Abstract
I am bewitched with being British. A Japanese is equally enamoured with being Japanese. Such nationalism can be both creative and destructive. The 1930s and 1940s saw Japan in the grip of a wasteful nationalism, just as Britain has indulged itself on the international football terraces and other violent venues during the 1980s. Even in the 1980s it could lead former Prime Minister Nakasone to make a patently absurd statement that Japan’s strength is derived from its homogeneous (that is, pure) population. It is obvious that the Japanese population is a mixture of Asian and South Pacific peoples; there are no ‘pure’ populations.
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© 1991 Michael D. Stephens
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Stephens, M.D. (1991). On Being Japanese. In: Japan and Education. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230376793_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230376793_1
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-38965-0
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-37679-3
eBook Packages: Palgrave Social & Cultural Studies CollectionSocial Sciences (R0)