The core objective of this thesis project is to highlight the enriching contributions of Japanese authors to university-level literature courses that survey human history through literature. Japanese literature, rich in its exploration of complex emotions and philosophical depths through the novella and other forms, presents a unique opportunity to broaden the scope of "Great-Books" courses. Traditionally, these courses have predominantly featured Western texts, inadvertently reinforcing the notion that modern philosophical thought is exclusively a Western domain. This project has taken thematic elements from HON272 at Arizona State University (ASU), Barrett, The Honors College's flagship humanities course, as a basis for analysis. A selection of texts from a diverse array of Japanese literature was then methodically paired with these materials based on periodization, thematic resonance, and the audience's interests. Of the twenty-seven different pieces of literature spanning from 1651 to the present day included in HON272, this project has identified twenty-one Japanese novels or primary texts that can serve as complements to the existing curriculum. This approach not only enriches the curriculum but also empowers professors to introduce themes vital for a comprehensive understanding of human history and thought, thereby enhancing the flexibility and inclusivity of their course designs. To support this endeavor, a comprehensive sourcing guide has been developed. This guide prioritizes Japanese literature, listing these texts first and detailing their potential integration into conversations typically dominated by Western texts. It provides, where possible, links to free online PDF versions or excerpts, purchasing information, and availability within the ASU library system. This initiative aims to foster a curriculum that appreciates the global expanse of intellectual heritage and encourages a move away from a Euro-centric narrative. By doing so, it aspires to cultivate a diverse cultural perspective within higher education, both for faculty and students alike. By embracing the vast thematic landscapes offered by Japanese literature, this project serves as a step towards avoiding the pitfalls of cognitive imperialism. It champions the cause of diversifying educational content, ensuring we are moving in the right direction by celebrating and integrating the depth and diversity of global literature into our academic pursuits.

This thesis explores the relationship between the Japanese urban myth of Kuchisake-onna and expectations of motherhood in postwar Japan. The following study was performed with the goal of establishing Kuchisake-onna’s spontaneous emergence in 1970s Japan as a response to the Ūman Ribu (a contracted transliteration of “Women’s Liberation”) Movement, a new wave of feminism. Historically, a Japanese nuclear family unit (ie) was considered to be fundamental to the structure and stability of the nation. As women increasingly sought to shift from their roles as mothers within the domestic sphere in order to pursue employment outside as sararī ūman (“salary woman”), the ie was threatened. At the same time, unrealistic expectations and the pressure of motherhood resulted in numerous cases of filicide in Japan in the 1970s. This research study engages textual history, feminist theory, news/magazine articles, and an analysis of the film Carved: The Slit-Mouthed Woman (2007). I conclude that Kuchisake-onna’s representation within Carved: The Slit-Mouthed Woman serves to address a perceived need for liberation from the overly rigid expectations that mothers in 1970s Japan faced to excel within their roles as the custodians of the domestic sphere. However, it also allows for a reading whereby the Kuchisake-onna’s emergence cannot be attributed to a single notion of the ‘good’ or ‘bad’ mother. Rather, it is the failure of the ie system which creates insurmountable pressures for these women to fulfill the role of the perfect mother which allows for the manifestation of Kuchisake-onna.

The hero Sarutobi Sasuke (literally, “monkey-jump Sasuke”) is one of the most popular Japanese literary characters of the twentieth century. The Tachikawa Bunko book series released in the 1910’s told the story of the samurai Sasuke, who used magic and trickery to defeat his foes. The character garnered so much interest that many other writers wrote their own books, manga, and stories about Sasuke, and filmmakers went on to adapt his story to the big screen throughout the twentieth century. Sarutobi Sasuke’s influence is so wide in Japan that he still maintains some level of relevance in Japan today. From the postwar period onward, however, modern academic and non-academic writers and media figures in both the West and Japan have advanced two controversial claims: first, that Sarutobi Sasuke was either real, or based on a real person, and second, that Sarutobi Sasuke has always been a “ninja.” By investigating the Tachikawa Bunko series that popularized the character of Sarutobi Sasuke, this thesis surveys the evidence available on both of these claims. Firstly, this thesis explores the fact that though there are a wide range of sources available that show Sarutobi Sasuke is a completely fictional character, many authors still write about the character as though he were a historical figure. Secondly, the thesis examines the sources that have characterized Sarutobi Sasuke as a “ninja” by historicizing the idea of “ninja,” which is a term that was never actually used in the original Tachikawa Bunko series to describe Sasuke. Evidence suggests that Sarutobi Sasuke was only ever understood to be a “ninja” after the ninja boom of the 1960’s, and that many of these claims characterizing Sarutobi Sasuke as a ninja have come from the anachronistic misinterpretation of the Japanese words ninjutsu and ninjutsu-tsukai. This thesis thus tells the story of the origins of an often overlooked, yet important fictional character of the twentieth century, while also highlighting a strain of Orientalism, as described by Said, in English-language ninja writing. These issues have led popular writers to ignore Japanese literary creativity and treat all Japanese texts as literal history.

