Japan's history textbooks in English

[Otaku]

I ripped this link from another thread cuz' I thought it deserved its own thread...

http://www.je-kaleidoscope.jp/

This site has translated sections of from the 8 MEXT-approved Japanese JHS history books.

[Otaku]

http://www.je-kaleidoscope.jp/english/pdf/osak52eg.pdf

Nanking: p22
Japan goes to war: p26
Pearl Harbor: p26
Battle of Okinawa: p28
Himeyuri Girls: p28
Hiroshima/Nagasaki: p29

Comfort women: ???
Unit 731: ???
Baatan March: ???

[gsuiris]

The only thing about looking at these books is that I remember my US history book in high school not covering Internment Camps, treatment of the American Indians in multiple ways, etc., Some of it I learned through independent reading, other in upper division history courses in university.

Even my university Intro to American History text glossed over some of the bad things, or maybe it was the teacher that did that. I didn't read all of the assigned materials.

Yes it would be nice if everything was mentioned, but there has to be a limit to everything. I'm sure it would help if the books were actually longer and had more text...... I know my textbooks back home always weighed a ton, per book.

[Paul]

Yes it would be nice if everything was mentioned, but there has to be a limit to everything. I'm sure it would help if the books were actually longer and had more text...... I know my textbooks back home always weighed a ton, per book.

The highlighted part is a common excuse made by Social Studies teacher's here when asked about the "why" they don't teach more about what happened during WWII and Japan's part in the war. They mention that Japan has well over 2,000 years of history to cover and WWII is just a drop in the bucket in comparison to the rest of Japanese history and they only have so much time to cover it all.

[jessen100]

as a proposed counter argument, you could mention the fact that today we live in a worldwide society and in this day and age, as a citizen of the world it is far more important to understand the history of japan in relation to the rest of the world in the past ~100 years rather then who killed who 1000 years ago.

run on sentence long enough?

[Paul]

as a proposed counter argument, you could mention the fact that today we live in a worldwide society and in this day and age, as a citizen of the world it is far more important to understand the history of japan in relation to the rest of the world in the past ~100 years rather then who killed who 1000 years ago.

run on sentence long enough?

You see that would make sense so it would never happen. You are preaching to the choir.

[sonofobed]

gsirius, we learned about the Trail of tears and killing the buffalo that destroyed the Native Americans' way of life.

As for the internment camps, we never really studied much past WWI in the history books in HS. Focused primarily on the history of Europe, the Renaissance, the Great Enlightenment, and the Industrial Revolution.

Also, internment camps were relatively mild compared to slavery, which was studied in depth too.

Once hilarious footnote in the American history is how we got owned in the War of 1812. Most of the time, its just a quick note that there was a war, the British ransacked DC, and it ended up as a draw (kind of).

[Richard_BenoitEnglipedia Drone]

"After the annexation of Korea, Japan concluded a land survey in Korea. Many peasents lost their land due to claims that ownership was unclear."
p.5

Has to be one of my favorite nuggets so far....say whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?

[Richard_BenoitEnglipedia Drone]

http://www.je-kaleidoscope.jp/english/pdf/osak52eg.pdf

pg. 28 on Okinawa is pretty good for a JHS text, me thinks. "FORCED suicides" and the like. "Horrific" is also a word I would use!