full screen
Home > Overcome by Modernity
Overcome by Modernity

Overcome by Modernity


     0     
5
4
3
2
1



International Edition


About the Book

In the decades between the two World Wars, Japan made a dramatic entry into the modern age, expanding its capital industries and urbanizing so quickly as to rival many long-standing Western industrial societies. How the Japanese made sense of the sudden transformation and the subsequent rise of mass culture is the focus of Harry Harootunian's fascinating inquiry into the problems of modernity. Here he examines the work of a generation of Japanese intellectuals who, like their European counterparts, saw modernity as a spectacle of ceaseless change that uprooted the dominant historical culture from its fixed values and substituted a culture based on fantasy and desire. Harootunian not only explains why the Japanese valued philosophical understandings of these events, often over sociological or empirical explanations, but also locates Japan's experience of modernity within a larger global process marked by both modernism and fascism.

What caught the attention of Japanese thinkers was how the production of desire actually threatened historical culture. These intellectuals sought to overcome the materialism and consumerism associated with the West, particularly the United States. They proposed versions of a modernity rooted in cultural authenticity and aimed at infusing meaning into everyday life, whether through art, memory, or community. Harootunian traces these ideas in the works of Yanagita Kunio, Tosaka Jun, Gonda Yasunosuke, and Kon Wajiro, among others, and relates their arguments to those of such European writers as George Simmel, Siegfried Kracauer, Walter Benjamin, and Georges Bataille.

Harootunian shows that Japanese and European intellectuals shared many of the same concerns, and also stresses that neither Japan's involvement with fascism nor its late entry into the capitalist, industrial scene should cause historians to view its experience of modernity as an oddity. The author argues that strains of fascism ran throughout most every country in Europe and in many ways resulted from modernizing trends in general. This book, written by a leading scholar of modern Japan, amounts to a major reinterpretation of the nature of Japan's modernity.


About the Author: Harry Harootunian is Chair of the East Asian Studies Department and Professor of History at New York University. He is the author of many books, including History's Disquiet: Modernity, Cultural Practice, and the Questions of Everyday Life, Things Seen and Unseen: Discourse and Ideology in Tokugawa Nativism, and, with B. Silberman, Japan in Crisis (Princeton)


Best Sellers



Product Details
  • ISBN-13: 9780691095486
  • Publisher: Princeton University Press
  • Publisher Imprint: Princeton University Press
  • Depth: 25
  • Language: English
  • Returnable: Y
  • Spine Width: 29 mm
  • Weight: 716 gr
  • ISBN-10: 0691095485
  • Publisher Date: 15 Jan 2002
  • Binding: Paperback
  • Height: 232 mm
  • No of Pages: 480
  • Series Title: English
  • Sub Title: History, Culture, and Community in Interwar Japan
  • Width: 155 mm


Similar Products

Add Photo
Add Photo

Customer Reviews

REVIEWS      0     
Click Here To Be The First to Review this Product
Overcome by Modernity
Princeton University Press -
Overcome by Modernity
Writing guidlines
We want to publish your review, so please:
  • keep your review on the product. Review's that defame author's character will be rejected.
  • Keep your review focused on the product.
  • Avoid writing about customer service. contact us instead if you have issue requiring immediate attention.
  • Refrain from mentioning competitors or the specific price you paid for the product.
  • Do not include any personally identifiable information, such as full names.

Overcome by Modernity

Required fields are marked with *

Review Title*
Review
    Add Photo Add up to 6 photos
    Would you recommend this product to a friend?
    Tag this Book Read more
    Does your review contain spoilers?
    What type of reader best describes you?
    I agree to the terms & conditions
    You may receive emails regarding this submission. Any emails will include the ability to opt-out of future communications.

    CUSTOMER RATINGS AND REVIEWS AND QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS TERMS OF USE

    These Terms of Use govern your conduct associated with the Customer Ratings and Reviews and/or Questions and Answers service offered by Booksbay (the "CRR Service").


    By submitting any content to Booksbay, you guarantee that:
    • You are the sole author and owner of the intellectual property rights in the content;
    • All "moral rights" that you may have in such content have been voluntarily waived by you;
    • All content that you post is accurate;
    • You are at least 13 years old;
    • Use of the content you supply does not violate these Terms of Use and will not cause injury to any person or entity.
    You further agree that you may not submit any content:
    • That is known by you to be false, inaccurate or misleading;
    • That infringes any third party's copyright, patent, trademark, trade secret or other proprietary rights or rights of publicity or privacy;
    • That violates any law, statute, ordinance or regulation (including, but not limited to, those governing, consumer protection, unfair competition, anti-discrimination or false advertising);
    • That is, or may reasonably be considered to be, defamatory, libelous, hateful, racially or religiously biased or offensive, unlawfully threatening or unlawfully harassing to any individual, partnership or corporation;
    • For which you were compensated or granted any consideration by any unapproved third party;
    • That includes any information that references other websites, addresses, email addresses, contact information or phone numbers;
    • That contains any computer viruses, worms or other potentially damaging computer programs or files.
    You agree to indemnify and hold Booksbay (and its officers, directors, agents, subsidiaries, joint ventures, employees and third-party service providers, including but not limited to Bazaarvoice, Inc.), harmless from all claims, demands, and damages (actual and consequential) of every kind and nature, known and unknown including reasonable attorneys' fees, arising out of a breach of your representations and warranties set forth above, or your violation of any law or the rights of a third party.


    For any content that you submit, you grant Booksbay a perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free, transferable right and license to use, copy, modify, delete in its entirety, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from and/or sell, transfer, and/or distribute such content and/or incorporate such content into any form, medium or technology throughout the world without compensation to you. Additionally,  Booksbay may transfer or share any personal information that you submit with its third-party service providers, including but not limited to Bazaarvoice, Inc. in accordance with  Privacy Policy


    All content that you submit may be used at Booksbay's sole discretion. Booksbay reserves the right to change, condense, withhold publication, remove or delete any content on Booksbay's website that Booksbay deems, in its sole discretion, to violate the content guidelines or any other provision of these Terms of Use.  Booksbay does not guarantee that you will have any recourse through Booksbay to edit or delete any content you have submitted. Ratings and written comments are generally posted within two to four business days. However, Booksbay reserves the right to remove or to refuse to post any submission to the extent authorized by law. You acknowledge that you, not Booksbay, are responsible for the contents of your submission. None of the content that you submit shall be subject to any obligation of confidence on the part of Booksbay, its agents, subsidiaries, affiliates, partners or third party service providers (including but not limited to Bazaarvoice, Inc.)and their respective directors, officers and employees.

    Accept

    New Arrivals



    Inspired by your browsing history


    Your review has been submitted!

    You've already reviewed this product!