UH Press

Oshiro Tatsuhiro’s The Cocktail Party

Posted on September 20, 2011 by stephchun

The Cocktail Party, a play by Oshiro Tatsuhiro based on his Akutagawa Prize–winning book, will have its world premiere in Hawai‘i next month.

The first performance is on Wednesday, October 26, at 7 pm at the Hawai‘i Okinawa Center (in Waipio). Regular admission is $15; admission for seniors (65 or over) and students is $10. For ticket information, call 676-5400 or e-mail info@huoa.org. The second performance is on Thursday, October 27, at 7:30 pm at Orvis Auditorium (University of Hawai‘i–Mānoa campus). Admission is free. For ticket information, call 956-8246. Copies of Living Spirit: Literature and Resurgence in Okinawa and Voices from Okinawa will be available for purchase at $20 each at both performances. The Cocktail Party was published in Living Spirit, and Mr. Oshiro will be on hand to sign copies of the book.

The Orvis event will include a panel discussion of the humanities issues in the play. This portion of the project is sponsored by the Hawai‘i Council for the Humanities with support from the “We the People” initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Mr. Oshiro will be participating, along with Frank Stewart and Katsunori Yamazato, the editors of Living Spirit.

This is the third in a series of events MANOA Journal has produced with the Manoa Readers/Theatre Ensemble and UHM Outreach College. Other sponsors include the UHM Center for Okinawan Studies, the University of Hawai‘i Japan Studies Endowment, the Manoa Foundation, and the UHM College of Languages, Linguistics, and Literature. Cosponsor of the HOC performance is the Hawai‘i United Okinawan Association.

For information about Mr. Oshiro, Living Spirit, or Voices from Okinawa, please contact Frank Stewart at 956-3070 or write to mjournal-l@lists.hawaii.edu. See http://manoaokinawaissue.wordpress.com/ for further information.

UH Press Adds 3 New Publishers to Its Distribution Program

Posted on September 15, 2011 by stephchun

UH Press now distributes these fine publishers of Asia books: Seoul Selection, MerwinAsia, and iPRECIATION.

Asian Theatre Journal, vol. 28, no. 2 (2011)

Posted on September 15, 2011 by alphabex

Kabuki watercolor drawing by A.C. Scott (Courtesy of Martha Johnson) — Kabuki watercolor drawing by A. C. Scott (Courtesy of Martha Johnson)

From the Editor, v

Addendum to Modern Chinese Drama in English: A Selective Bibliography
Siyuan Liu and Kevin J. Wetmore Jr., 279

SYMPOSIUM:
FOUNDERS OF THE FIELD

(First Generation Asian Theatre Scholars in the United States)
edited by Siyuan Liu and David Jortner
Continue reading “Asian Theatre Journal, vol. 28, no. 2 (2011)”

Upcoming Author Events in September

Posted on September 14, 2011 by stephchun

Carlos Andrade, author of Ha‘ena: Through the Eyes of Ancestors, will discuss how ancient and other points of view accumulate over time to create a unique story and sense of place. The event, “Telling the Story of Place: Ha‘ena,” will be held at the Kaua‘i Historical Society on Friday, September 16, at 5:30 pm. For more details, go to http://kauaihistoricalsociety.org/events/.

John Clark will be at Kaimuki Library on Sunday, September 18, to talk about his latest book, Hawaiian Surfing: Traditions from the Past. Go to HawaiiNewsNow for more information: http://urbanhonolulu.hawaiinewsnow.com/news/arts-culture/66825-meet-hawaiian-surfing-author-kaimuki-library.

The Japanese American National Museum will host a discussion by ShiPu Wang, author of Becoming American? The Art and Identity Crisis of Yasuo Kuniyoshi, on Saturday, September 24, at 2:00 pm. Check the JANM event calendar: http://www.janm.org/events/2011/09/24/ibecoming-american-the-art-and-identity-crisis-of-yasuo-kuniyoshii-by-shipu-wang/.

The Making of Burakumin in Modern Japan

Posted on September 12, 2011 by stephchun

The burakumin, Japan’s largest minority group, have been the focus of an extensive yet strikingly homogenous body of Japanese language research. The master narrative in much of this work typically links burakumin to premodern occupational groups which engaged in a number of socially polluting tasks like tanning and leatherwork. This master narrative, however, when subjected to close scrutiny, tends to raise more questions than it answers, particularly for the historian. Is there really firm historical continuity between premodern outcaste and modern burakumin communities? Is the discrimination experienced by historic and contemporary outcaste communities actually the same? Does the way burakumin frame their own experience significantly affect mainstream understandings of their plight? Embodying Difference: The Making of Burakumin in Modern Japan, by Timothy D. Amos, is the result of a decade-and-a-half-long search for answers to these questions.

