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Asia: Local Studies / Global Themes
Japan in Print: Information and Nation in the Early Modern Period
A quiet revolution in knowledge separated the early modern period in Japan from all previous time. After 1600, self-appointed investigators used the model of the land and cartographic surveys of the newly unified state to observe and order subjects such as agronomy, medicine, gastronomy, commerce, travel, and entertainment. They subsequently circulated their findings through a variety of commercially printed texts: maps, gazetteers, family encyclopedias, urban directories, travel guides, official personnel rosters, and instruction manuals for everything from farming to lovemaking. In this original and gracefully written book, Mary Elizabeth Berry considers the social processes that drove the information explosion of the 1600s. Inviting readers to examine the contours and meanings of this transformation, Berry provides a fascinating account of the conversion of the public from an object of state surveillance into a subject of self-knowledge.
"Japan in Print "shows how, as investigators collected and disseminated richly diverse data, they came to presume in their audience a standard of cultural literacy that changed anonymous consumers into an "us" bound by common frames of reference. This shared space of knowledge made society visible to itself and in the process subverted notions of status hierarchy. Berry demonstrates that the new public texts projected a national collectivity characterized by universal access to markets, mobility, sociability, and self-fashioning.
"Japan in Print "shows how, as investigators collected and disseminated richly diverse data, they came to presume in their audience a standard of cultural literacy that changed anonymous consumers into an "us" bound by common frames of reference. This shared space of knowledge made society visible to itself and in the process subverted notions of status hierarchy. Berry demonstrates that the new public texts projected a national collectivity characterized by universal access to markets, mobility, sociability, and self-fashioning.
342 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
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January 31, 2023read for history of japanese popular culture and everyday life
October 17, 2017
This is a scholarly book written for an academic audience about a subject I know almost nothing about, so at times I found it heavy going. On the whole, however, it was really interesting; I had never thought about maps this way, nor did I know how much a product of the early modern period they are, and the picture she gives of Edo and Kyoto in the 17th and 18th centuries is amazing. I now wish to read more books about this period, especially about women's lives, as there were many more women pictured and mentioned in her quotes from her sources than I would have expected -- one of those moments in which I realised how much I do not know.
September 13, 2023
Mary Berry's volume studies books and maps and flows of information in early modern Japan. She begins with changes in map making and cadastral surveys. Then she details travel guides and local gazetteers in the Edo period, a time of great travel and communications.
This volume has a large amount of information about printing and books in Edo Japan, a great time of mass communications and peace.
This volume has a large amount of information about printing and books in Edo Japan, a great time of mass communications and peace.
March 1, 2025
good info but the most dense and repetitive way to convey it
September 2, 2019
This book was similar to Berry’s other book which I read a few months ago in two important respects. On the one hand, in some ways I t is an impressive piece of scholarship. She clearly reviewed hundreds, if not thousands, of primary sources, many of which were in Japanese, to write a very comprehensive review of the topic.
On the other hand, this book, as was the case with her other book which I have read, this one was also not reader friendly. The author did use some narratives of people, places, traditions, etc which were engaging. But, as with the other book, the prose often contained long, complex, compound sentences. Sometimes these involved long lists of 6-8, even more, names, places, etc. (and some of those have sub lists of even more examples contained inside parentheses). For me anyway, all of this made it slow going, if not downright tedious at times. Because of this I found it hard to assimilate, let alone recall, the points which she was trying to make.
Chapters on maps and rosters included numerous sample maps and/or prints of drawings of various areas of Kyoyo or Edo (Tokyo in the pre-modern era). Likewise Berry’s chapter on the rosters of military men, aristocrats, etc contained many examples. While these rosters were informative, they were all in Japanese. Why not translate some, or at least part, of them into English for non-Japanese readers like me?
In regards to the maps the author made references to color coding or shading but black/white printing eliminated that info. I realize printing maps in books is expensive. But the manner in which these were presented were much less instructive than they could have been.
The chapter on cities described in great detail the various inventories and guides developed for Kyoto and Edo of various aspects of life there. While these were informative, lengthy descriptions and examples were provided to such an extent that it became tedious.
