Re-Contextualizing Foreign Influence in Japan’s Educational History: the (re)reception of John Dewey

Abstract

This work explores John Dewey's reception and re-reception in the Japanese context. Although Dewey's two month visit to Japan in the spring of 1919 coincided with the hopeful Taishō democracy movement, his ideas appear to have made little impact in a political, intellectual, and educational landscape dominated a complex interplay of traditional neo-Confucian, nativist, and German ideas. Yet the story does not end there: following World War II, there was a remarkable Dewey 'boom' across Japan lasting more than a decade that far surpassed Dewey's original reception in 1919. Here we find Dewey central to revamped reform debates and a focal point for the reinterpretation of Japan's prewar educational history. Given this curious resurgence-cum-paradox of increasing interest in Dewey, few national contexts would seem to hold more evidence than Japan in support of the idea that political and ideological shifts qualify definitions of what counts as educational 'knowledge'.

Revisiting the metaphor of the island: challenging ‘world culture’ from an island misunderstood

“…As discussed at the outset, it announced that the 'evil practices of the past shall be broken' and 'actions shall be based on international usage to strengthen imperial rule'. Despite an apparent similarity with a world culture prediction, these phrases did not signify shared consensus on the superiority of 'international' models (Rappleye 2010). While it is common for 'evil practices of the past' to be equated by Western scholars (often steeped in the assumptions of modernisation theory) with the totality of 'tradition', it was, in fact, understood domestically as a signal from the top for a large number of 'nativist' Japanese scholars to explicitly depart from two and half centuries of state-supported neo-Confucian and Buddhist (i.e., Chinese) thought sponsored by the recently toppled Tokugawa Shogunate (1603-1868).…”

“We Should Learn to Live, Learning is Power”: <i>Pyŏllara</i>, Night Schools and the Dilemma of Workers’ Education in Colonial Korea

“…42 The so-called "Pyŏllara saggŏn," a police investigation centering on the links with the Japanese leftist movement which occurred in the same year, made it clear that Pyŏllara was important to the left-wing cultural movement. 43 The incident was triggered by the Night School Association Fair hosted by Pyŏllara from July 2nd to 3rd, 1932. 44 It was planned as an event for the 6th anniversary of Pyŏllara, designed in line with the change of direction in KAPF's activities in 1930, which promoted the popularization of socialism using strategies that employed various genres of popular media (literature, 41 film, music, theatre, etc.).…”