Yu Sakai

Research Topic

Humanistic Naturalism: Kunikida Doppo and the History of Small People in Modern Japan, 1887-1923

Supervisor: Sho Konishi

My academic research focuses on the intellectual and cultural history of modern Japan from a transnational and non-state perspective. I am particularly interested in the concept of nature, the issue of translation, and the place of culture in politics. Before returning to academia in 2014, I spent several years working in business in Japan. 

In revising our existing understanding of the renowned Japanese literary writer Kunikida Doppo (1871-1908), my dissertation overturns the concept of culture in modern Japan. Situating Doppo in a broad intellectual movement in late nineteenth-century Japan which called for a ‘second revolution’, it uncovers his thought that may be called ‘humanistic naturalism’, which makes an important intervention in the intellectual history of modern Japan. 

My forthcoming article, 'Survive to be Critical: The Wartime Graphic as a "masquerading" media in the Russo-Japanese War, 1904-05', will be published in War in History.

The following organisations have generously supported my doctorate research: the British Association for Japanese Studies, Japan Student Services Organization, the Sasakawa Fund (Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford), and the Sasakawa Studentship (Nissan Institute, University of Oxford).