PDF Ebook Japan Through the Looking Glass

We recognize that everyone will certainly need various book to review. The requirements will certainly depend on how they collaborate with. When they require the resources from the various other nation, we will not let them really feel so difficult. We offer the books from abroad quickly based upon the soft documents offered in web link checklists. All publications that we offer are in easy ways to connect and get, as the Japan Through The Looking Glass in soft data in this site.

Japan Through the Looking Glass

PDF Ebook Japan Through the Looking Glass

Understanding is a procedure that will certainly be undergone by all individuals in every age. In this instance, we have always guides that need to be accumulated and also review. Japan Through The Looking Glass is just one of the books that we constantly advise for you in learning. This is the way how you find out pertaining to the subject. When you have the presence of guides, you should see exactly how this publication is really suggested.

Yet, when a publication is very popular, it will run out swiftly. It is one of the matters that you need to consider. After walking for much ranges to get this publication, it will not assure you to find it. Sometimes, you will not discover it in some shelfs. So, it will be much better for you to obtain guide in this place. By just clicking the link and locate the book rapidly, you can wait and also begin to read. This is just what you can feel so happy to make far better for getting the certified source to read.

The book appearance is additionally good enough. Also there is wise words to not to evaluate the book from its cover. Yet, when the cover has been intriguing, it will reasonably attract you to review the inside or web content of guide. Moreover, the choice of words and also organize to be title is really influencing. It will certainly specify just what you the writer will certainly utter to the visitors. Those components are suitable sufficient with the principle of this Japan Through The Looking Glass So, you might not need to be worried about that.

Various other factors are that this book is created by a motivating writer that has professionalism to write and also make a publication. Nonetheless, the product is basic but meaningful. It does not use the difficult as well as difficult words to recognize. The content that is provided is actually significant. You can take some remarkable reasons of reviewing Japan Through The Looking Glass when you have begun reviewing his publication intelligently.

Review

“A well-informed analysis of Japanese culture and society.”―The Independent“A disarming, engaging, and provocative book.”―Andrew Barshay, University of California, Berkeley“A well-informed analysis of Japanese culture and society.”—The Independent“A disarming, engaging, and provocative book.”—Andrew Barshay, University of California, Berkeley

Read more

About the Author

Alan Macfarlane is Professor of Anthropology at Cambridge. He has often visited and taught in Japan. He is the author of The Glass Bathyscaphe and Japan Through the Looking Glass.

Read more

Product details

Paperback: 288 pages

Publisher: Profile Books; Main edition (February 1, 2009)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 1861979673

ISBN-13: 978-1861979674

Product Dimensions:

5.2 x 0.8 x 8 inches

Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review:

3.4 out of 5 stars

6 customer reviews

Amazon Best Sellers Rank:

#719,983 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

In anticipation of an upcoming trip to Japan, I read Cambridge anthropologist Alan Macfarlane's Japan Through the Looking Glass. Macfarlane is a relatively a relative latecomer to Japan, having arrived there for the first time only in 1990, although he’s been back several times, in addition to reflecting upon what he saw and learned there. Macfarlane completed his anthropological fieldwork in Nepal and he’s written a great deal about early modern England. He's a keen student of the transition to modernity and the early theorists who dealt with that change from Montesquieu to Maitland, including Adam Smith, Tocqueville, Malthus, Marx, and others who have attempted to explain the advent of modernity. It was with this background that Macfarlane approached Japan, and he found that Japan confounded many of the characteristic dichotomies that classical theorists had developed about modern versus traditional societies.The main theme of Japan Through the Looking Glass is that nothing seems quite as it first appears in Japanese culture; indeed, even upon closer examination, paradoxes and uncertainties abound. As Macfarlane notes, many outward similarities exist with Great Britain. Both are island nations, both have a feudal history, both have a long history of a strong work ethic, and both were the first to industrialize in their regions. But as Macfarlane points out, despite the similarities, westerners have a continuing challenge in understanding how Japan works.For instance, Japan has a mix of individualism and status relationships. It is a modern (often hyper-modern) capitalist society, yet the profit motive is not glorified. Individuals in the sense of Western individualism don’t exist. Instead, people are defined by relationships. People think in terms of relationships and emotions rather than in terms of logic whenever dealing with other people. Thus, while the Japanese can be quite reticent in speech and seemingly cold, in their observation of the subtlest behaviors and assessments of responses they’re finely nuanced and responsive. As to religion, in a land filled with temples and shrines, the Japanese are, according to Macfarlane, some of the least religious people in the world. If we measure religiosity by belief in a soul, the afterlife, or belief in God, we find few Japanese adhere to these beliefs. The Japanese perceive little difference between nature and culture, and none between the natural and the supernatural. This does not mean that the native Shinto religion, Confucianism, and Buddhism have not had an effect, but rather than suffer a transformation by any one religion, Japanese culture has transformed the religions to fit Japan. Thus, Zen Buddhism lies a far distance from the more traditional Buddhism of South Asia. This lack of distinction between nature and culture also helps us appreciate Japanese attitudes towards nature and the beauty of ephemeral things like cherry blossoms and the phases of the moon. Macfarlane even ventures into the difficult question of why, when Japanese became a conquering military power in the 1930s, there were so many instances of the Japanese atrocities. How did such an otherwise docile people, who have an extremely low crime rate and few incidents of criminal violence, turn into war criminals? Macfarlane, adopting the opinions of some others who have considered this paradox, suggests that the perception of extreme differences between native Japanese and others accounts for this stark dichotomy. But it remains in some sense another one of the enigmas of Japan.Macfarlane has an open, inquisitive mind that is well trained in attempting to understand how societies work. He readily admits that Japan has confounded his preconceived notions about the transformation to modernity and the role of the Axial religions in modern cultures. In this way, he serves as an outstanding guide him for a venture into understanding Japan and the Japanese. If you're looking for us a sink, a well constructed and broad ranging work on the enigma of Japan, I highly recommend this book to you.

