the excessive attention devoted to repetitive references concerning her depiction of Japan as a “shame culture” by numerous social scientists. As this paper demonstrates through a consideration of her background research, the importance placed on the concept of “shame culture” by others was not shared by Benedict herself.

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