あらすじ
The Heisei era saw gradual yet far-reaching transformations in Japanese society and culture. Globalization, shifting identities, evolving family structures, and changes in education and public discourse all reshaped everyday life, while popular culture-from manga and anime to foodways and sport-emerged as a powerful medium through which Japan engaged the world. How did Japanese society balance global pressures with cultural continuity? And what do these shifts reveal about Japan’s self-understanding at the turn of the twenty-first century? This volume, the fourth and final in the Examining Heisei Japan series, brings together influential essays on themes such as symbolic identity, the role of the public intellectual, cultural transmission, and the social implications of globalization, offering a wide-ranging view of the forces that shaped the era. The insights presented here remain essential for understanding Japanese society today.
Foreword
Preface
Part I Issues of Globalization
1. Aspects of Globalization in Contemporary Japan
2. Rethinking Our Response to September 11
3. Japan in a World of Rival Empires
4. Globalization and Japanese Identity
Part II Japanese Identity
1. Portending the 21st Century
2. The Religious Identity of the Japanese
3. The Japanese World View: Three Keys to Understanding
4. A Perspective on Archetypes and the Japanese Consciousness: The Elder, Youth, Male, and Female Archetypes
Part III The Symbolic Emperor System at a Crossroads
1. A Turning Point for the System of Emperor as Symbol: Bagehot, Emperor Shōwa, and Fukuzawa’s On the Imperial Family
Part IV The Roles of Intellectuals and the Media
1. The Intellectual Community of the Shōwa Era
2. Ishibashi Tanzan: A Coherent Liberal Thinker
3. The Polarization of the Japanese Media and the Need for Middle Ground
Part V Education and Human Resource Development
1. Development of Human Resources and the Japanese Economy
2. Japanese Experience in Engineering Education: A Historical Recollection
3. Back to Basics in Elementary Schooling
Part VI Labor, Women, Youth, and the Family
1. In Search of a New Kind of Equality
2. Parasite Singles Feed on Family System
Part VII A Shift in the View of Nature
1. The Great Hanshin Earthquake and Dysfunctional Japan
2. The Limits of Urbanism
Part VIII New Possibilities in Cultural Reception and Dissemination
1. Shared Japanese Culture-Manga Will Surpass Kōrin
2. The Domestication of Chinese Foodways in Contemporary Japan: Ramen and Peking Duck
3. The Olympics: Politicized Games That Serve as a Civilizing Force
Part IX Kurosawa Akira’s “Last Will”
1. An Interview with Kurosawa Akira
Chronology of the Heisei Era
About the Supervisor, Editors, Authors
作品考察・見どころ
平成という激動の三十年間、日本がいかにして自己を定義し直そうとしたのか。本書はその精神の軌跡を辿る壮大な思索の海です。単なる記録集に留まらず、グローバル化の荒波と固有の伝統が交錯する境界線で、知識人たちが絞り出した知の結晶がここにあります。天皇制や教育、さらには食文化に至るまで、多角的な視点から浮き彫りにされるのは、揺らぎながらも再生を期する日本人の生きた肖像に他なりません。 各界の碩学たちが綴る言葉の端々には、時代を見据える冷徹な眼差しと未来への切実な祈りが共鳴しています。特に黒澤明監督へのインタビューやマンガ文化の考察は、高尚な議論を日常の感性に引き寄せ、読者の魂を激しく揺さぶります。失われた時代を惜しむのではなく、現代を生き抜くための叡智を掴み取るための必読書。知的好奇心を極限まで刺激する、圧倒的な深度を備えた一冊です。