Okay, admittedly I have not read the entire book yet, for I was most interested in the "Beliefs" section. I know some Japanese mythology, but I wanted to learn more about the "real-life" Shinto and Japanese religion. Of course beliefs will vary from person to person, but his claim that the Japanese do not believe in a soul or an afterlife contradicts other things I've read about the religion. Buddhism believes in an afterlife, and while some myths suggest the afterlife, Yomi, is somewhat like Hades, but there is also the idea of returning to nature, becoming a spirit, and so one and so forth, which this book did briefly touch on. I could be wrong, but this book goes against other things I've read, so it was a bit of a disappointment.

A little too superficial. I would have much preferred a clearer discussion of actual beliefs, rather than what I got.

There are many books telling us why Japanese are like they are and why they have become like they are. This book is in the tradition of The Chrysanthemum and the Sword, but written just a couple of years ago. Its style is non-scientific but thoughtful. It is a very easy read, but also a good read.

My title says it all. This book contains interesting ideas. The author occasionally whips up sentences like "As I came to learn a little more about Japan, I began to have the sense that if the economy dominates America, law dominates England, religion India, culture China, then one of the central threads of Japan is aesthetics." Such statements, though impressionistic and hardly empirical, provide interesting prompts for further reflection on the topic at hand. This may be taken to be a good thing.However, one gets the impression that the author is romanticising Japan. The overall impression of Japan that he conveys is positive at best and neutral at worst. He often gives a general statement or observation about the country, which is fine. The problem I have with his approach is two-fold: firstly, the way in which he depicts this observation is frequently one-sided; secondly, his observations do not always strike me as painting the full picture of Japan. For the first point, I cannot say for sure whether it is because the author is consciously romanticising Japan, or whether he is just being generous by trying to find explanations for why the Japanese have such-and-such a characteristic. With regards to the second point, I personally feel that it is as though his materials were deliberately selected to portray the Japanese in a sympathetic light. However, as this book appears to be, simply, an account of his experiences, perhaps it was just the result of the way his personal journey played out for him. That I do not know.Another criticism I have about this book is that the author makes certain claims based on wrong assumptions. For example, he says, "In so far as there were any kinds of 'rank' groupings in the past, they (the Japanese, we assume) were original and unparalleled in other civilisations." He then goes on to give this "'rank' grouping" as "lords, peasants, merchants and craftsmen". Two factual errors here: firstly, the hierarchy is wrong. It should be: lords, peasants, craftsmen, then merchants. He got the last two mixed up. Secondly, this was hardly "original and unparalleled". It was copied from the Chinese structure. The only way to exculpate the author is to say that we really cannot tell for sure where his original topic sentence ("original and unparalleled") is supposed to extend to. Maybe we are meant to take into account his subsequent additions, like "The differentiations were porous, allowing people to move between strata on the basis of talent and good fortune." But then we have to question his clarity of expression. Besides, this second assertion is also factually wrong because social distinctions were also porous in China thanks to the imperial examination system. Finally, he also mixes up the different Indo-european classes when he uses them as a comparison.Then, his book is also full of contradictions. He likes to say something about the Japanese, and then turn it over by asserting that the opposite can be said to be true too. Maybe he's trying to demonstrate that the Japanese are not one-dimensional, or trying to show us that there are multiple perspectives to things, but the final effect is that he sounds muddled.Finally, the overall sense that one gets from the way the author writes is that he is sloppy. At one point he starts out by saying, "From one perspective it appears that there are no individuals in Japan", and then proceeds to give an "example of the lack of any fixed concept of the individual" by using the fact that the Japanese in the past had different names at different stages of their lives. He also mentions, in parentheses, that people in Vietnam and Thailand had this practice as well. Two problems arise from here: 1) there is a slide in core idea: from there being "no individuals in Japan", it becomes "a lack of any fixed concept of the individual" 2) although he qualifies himself, saying that this practice is not unique to Japan, this then leads us to wonder why he started making this point in the first place (since this question then seems to be more of a say, Asian vs. Western paradigm rather than a Japanese vs. non-Japanese one). Thus, one feels that he is rather messy in the way he expresses himself, and does not always get a crystal-clear idea of what exactly he is trying to get at.To end off, I feel that this book may be an interesting skim. The author scatters interesting conclusions here and there, and often includes observations from other writers on Japan. However, it does not warrant a closer read because of the not-always-reliable claims, and the less-than-rigorous manner in which the author structures his arguments and makes his points. (Oh, and I cannot resist pointing out one last inaccuracy: the Japanese personal name is not necessarily "tucked away unobtrusively at the end"--on the contrary, in Japanese, the most important piece of information is more often than not found at the... end.)

I lived in Japan for 3 years and read this after that period. Backwards I guess. Its not a bad book if you are interested about Japan and what makes it tick. For me its a bit of a boring read but I guess thats too be expected with non-fiction books.

Japan Through the Looking Glass PDF
Japan Through the Looking Glass EPub
Japan Through the Looking Glass Doc
Japan Through the Looking Glass iBooks
Japan Through the Looking Glass rtf
Japan Through the Looking Glass Mobipocket
Japan Through the Looking Glass Kindle

Japan Through the Looking Glass PDF

Japan Through the Looking Glass PDF

Japan Through the Looking Glass PDF

Japan Through the Looking Glass PDF