Ways of Forgetting, Ways of Remembering: Japan in the Modern World

by John W. Dower

Remembering and reconstructing the past inevitably involves forgetting—and nowhere more so than in the complex relationship between the United States and Japan since the end of World War II. In this provocative and probing series of essays, John W. Dower—one of our leading historians of postwar Japan and author of the Pulitzer Prize–winning Embracing Defeat—explores the uses and abuses to which this history has been subjected and, with deliberation and insight, affirms the urgent need for scholars to ask the questions that are not being asked.

Taking as a starting point the work of E.H. Norman, the unjustly neglected historian of prewar Japan, Ways of Forgetting, Ways of Remembering sets out both to challenge historiographical orthodoxy and reveal the configurations of power inherent in scholarly and popular discourse in Japan and America. Dower’s fascination with capturing popular experience leads to sources as far ranging as textiles adorned with wartime propaganda and the satirical cartoon panels that decorate traditional karuta playing cards. Dower, who is rightly known as one of the most perceptive critics of American foreign policy, also offers a blistering critique of the U.S. occupation of Iraq and the misuse of postwar Japan as an example of success.

Ways of Forgetting, Ways of Remembering is a profound look at American and Japanese perceptions—past and present—of key moments in their shared history. An incisive investigation of the problems of public history and its role in a modern democracy, these essays are essential reading for anyone interested in postwar U.S.-Japan relations, as well as the broader discipline of history.

Genres: Japan, History, Nonfiction, Asia, Essays, Japanese History, Politics

336 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

John W. Dower is the author of Embracing Defeat, winner of the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize; War without Mercy, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award; and Cultures of War. He is professor emeritus of history at MIT. In addition to authoring many books and articles about Japan and the United States in war and peace, he is a founder and codirector of the online “Visualizing Cultures” project established at MIT in 2002 and dedicated to the presentation of image-driven scholarship on East Asia in the modern world. He lives in Boston, Massachusetts.

Reviews

[E. G. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Preface

--E.H. Norman, Japan, and the Uses of History
--Race, Language, and War in Two Cultures: World War II in Asia
--Japan's Beautiful Modern War
--"An Aptitude for Being Unloved": War and Memory in Japan
--The Bombed: Hiroshimas and Nagasakis in Japanese Memory
--A Doctor's Diary of Hiroshima, Fifty Years Later
--How a Genuine Democracy Should Celebrate Its Past
--Peace and Democracy in Two Systems: External Policy and Internal Conflict
--Mocking Misery: Grassroots Satire in Defeated Japan
--Lessons from Japan About War's Aftermath
--The Other Japanese Occupation

Sources
Notes
Index

[Kusaimamekirai · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Sometimes, as in the case of the last “good war” and the almost nonchalant incineration of hundreds of thousands of enemy civilians that accompanied it, it seems excruciatingly difficult to separate our truly heroic from our horrendous deeds. Yet we must face these terrible ambiguities squarely—and do so at our public, as well as our private, institutions—or else stop pretending to be an honest and open society."

One essay in John Dower’s “Ways of Forgetting, Ways of Remembering” nicely summarizes the problem of history by stating that once those who lived and experienced an event have passed on, the true battle for history and memory begins. With nobody left to combat falsehoods with firsthand knowledge truth becomes the property of those who often scream the loudest and most effectively blunt contrary interpretations. These essays deal with postwar memory in Japan and how the Japanese saw, and see themselves. Occasionally as victims, occasionally as aggressors, occasionally occupying both spheres. It is also the story of how the U.S. occupation deeply influenced and continues to influence Japan’s view of itself right up until the present day. Dower’s writing is incredibly balanced and accessible while still being meticulously researched and of the highest quality. Anyone looking for a better understanding of Japanese identity in the 20th and 21st centuries can learn a great deal from the wonderful book.

