Conference: Across Anti-Imperial Metropolises Nonstate Approaches to Modern Japan-France History

Thursday 5 November, 09:00-17:30 & Friday 6 November, 10:00-15:00

Day 1: Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies - Day  2: Maison Française d'Oxford

This conference examines the transnational formations of anti-imperial knowledge between two metropolises in Japan and France from a non-state historical perspective. Just as Paris was an “anti-imperial metropolis” (Goebel, 2015) so too was Tokyo. Accordingly, this conference adopts a transnational historical approach not only to reveal connections across Japan and France, but also to unveil alternative intellectual and cultural visions that are obscured when the primary objective is to explain the post-imperial proliferation of nationalism and nation-states. In doing so, the conference dislodges national and imperial history by presenting a fresh perspective on the intellectual and cultural history of modern Japan–France.

This conference counterintuitively centers Japan and France not as essentialized entities but to zoom in on alternative possibilities that emerged from the connections between two anti-imperial metropolises.

Programme

DAY 1 (5 Nov.): Lecture Theatre, Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies, University of Oxford 

9:30 am (GMT) Venue Opens

10:00 am – 10:15 am Welcome Remarks

Toma-Jin Morikawa-Fouquet

10:15 – 10:45 am Keynote Lecture (in-person only)

Professor Sho Konishi (Director of the Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies and Associate Professor in Modern Japanese History)

10:45–11:00 am Break

11:00 am –12:00 pm Panel 1: Transnational Anarchism (Chair Dr. Alice Baldock; Discussant Zhou Fang)

Franco-Japanese Transnational Connections and Empowered Translators: Romain Rolland in the Japanese Imagination in the Early Twentieth Century

Prof. Nadine Willems (Associate Professor in Japanese History, School of History and Art History, University of East Anglia)

Anarchist Networks between Paris and Tokyo: Komatsu Kiyoshi and the Transnational Left of the 1920s

Prof. Geoffrey C Gunn (Professor Emeritus, Nagasaki University)

12:00 pm – 1:30 pm Lunch at St. Antony’s College Dining Hall

1:30 pm –2:30 pm Panel 2: Aesthetic Triangulations (Chair Alok Ranpise; Discussant Prof. Patrice Baubeau)

Translating Surrealities: Surrealist doujin and Translation in Anti-Imperial Metropolises of Tokyo and Shanghai (1905–1945)

Dr. Shang (Sky) Cheng (DPhil in History, University of Oxford, Incoming JSPS Research Fellow at Keio University)

From Ueda to Bretagne: Yamamoto Kanae and the Conceptualization of the Transnational nōmin

Dr. Maggie Bryan (DPhil in History, University of Oxford)

2:30 pm – 3:00 pm Break

3:00 pm – 4:00 pm Panel 3: Ecoanarchist Currents (Chair Zhou Fang; Discussant Dr. Maggie Bryan)

The Virtue of Instincts

Toma-Jin Morikawa-Fouquet (DPhil candidate in History, University of Oxford)

Anarchist Modern Architecture: Between Le Corbusier and Kon Wajiro

Tyuki Imamura (DPhil candidate in Contemporary Art History and Theory, University of Oxford)

4:00 – 4:30 pm Break

4:30 – 5:30 pm Artist Talk (Chair & Discussant Tyuki Imamura)

Art as Archival Tool: Japanese Anarchists and the Reclus Circle in Domme, Dordogne, During and After WWI

Ikuru Kuwajima (Artist & Photographer, Master’s in Visual Arts [Research & Practice] at Bordeaux Montaigne University)

5:30 pm – 7:00 pm Drinks and Refreshments

7:00pm – 9:00 pm High Table Dinner (Invitation only)

DAY 2 (6 Nov.): Auditorium, Maison Française d’Oxford

10:00 am – 10:30 am Venue Opens

10:30 am – 11:30 am Panel 4: Nonstate Rights and Revolutions (2 talks; Chair Mrinalini Sisodia Wadhwa; Discussant Arron O’Connor)

Title TBD

Dr. Yu Sakai (Assistant Professor of Modern East Asian History, University of Cambridge)

The Farmers’ Emissary: Miyazaki Tamizō’s Land Restoration Movement (1898-1908)

Dr. Joel Littler (Japan Foundation - Global Japan Studies Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, University of Tokyo)

11:30 am – 12:30 pm Lunch at Maison Française d’Oxford

12:30 pm – 1:30 pm Panel 5: Gendered Anti-Imperialisms (Chair Tiffany Chan; Discussant Dr. Shang [Sky] Cheng)

Compromising Art for Empire: Tanizaki Jun’ichirō and Honoré de Balzac’s Janus-Faced Literature

Dr. Leslie Winston (Lecturer, California State University, San Bernardino)

A Transnational Body of Knowledge: Women Butoh Dancers in 70s and 80s France

Dr. Alice Baldock (Okinaga Junior Research Fellow in Japanese Studies, University of Oxford)

1:30 pm – 2:00 pm Break

2:00 pm – 3:00 pm Roundtable Discussion and Closing Remarks

Discussions among presenters, chairs, discussants, and participants on the conceptual contours of the conference, its presentations, and research moving forward.

Day 1: Nissan Lecture Theatre, The Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies, University of Oxford 27 Winchester Road, Oxford OX2 6NA, United Kingdom (Google Maps)

Day 2: Auditorium, Maison Française d'Oxford, 2-10 Norham Road, Oxford, OX2 6SE, United Kingdom (Google Maps)

Day 1 & 2: The link for online participation will be shared and accessible to registered participants only. Unauthorized recording is strictly prohibited.