Events by year: 2021

25 March 2021

British and Japanese Charities Historically Compared

Since the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake in 1995, Japanese people have started to encounter unfamiliar words and deeds such as ‘volunteering’ and ‘charity’ on the TV news and in magazines and newspapers. Before that disaster, the existence of charity in Japan was rarely noticed, although of course that does not mean that there was no indigenous tradition or practice of charity. Professor Shusaku Kanazawa will talk about the peculiarity of Britain in terms of charity through the lens of some Japanese observers in the 19th and 20th centuries.

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23 March 2021

Poverty in the UK and Japan

The “invisibility” of poverty in Japanese society has long been one of the reasons for the underestimation of this social issue by the authorities. Nevertheless, data from the OECD reveals that the poverty rate in Japan (15.7% in 2018) is actually higher than that in the UK (11.7%). In this talk, Dr Aya Abe described how Japan “discovered” the problem of child poverty and how social science informed policymakers. Then, Dr David Gordon discussed the UK’s experience of child poverty, its anti-poverty policies, and some of the lessons that have been learned from poverty research.

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18 March 2021

Queer Cinema: the Global Context and Japan

Queer cinema has evolved significantly over the past few decades, becoming a new mainstream cinema option, and raising awareness of the experiences of the LGBTQ+ community worldwide. There has been a remarkable increase in the number of queer films produced recently by activists and other related communities. Queer film festivals nowadays play an important role not only in screening non-commercial films but also in supporting the LGBTQ+ community. In this webinar, Professor Karl Schoonover discussed how queer cinema has evolved globally. Dr Yuka Kanno then explored the relationship between activist films and queer communities in Japan.

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2 March 2021

10 years from the Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami

On 11 March 2011 Japan experienced the Tohoku Earthquake, the most powerful earthquake ever recorded in the country. The quake was followed by a massive 120-foot-high tsunami smashing into the coast of north-east Japan. The tsunami wiped out many coastal communities, dragging houses, cars, trees and people on its way. This natural disaster resulted in the greatest loss of life Japan has suffered from a single event since the end of World War II. In this webinar, British journalists Jon Snow and Richard Lloyd Parry spoke about their different experiences reporting the tragedy, describing the impact of the disaster as they witnessed it on the ground.

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26 February 2021

Kintsugi - The Poetic Mend

The Japanese repair technique of kintsugi restores beauty and function to broken objects, leaving visible lines that appear as solid gold. These golden seams speak of kintsugi’s innate metaphor of fortitude, individuality, and the strength to be found in overcoming loss and hardship. Kintsugi: The Poetic Mend tells the story of this remarkable art form through its technical and practical elements, its origins, and its connections to today’s world. With a Daiwa Foundation grant, Dr Kemske interviewed maki-e artists and ceramicists in Japan, and their stories express kintsugi’s deep-rooted place in Japanese culture, giving the reader an experience of kintsugi on a personal level.

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23 February 2021

Ainu Mosir - a movie starring Ainu people

The film Ainu Mosir, directed by Japanese filmmaker Takeshi Fukunaga, depicts an Ainu boy’s life story in modern society, and shows his ambivalence to his traditional Ainu heritage. The film gives a multifaceted picture of the Ainu community and culture, as well as the generational differences within it. As a Japanese filmmaker, Fukunaga looks for ways to tell his stories truthfully. The result is a fictional film starring Ainu non-actors playing. Fukunaga hopes that the film gives Ainu people a voice and helps to create a better understanding of them. In this talk chaired by Alastair Phillips, the film will be examined from various perspectives.

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19 February 2021

New COVID-19 Variants: The Race between Vaccines and the Virus

As vaccination campaigns began to be rolled out in the UK and other countries, new strains of the virus emerged. The number of coronavirus cases in the UK has dramatically increased since December, with many attributed to one of the new variants, while two other important variants have emerged in South Africa and Brazil. All these strains have been identified in Japan, where the infection rate is also increasing. There are growing concerns about whether existing vaccines are effective against the new strains. In this webinar, Dr Ono from Imperial College London explained the relationship between vaccines, new variants, and immunity.

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18 February 2021

Science communication from Fukushima to COVID

After the Fukushima nuclear accident, the Japanese government struggled to communicate to the public information about the situation and the likely radiation risks. By contrast, four days after the accident the UK Government’s CSA Sir John Beddington released a worst-case scenario of the accident and predictions. This enabled people in Japan to get reliable information. Following this experience, the Japanese government tried to develop a more robust framework for scientific advice, but were overwhelmed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The journalist Shigeyuki Koide explained from a journalist’s perspective why the Japanese government in 2011 failed to communicate the science. Professor Cope discussed the British government’s approach of communicating promptly to the public.

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12 February 2021

シャーロック・ホームズで読み解く英国

名探偵といえば誰もがシャーロック・ホームズを思い浮かべますが、シャーロック・ホームズについてどれほどご存知でしょうか。シャーロック・ホームズが活躍した１９世紀末の英国へ想いを馳せ、シャーロック・ホームズを学問として研究してしまう「シャーロキアン」の観点から、推理小説として楽しむにとどまらず、英国をより深く知るきっかけとして読み解いていきます。さらに、シャーロック・ホームズと日本の知られざるつながりについてもご紹介いたします。

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28 January 2021

1945年以降の「日本の写真作品」

This talk will provide an introduction to Japanese photography. It traces developments chronologically from post-war Realism to the diversity of contemporary photography. Fritsch focusses on selected photographers whose work she has researched in depth for her recent publication, Ravens & Red Lipstick: Japanese Photography since 1945 (Thames & Hudson/Seigensha, 2018) and whom she knows personally. These include Kawada Kikuji, Hosoe Eikoh, Moriyama Daido, Ishiuchi Miyako, Yoneda Tomoko, and Sawada Tomoko, amongst others.

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26 January 2021

Pleasure in Profit

In the first comprehensive study of the birth of Japanese commercial publishing, Dr Laura Moretti investigates the world of popular literature. She marshals new data on the magnitude of the seventeenth-century publishing business and highlights the diversity and porosity of its publishing genres. Moretti explores how booksellers sparked interest among readers and demonstrates how they tantalized consumers. In this book launch, Dr Moretti presented some of the key arguments that she puts forward in ‘Pleasure in Profit’. She also introduced a number of primary sources and fleshed out the wealth of information packed in this monograph.

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20 January 2021

Beyond Kawaii: Studying Japanese Femininities at Cambridge

Kawaii. The love of all things cute has become the dominant image of Japanese girls and women. Real Japanese women are, however, more complex. Some celebrate their uterus, others experiment with fashion and cross-dressing or embrace their chubbiness, and many struggle with motherhood. Some may even return as vengeful ghosts. This third collection of studies by young scholars from the University of Cambridge looks beyond the kawaii image and explores the diversity and complexity of being a Japanese woman in the new millennium. It explores gender issues in contemporary Japanese society by focusing on women’s lives and their identities in the twenty-first century.

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