[Simon · Rating 5 out of 5]

How should citizens in a democracy deal with history? What is being asked and equally importantly what is not being asked? Is the history of Japan both during the Second World War and after misused in the West? These are among the fascinating and important questions the supreme historian of wartime and post-war Japan, John Dower, asks in this collection of essays. As always with Dower the scholarship and the argumentation are of the very highest order, and while the evidence and the opinions given here often challenge orthodoxy he has no “side”, other than the truth.
This book brings together 11 previously published Dower essays, with introductions to each newly written for this collection. Topics covered include US and Japanese wartime attitudes to each other, satire in post-defeat Japan, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan’s occupation of Manchuria and others. All the essays bring forward interesting and at times surprising evidence while adding to the reader's understanding. The book is full of nuggets, such as the reaction of legendary Hollywood director Frank Capra when asked to make US propaganda films by his government, who upon seeing the surprisingly sophisticated Japanese equivalents said “We can’t beat this kind of thing”. Most disturbing, for me at least, was the chapter about the US refusal to allow a Smithsonian exhibition about the atomic bombings to show the victims or to discuss views that challenge their necessity. Western criticisms of Japan’s failure honestly to discuss its history are often accurate, so you might think the erstwhile Allies would take care to avoid the same error or would understand that their side fought the war in defence of the very freedom of expression they want to shut down. Sadly not.
Dower remains best known for his magisterial history of the occupation of Japan, “Embracing Defeat”, and to a slightly lesser extent “War Without Mercy”, his shocking record of the racism on both sides of the Pacific in that theatre of World War Two. Those are better starting points for a reader interested in Dower’s work, but this new collection is a welcome addition from the best English language scholar of mid-twentieth century Japan. “Allies good, Axis bad” is indeed the correct four-word summary of the morality of the Second World War, but as John Dower shows us, we are or at least we should be capable of a much more sophisticated analysis.

[Shrike58 · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you've been reading Dower's work over the years there will be very few real surprises here; the real attraction is the man's commentary on his work and the field in general and how the historiography of Japan has developed. At the very least Dower has developed a certain disdain for modernization theory, which he now sees as a means of rationalizing the imperialism in all but name of the neo-conservative enthusiasts of American power projection.

Originally written: May 31, 2013.

[Michael Camilleri · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like most essay anthologies, this suffers slightly for being a sort of hodgepodge of different thoughts. Still, there's plenty to dig into here and Dower does a terrific job of putting postwar Japan into the appropriate context for the Western reader.

[Patrick McCoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Historian John W. Dower has recently published a collection of fascinating essays related to modern Japanese history called, Ways Of Forgetting, Ways Of Remembering: Japan In The Modern World (2012). The first essay, "E. H. Norman, Japan, and the Uses of History," is an interesting look at an obscure Canadian historian and diplomat who died in 1957 by suicide from pressure coming from the U.S. because of early leftist views and associations. Dower discusses reservations about modernization by calling attention to the questions Norman raised in his work on modern Japan. The second essay in the collection, "Race, Language, and War in Two Cultures: World War II in Asia," has many of the same observations and concerns that he pursed in his book, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War. The third chapter, "Japan's Beautiful War," was written to accompany a 2005 exhibition catalog at Bard College curated by Jacqueline Atkins that looked at the beautification of the war through the introduction of martial themes into textiles worn in the form of traditional garments. "'An Aptitude for Being Unloved': War And Memory In Japan," follows this chapter. It focuses on war memory and appeared in a 2002 book devoted to war crimes and denial in the twentieth century. Dower characterizes memory as following one of the five following forms: (1) denial (2) evocations of moral (or immoral) equivalence (3) victim consciousness (4) bi-national (U.S.-Japan) sanitizing of Japanese war crimes, and (5) popular discourses acknowledging guilt and responsibility. It is a fascinating discussion of national memory and historical perspectives. Chapter five, "The Bombed: Hiroshimas and Nagasakis In Japanese Memory," is spurred by Dower's idea that there is no monolithic way to of remembering Hiroshima and Nagasaki, hence the title-it was published in a special anniversary issue on the bombs in a journal in 1995. This is followed by a memoir of the bombing at Hiroshima, chapter six, " A Doctor's Diary Of Hiroshima, Fifty Years Later." This engaging account of a survivor was published in English in 1955 by Michiko Hachiya. Hachiya covered the weeks between August 8th and the end of September-Dowers wrote this as an introduction to the reissue of the diary. Next up, chapter seven, "How A Genuine Democracy Should Celebrate Its Past," in which Dowers discusses the problems associated with the heroic narrative of dropping atomic bombs on Japan. Chapter eight is entitled, "Peace And Democracy In Two Systems: External Policy And Internal Conflict," in which Dowers tries to come to terms historically with two systems and the dialectical relationship between domestic and international structures, policies, and conflicts. ""Mocking Misery: Grassroots Satire In Defeated Japan," is a missing chapter from his influential and thorough book on the occupation, Embracing Defeat. "Lessons from Japan About War's Aftermath" is editorial that again focuses on the misuses of history in regard to the U.S. "war on terror" and invasion of Iraq following the events of 9-11. The last chapter, "The Other Japanese Occupation" draws a connection between America's invasion of Iraq with the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931. All in all, this collection has a number of thoroughly researched and interesting and provocative perspectives on Japan since the end of WWII.

[S. · Rating 4 out of 5]

to put it in bluntly simplistic terms, this book is not going to draw the same audience as Embracing Defeat. the first is a unified, coherent book-length piece of readable scholarship with a subversive title. this work, on the contrary, is a collation of Dower's essays, starting with a criticism of the racism evident in America's prosecution of the Pacific War and ending with an overtly political op-ed piece against the Iraq War. naturally, the American public, chastised on two levels (the idea of 'the Greatest Generation' as well as the widespread public support for IW2), is not going to rush to read this book. and GR statistics prove it-- 20 ratings vs. the 1000+ for EMBRACING DEFEAT. almost zero scholarly attention compared to the National Book Award for Dower's masterpiece.

still, in sympathy for the superb achievement of DEFEAT, I'll tilt toward the 4 over the 3. (with the shorter length; footnotes subtracted noted) it's not easy to write a full length historical account. it's difficult, in many ways, to be an academic. a lifetime's achivement might be a half-dozen books, and we'll respect the academic behind the mixed-quality of this work with an overall 4, and reiterate the strong 5 for EMBRACING DEFEAT.

book consists of scholarship on America's engagement with Japan; with Dower's growing up in the country (age 0 - 15) the source of considerable Japan-culture sympathies.

[Alice · Rating 4 out of 5]

I understand now, why he said the person, dead or alive, he'd most want to talk to in person would be John Dower.

In some ways, it's a utopian format, a book of academically-inclining essays. I wish every academic would come out with one of these. Something more personal and not at all dumbed down. Being personal is one of the most intelligent things a thinker can achieve.

Sometimes the discipline of history feels like it is a continuous cry of defiance against the reduction that "it's all too complicated." Complex, yes, and still, clearly spoken like water with all the silt shaken out and saved like semi-precious stones. Worthy and noble as ever.

[AB Freeman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m a big fan of revisionist history; not only because attention to the form introduces previously unmentioned artefacts into the historical record, but also for how it often allows history to be told from the perspective of the victims.

In this intellectually powerful text, Dower combines a series of essays – written over several decades – that strive to revise 20th Century Japanese history through interrogation of how the prevailing narrative was originally created. Several areas feature; among them: disparate versions of racism in both US and Japanese propaganda materials, the reality of the technical prowess and hegemonic intention of Imperial Japan, and the nuances of the Liberal Democratic Party’s rise to domination in Japanese parliamentary politics.

However, the best example of this revisionist approach comes in Chapter Five, “The Bombed: Hiroshimas and Nagasakis in Japanese Memory,” wherein Dower focusses on the American policy of disallowing any form of criticism – or even public expression – of the horrors the Hiroshima/Nagasaki hibakusha – or “survivors” – sustained during the aftermath of those bombings. Awareness that few people in Japan ever learned about the realities of those abominations until roughly twenty years afterward provides clarity in how American policy contributed to a way of forgetting that, had the true devastation been revealed, might have changed the calculus of Japanese-American diplomatic relations, and what the common Japanese citizen may have come to believe about Japan’s role within the Pacific Theatre.

4 stars. During an extended stay in Japan, I’ve chosen to read this as an attempt to become better aware of how subtly nuanced commonalities of Japanese culture manifest in the modern era, and how they are deeply rooted in a historical perspective defined over the past eighty years. To forget the impact of the 20th Century on Japan’s current approach to living is to be unaware of their response to their own national humiliation. Considering their role as both victim and perpetrator, and how those stories are both remembered and forgotten, seems a key requirement for living in and amongst the Japanese as the 21st Century unfolds.

[Adam Gutschenritter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting read on how Japan views WWII as well as a historian's lessons on what we can learn from it. But as a collection of essays he only hits on themes were, for whatever reason, I just didn't enjoy the episodic version as much this time.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I originally put this book on my to read list after reading the excellent Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II. I thought, based on the title, that it would be about modern Japan as opposed to the post-war Japan of the previous book, but I should have remembered that I'm dealing with a historian's definition of modernity. Most of the essays collected in Ways of Forgetting, Ways of Remembering deal with the post-war period as well, but they're sufficiently different from the material in Embracing Defeat that it serves as an excellent companion volume to that book.

While the first essay didn't really grab my attention and made me worried that I the collection was going to be much more scholar-oriented than I had anticipated, the second essay, "Race, Language, and War in Two Cultures: World War II in Asia," dispelled that fear. It's an examination of how racism was used by both American and Japanese society during the war. The American side I mostly knew--the Japanese were a horde of fanatics filled with devotion to their god-emperor who were simultaneously idiot monkeymen, whose heads were so filled with kanji that they had no room to learn to fly true or shoot straight, and an unstoppable horde that threatened to overwhelm the few strongholds of civilization in the mysterious Orient. People of the inscrutable east, inherently duplicitous and conniving while also being naive and immature compared to the superior white race. You know, the usual stupid incoherence you get if you analyze racist stereotypes with any depth.

There was also a note that while nowadays it's the Shoah that everyone remembers when they think of the atrocities of World War II, during the war it was the Bataan Death March and the actions of the Japanese military that drew attention, at least in America.

The more interesting part was the way racism was used by the Imperial government. Japanese racism was less focused on other races and more focused on the glories of the Yamato, their descent from the gods and their home in the land of the kami, and their natural right to rule over the world in benevolent peace. The main depiction they made of Americans was not as subhumans, but as violent oni who opposed them. This also provided a place for the sudden turn after the war, since Japanese myth provided for oni who had a change of heart and came to become protectors of the communities they formerly preyed upon.

The discussion of censorship through the medium of karuta illustrated playing cards in "Mocking Misery: Grassroots Satire in Defeated Japan" was probably the second-most interesting essay within. Contrary to some Western Japanese "expert" opinions that the Japanese were fanatically devoted to the Emperor and would tolerate no disrespect, a culture of satire sprung up almost immediately after the war because the only reason it had not previously been extant was Imperial censorship laws. The karuta, which usually had moral lessons or famous proverbs, here became an insight into the way Japan felt about the post-war situation.

My favorite is probably the one for む, むりを通して道理に負けた ("Making trouble and losing rationality"), showing a soldier with a bamboo spear being hit with a hammer labeled "reason," but other good ones are け, けょうのユメはハイセンのユメ ("The capital's dreams are dreams of defeat") or め, めくら指導者 ("Blind leader "), showing a blind Tōjō giving a speech. The consistent narrative was that the Japanese had been led into war by their power-crazed rulers--self serving, true, but hardly the words of a group of fanatics who would die for the Heavenly Sovereign with a hundred million hearts all beating as one.

I hadn't heard about the Smithsonian exhibition of the Enola Gay and ensuing controversy in 1994, but "How A Genuine Democracy Should Celebrate Its Past" brought it up along with the shameful focus entirely on America heroism in ending the war because the bombs were necessary and blah blah blah. There is entirely reasonable and appropriate skepticism outside the country on Japan's commitment to truly face the atrocities it committed during World War II, but as Dower points out, it's truly hypocritical to expect that while also banning all criticism of the atomic bombing, and through an act of Congress, no less. As he also points out, Americans are hugely attached to World War II as the "good war" where we went out and saved the world from the bad guys, and with a litany of lost wars following we still turn it to when we need to prove our moral superiority to the world. Doing so, though, doesn't do anyone any favors.

Ways of Forgetting, Ways of Remembering is no Embracing Defeat, but few books are. As an essay collection, if you're interested in Japanese history at all you're sure to find something you'll like in here, and it renewed my interest in reading some of Dower's other books.

[R · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of essays. Interesting but not compelling. I trudged through this book.

[Sheng · Rating 3 out of 5]

The most impressive essays are "Japan's Beautiful Modern War", "Race, Language, and War in Two Cultures". The first essay make me feel vigil because the propaganda at that time of Japan is very likely what our Chinese people have now - e.g. unconditional patriotism, all kinds of beautiful stories. "Race" is very interesting by showing all kinds of reaction before and after Pearl Harbor attack(also Malaria invasion), and shows lots of poster at that time, and how Allies depict Japanese as monkey and Japanese depict Allies as demon.

But the other essays are less interesting. The exception is "Mocking Misery", which is a little interesting, but only shows Japanese after war cartoon. It is somehow boring... "The Bombed" and "The Doctor's Diary" is helpful for understanding the thought of Japanese, as the only victims of nuclear weapons on the earth.

Still recommended to read.

[Diana Duncan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a set of essays written by the author about Japan from the early sixties to the present. Though the information about Japan was interesting, I found the author's views about the use of history to be the most interesting part of the book. The title of the book is just as apt for the views of Americans about our own history. Our unwillingness to examine the ethics of the decision to drop the atomic bombs is the most troubling to me, especially with the current debates about the use of drones to kill suspected terrorists. This book is very dense so it is not a quick read. It would have helped if my knowledge of the war in Asia was not so sketchy.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is Dower's miscellaneous collection of articles, outtakes and excerpts of mostly recent work. Some of it won't make sense without a background in 20th century Japan, read something like Japan: The Story of a Nation first. His contrasts of WWII versus America's current middle east campaigns is disturbing.

[Antony · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like any top-shelf history there are surprises on every page of this book. (Who knew that a 1000 US citizens died in Hiroshima during the dropping of the atomic bomb?) A brilliant collection of essays that challenge what we know about how Japan remembers the Pacific War, and equally how popular renderings of that War in the US might involve a fair amount of "forgetting" too.

[John Crane · Rating 1 out of 5]

I REALLY love John Dower. I really disliked this book. It is written without clear development. It is a collection of essays that are often not as related to the topic as I would like. I really feel like I wasted time reading this book. You would have to be a real specialist to get into this one.

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good collection of articles from Dower's career. Some of the articles are stronger (and longer) than others, but the collection as a whole was informative and interesting. I will probably return to more of Dower's articles and writings as he is quickly proving himself to me as an astute scholar of the Japanese post-war years.

[Crystal · Rating 5 out of 5]

John Dower is both a good historian and a good writer. He gives us his evidence, mostly primary materials written by people living at the time, and shows us how he comes to his conclusions. He is not afraid of making judgments, but with evidence and due consideration of all sides. I learned lot about history from these essays - not just historical fact, but how history is made by historians.

[Tobias · Rating 5 out of 5]

While not every essay in this book is equally memorable or noteworthy, the best essays in this book may be some of the best writing about how World War II is remembered, period. Dower is both critical and sensitive of how Japanese treat the war - ultimately striving to understand above all - and is devastatingly effective at skewering American pieties regarding the "Good War."

[Bernadette · Rating 5 out of 5]

John W. Dower shows through the examples of wartime and post-wartime Japan are still relevant examples for today. Early Showa Japan in many ways followed the "example" of Western nations by trying colony build and influence of nations' politics, but partly for that they were despised. Post- wartime Japan was again quick to embrace the Western model.