Kokuji are a specific type of character, or Sinograph, present in Japanese script. Kokuji are differentiated from “normal” Sinographs in Japanese, kanji, by the origin. Kokuji are Sinographs of Japanese origin while other kanji in Japanese are of Chinese origin. The purpose of this paper was to explore how this kind of character has changed since it was first identified and the implications these changes have on Japanese identity. This essay is split into three chapters past the introduction. The first chapter explains the terminology used in the rest of the paper, how Sinographs work, and explores similar phenomena in other scripts. The second chapter focuses on the status of kokuji during two periods of Japanese history, the Edo period (1603-1868) and the Meiji period (1868-1912). The Edo period is relevant because during this period kokuji were first recognized as entities separate from normal kanji. The Meiji period is important because it marks the shift into modern Japan, and it started the linguistic and orthographic reforms that would continue until the late twentieth century. The last chapter takes a closer look at the linguistic reforms that took place during the Taishō period and the Shōwa periods. The Taishō period has Japan still trying to become a “modern” nation and continues some of the language reform from the Meiji period. The Shōwa period post-World War II enacts many of the language reforms that shape modern Japanese language. Through these linguistic reforms we can figure out why kokuji have fallen out of use and why the remaining ones are somewhat common.

In 1072 Jōjin (1011-1081) boarded a Chinese merchant ship docked in Kabeshima (modern Saga) headed for Mingzhou (modern Ningbo) on the eastern coast of Northern Song (960-1279) China. Following the convention of his predecessors, Jōjin kept a daily record of his travels from the time he first boarded the Chinese merchant ship in Kabeshima to the day he sent his diary back to Japan with his disciples in 1073.

Jōjin’s diary in eight fascicles, A Record of a Pilgrimage to Tiantai and Wutai Mountains (San Tendai Godaisan ki), is one of the longest extant travel accounts concerning medieval China. It includes a detailed compendium of anecdotes on material culture, flora and fauna, water travel, and bureaucratic procedures during the Northern Song, as well as the transcription of official documents, inscriptions, Chinese texts, and lists of personal purchases and official procurements. The encyclopedic nature of Jōjin’s diary is highly valued for the insight it provides into the daily life, court policies, and religious institutions of eleventh-century China. This dissertation addresses these aspects of the diary, but does so from the perspective of treating the written text as a material artifact of placemaking.

The introductory chapter first contextualizes Jōjin’s diary within the travel writing genre, and then presents the theoretical framework for approaching Jōjin’s engagement with space and place. Chapter two presents the bustling urban life in Hangzhou in terms of Jōjin’s visual and material consumption of the secular realm as reflected in his highly illustrative descriptions of the night markets and entertainers. Chapter three examines Jōjin’s descriptions of sacred Tendai sites in China, and how he approaches these spaces with a sense of familiarity from the textual milieu that informed his movements across this religious landscape. Chapter four discusses Jōjin’s impressions of Kaifeng and the Grand Interior as a metropolitan space with dynamic functions and meanings. Lastly, chapter five concludes by considering the means by which Jōjin’s performance of place in his diary further contributes to the collective memory of place and his own sense of self across the text.

The paper analyzes Eiichiro Oda's One Piece and its depiction of sexuality and LGBT characters. The author puts forth that this representation is not only a positive representation, but is also important for the representation of LGBT in future anime and manga. In the first chapter, the author describes the history of male-male sexuality in Japan, starting from its recorded inception in writing, continuing into its proliferation in the Tokugawa period, and its declining in the Meiji period. This section highlights the major changes of male-male sexuality in Japan. The second chapter focuses on the latter half of the twentieth century, as LGBT began to take a new identity and a different kind of scrutiny by the public. The chapter continues through the decades as new terms are introduced and popularized to describe LGBT people. The chapter also describes some of the genres of male-male sexuality that became popular at the time. The third chapter is a focus on the title work: One Piece. In this chapter, the author analyzes several LGBT characters and their roles within the story. The author finds that the characters are developed thoroughly in contrast with most stereotypes in other works and in some ways reflect on Japanese society's treatment of LGBT. In the paper's conclusion the author examines another popular work directly influenced by One Piece that also contains LGBT characters. These characters also diverge from common stereotypes of LGBT characters, indicating a trend in popular works of depicting LGBT characters in a positive manner. The paper ultimately comes to the conclusion that this trend will continue in the future of anime and manga.

A Japanese national identity is generally thought to have originated in the 17th century, with the advent of the Kokugaku movement. I will argue that there is earlier evidence for the existence of a Japanese national identity in the Kumano Nachi mandalas of the Kamakura and Muromachi periods. These mandalas employ the Nachi waterfall as a symbol of the strength and power of the Japanese land, counterbalancing Chinese Buddhist visual motifs. In this paper, I further assert that these mandalas are an early example of an artistic tradition of painting specific landscape features as symbols of a Japanese national identity, and that this tradition continues into the modern period.