Between the prose and all of the detailed descriptions this book often became a matter of TMI, IMHO. Towards the end of the book I wondered why the editor allowed all of this to happen? Was it because Berry is a highly esteemed professor of history at UC Berkeley? So they let her pretty much have her way when it came to a finished manuscript? Or did the editor determine that this would be an academic treatise aimed at an audience of experts?
Overall, I would say that I was as much, if not more, relieved as I was satisfied at the completion of this book. The written text is only 250 pages long. But the ‘hard work’ of reading it was finally over. Thus, I would give it 3 stars.
Berry wrote a book on Hideyoshi, one of the three war lords responsible for the unification of Japan in the late 16th century. But after having struggled to get through two of her books I think I will look elsewhere if/when I want to read something about this important figure in Japan’s history. Maybe a break will make me more inclined to want to read something else by her. But I doubt it.
On the other hand, this book, as was the case with her other book which I have read, this one was also not reader friendly. The author did use some narratives of people, places, traditions, etc which were engaging. But, as with the other book, the prose often contained long, complex, compound sentences. Sometimes these involved long lists of 6-8, even more, names, places, etc. (and some of those have sub lists of even more examples contained inside parentheses). For me anyway, all of this made it slow going, if not downright tedious at times. Because of this I found it hard to assimilate, let alone recall, the points which she was trying to make.
Chapters on maps and rosters included numerous sample maps and/or prints of drawings of various areas of Kyoyo or Edo (Tokyo in the pre-modern era). Likewise Berry’s chapter on the rosters of military men, aristocrats, etc contained many examples. While these rosters were informative, they were all in Japanese. Why not translate some, or at least part, of them into English for non-Japanese readers like me?
In regards to the maps the author made references to color coding or shading but black/white printing eliminated that info. I realize printing maps in books is expensive. But the manner in which these were presented were much less instructive than they could have been.
The chapter on cities described in great detail the various inventories and guides developed for Kyoto and Edo of various aspects of life there. While these were informative, lengthy descriptions and examples were provided to such an extent that it became tedious.
Between the prose and all of the detailed descriptions this book often became a matter of TMI, IMHO. Towards the end of the book I wondered why the editor allowed all of this to happen? Was it because Berry is a highly esteemed professor of history at UC Berkeley? So they let her pretty much have her way when it came to a finished manuscript? Or did the editor determine that this would be an academic treatise aimed at an audience of experts?
Overall, I would say that I was as much, if not more, relieved as I was satisfied at the completion of this book. The written text is only 250 pages long. But the ‘hard work’ of reading it was finally over. Thus, I would give it 3 stars.
Berry wrote a book on Hideyoshi, one of the three war lords responsible for the unification of Japan in the late 16th century. But after having struggled to get through two of her books I think I will look elsewhere if/when I want to read something about this important figure in Japan’s history. Maybe a break will make me more inclined to want to read something else by her. But I doubt it.
January 5, 2009
Easily one of my favourites in the books I've had to read for classes. While being a history book, Berry takes an almost sociological approach in analyzing the way knowledge was disseminated through the merchant classes of Japan in the mid-to-late Tokugawa period. Extensively researched, there's little I have to say in criticism of the main thesis of the book: that through not publishing their own information, the Tokugawa shogunate allowed the populace of Japan (really, anyone that could get their hands on a book, and with cash-crop farming and the rise of the wealthy peasant, to say nothing of the skyrocketing merchant class, that was more and more people as the years wore on) to create their own kind of social mobility and form connections through knowledge, not class.
The chapters on maps got a little stale at times, but Berry's writing style makes it easier to slog through them. I could spend a week just reading the footnotes.
The chapters on maps got a little stale at times, but Berry's writing style makes it easier to slog through them. I could spend a week just reading the footnotes.
May 17, 2013
Professor Berry's sharp intellect is at work in every sentence of her book which speaks with authority and originality. She makes even the most tedious directory on persons, products, and places sound interesting to read. However, she does not engage much with Japanese-language works or theories on maps and space-making. This may be the author's conscious choice, though some readers may be disappointed.
October 9, 2007
Amazing. A masterpiece. Wonderful narrative combined with in-depth analysis.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews