Japan's Carnival War
Mass Culture on the Home Front, 1937–1945

This cultural history of the Japanese home front during the Asia-Pacific War challenges ideas of the period as one of deprivation and repression.

Benjamin Uchiyama (Author)

9781316637449, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 19 March 2020

292 pages, 27 b/w illus.
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.3 kg

'a provocative and controversial book that will be required reading for anyone seeking to seriously grapple with the problem of state-society relations in Japan in the era of total war.' Janis Mimura, Monumenta Nipponica

Japan in the Asia-Pacific War years is usually remembered for economic deprivation, political repression, and cultural barrenness. Benjamin Uchiyama argues that although the war created the opportunity for the state to expand its control over society and mass culture, it also fractured Japanese people's sense of identity, spilling out through a cultural framework which is best understood as 'carnival war'. In this cultural history, we are introduced to five symbolic figures: the thrill-seeking reporter, the defiant munitions worker, the tragic soldier, the elusive movie star, and the glamorous youth aviator. Together they represent both the suppression and proliferation of cultural life in wartime Japan and demonstrate that 'carnival war' coexisted with total war to promote consumerist desire versus sacrifice, fantasy versus nightmare, and beauty versus horror. Ultimately, Uchiyama argues, this duality helped mobilize home front support for the war effort.

Introduction
1. The reporter
2. The munitions worker
3. The soldier
4. The movie star
5. The youth aviator
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: Second World War [HBWQ], Military history [HBW], Social & cultural history [HBTB], Asian history [HBJF]