September 2011 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3579-8 / $33.00 (PAPER)

Asian Perspectives Back Issues Now Online

Posted on September 9, 2011 by UH Press

The full run of Asian Perspectives: The Journal of Archaeology for Asia and the Pacific is now available online. All except the latest volume of AP can now be freely accessed in the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa Library’s ScholarSpace digital repository, while the most current volumes (from vol. 39, 2000) are available online for subscribers to Project MUSE. To facilitate access to the individual contributions in the earliest volumes, we have inserted links to them from the AP Author/Title Index to vols. 1–39 (1957–2000) republished on this blog.

Continue reading “Asian Perspectives Back Issues Now Online”

Interviews with Gerald Horne

Posted on September 9, 2011 by stephchun

Gerald Horne discussed his new book, Fighting in Paradise: Labor Unions, Racism, and Communists in the Making of Modern Hawai‘i, on KPFK 90.7FM’s Sojourner Truth with Margaret Prescod. To listen to the program, visit the KPFK online audio archive: http://www.archive.org/details/Sojournertruthradio090711.

In July Horne spoke extensively about Fighting in Paradise at politicalaffairs.net. Listen to the podcast: http://www.politicalaffairs.net/new-podcast-interview-with-historian-gerald-horne/.

Gerald Horne is also the author of The White Pacific: U.S. Imperialism and Black Slavery in the South Seas after the Civil War.

Photo: politicalaffairs.net

Journal of World History, vol. 22, no. 3 (2011)

Posted on September 9, 2011 by alphabex

ARTICLES

The Spiritual Journey of an Independent Thinker: The Conversion of Li Zhizao to Catholicism
Yu Liu, 433

Li Zhizao (d. 1630) was one of the most famous early Chinese Roman Catholics intimately associated with Matteo Ricci (1552–1610), the founder of the Jesuit mission in China. In spite of his fame, Li’s religious experience has not so far been adequately investigated. To understand this crucially important aspect of his life and the related early modern East-West intellectual interaction, this article looks closely into questions about his conspicuously late formal entry into the Church, the peculiar circumstances of his agreement to receive baptism in 1610, and the complex implications of his logically deduced theistic belief for both Confucianism and Christianity. Continue reading “Journal of World History, vol. 22, no. 3 (2011)”

Buddhist Healing, Chinese Knowledge, Islamic Formulas, and Wounds of War

Posted on September 8, 2011 by stephchun

Confluences of Medicine in Medieval Japan: Buddhist Healing, Chinese Knowledge, Islamic Formulas, and Wounds of War, by Andrew Edmund Goble, is the first book-length exploration in English of issues of medicine and society in premodern Japan. This multifaceted study weaves a rich tapestry of Buddhist healing practices, Chinese medical knowledge, Asian pharmaceuticals, and Islamic formulas as it elucidates their appropriation and integration into medieval Japanese medicine. It expands the parameters of the study of medicine in East Asia, which to date has focused on the subject in individual countries, and introduces the dynamics of interaction and exchange that coursed through the East Asian macro-culture.

September 2011 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3500-2 / $52.00 (CLOTH)

The Healing Heart of Japanese Women’s Rituals

Posted on September 8, 2011 by stephchun

Bringing Zen Home: The Healing Heart of Japanese Women’s Rituals, by Paula Arai, brings a fresh perspective to Zen scholarship by uncovering a previously unrecognized but nonetheless vibrant strand of lay practice. The creativity of domestic Zen is evident in the ritual activities that women fashion, weaving tradition and innovation, to gain a sense of wholeness and balance in the midst of illness, loss, and anguish. Their rituals include chanting, ingesting elixirs and consecrated substances, and contemplative approaches that elevate cleaning, cooking, child-rearing, and caring for the sick and dying into spiritual disciplines. Creating beauty is central to domestic Zen and figures prominently in Arai’s analyses.

September 2011 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3535-4 / $52.00 (CLOTH)

Transformations of Cultural Traditions in Oceania

Posted on August 31, 2011 by stephchun

Changing Contexts, Shifting Meanings: Transformations of Cultural Traditions in Oceania, edited by Elfriede Hermann, sheds new light on processes of cultural transformation at work in Oceania and analyzes them as products of interrelationships between culturally created meanings and specific contexts. In a series of inspiring essays, noted scholars of the region examine these interrelationships for insight into how cultural traditions are shaped on an ongoing basis.

September 2011 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3366-4 / $58.00 (CLOTH)

New in the Dimensions of Asian Spirituality Series

Posted on August 31, 2011 by stephchun

Karma has become a household word in the modern world, where it is associated with the belief in rebirth determined by one’s deeds in earlier lives. This belief was and is widespread in the Indian subcontinent as is the word “karma” itself. In lucid and accessible prose, this book, by Johannes Bronkhorst, presents karma in its historical, cultural, and religious context.