Abstract
As a Tokyo-based independent academic association run by Germans according to Japanese laws, the German East Asiatic Society (OAG) undoubtedly occupies a special place within German-Japanese relations, at the very least because of the extent of the OAG’s cooperation with Japanese members and benefactors. Closer examination of the society’s history during the first half of the twentieth century shows how far international relations interfered with the activities of this group of a few hundred Germans abroad, whose declared aim it was to study East Asia. This is especially the case for the most active branch groups in Shanghai (1931–1945) and Batavia (Jakarta, 1934–1940), which were seriously affected by Japanese and German expansionism.1
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Notes
This chapter is based on earlier papers the author has published on the history of the OAG in German and Japanese. For a more detailed account of the history of the OAG, refer to the forthcoming volume by Christian W. Spang, Rolf-Harald Wippich and Sven Saaler, Die Geschichte der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Natur- und Völkerkunde Ostasiens (OAG) von 1873 bis 1979 (Munich: Iudicium, 2016).
For further details, see Douglas M. Kenrick, A Century of Western Studies in Japan. The First Hundred Tears of the Asiatic Society of Japan 1872–1972 (Tokyo: ASJ, 1978),
and Robert Schinzinger, “Die Beziehungen zwischen OAG und der Asiatic Society in hundert Jahren,” in Sechs Vorträge im Jubiläumsjahr 1972–73, ed. OAG (Tokyo: OAG, 1974), 82–97.
See Rolf-Harald Wippich, “Max von Brandt und die Gründung der OAG,” Studien des Instituts für Kultur der deutschsprachigen Länder 11 (1993), 64–77.
See Ulrich Goch, “Gesellschaft und Auslandswissenschaft am Beispiel der Deutschen Japanologiegeschichte,” Bochumer Jahrbuch zur Ostasienforschunß 3 (1980), 98–129.
See Christian W. Spang, “Anmerkungen zur frühen OAG-Geschichte bis zur Eintragung als ‘japanischer Verein’ (1904),” Nachrichten der OAG (NOAG) 179/180 (2006), 67–91.
See Christian W. Spang, “Die ersten Japaner in der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Natur- und Völkerkunde Ostasiens (OAG),” Foreign Language Education [Daitō Bunka University] 42 (2013), 85–92, for fürther details about Aoki, Katsura, Konoe, Nagai, and Wada. The latter was the first Japanese OAG member. He was asked to join the society in 1885 to front for the OAG in a transaction that enabled the association to buy a house outside the foreign settlement.
Besides various German advisors, some British and Americans such as Basil Hall Chamberlain, Sir Ernest Mason Satow and others joined the OAG as well. For further details, see Robert Schinzinger and Carl von Weegmann, Die Geschichte der OAG 1873–1980 (Tokyo: OAG, 1982), 25.
The Nazi attitude to the Japanese was rather ambivalent. On the one hand, they admired the assumed racial purity and the samurai along with their famous bushido spirit, but they still did not accept the Japanese as racially equal. The clearest incidence for this can be found in Hitler’s Mein Kampf, where he created a three-fold racial system with the supposedly “culture-creating” Aryan race on top, “culture-bearing” races in the middle, and the “culture-destroying” races at the bottom. The only race Hitler explicitly mentions to be “culture-bearing” are the Japanese. See Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf (Munich: Eher, 1934), 317–320.
Ōshima had followed his father ōshima Kenichi in pursuing a military career, but in 1938 he was promoted from military attaché to Japanese ambassador to Germany, a very unusual move. Togo was stationed three times in Switzerland and Germany and had a German wife. After being ambassador in Berlin 1937/1938, he moved on to represent Japan in Moscow (1938–1940) before becoming foreign minister in 1941–1942, a post he regained in 1945. Endo, who rendered his name “Yendo” in German, was an influenti Navy representative, twice serving as naval attaches in Berlin. He also worked as liaison officer for the emperor and as head of the Institute for Total War (Sōryokusen Kenyūjo). See Christian W Spang, Karl Haushofer und Japan. Die Rezeption seiner geopolitischen Theorien in der Deutschen und japanischen Politik (Munich: Iudicium, 2013) for more details on Endō/Yendo.
See the two related OAG publications, which praise the OAG and the Axis: Kurt Meissner, “Der OA.G. zum 22. März 1943,” NOAG 63 (1943), 1–12, and anonym, “Siebzig Jahre O. A. G. Ein Rückblick auf die Feier in der Deutschen Botschaft am 24. März 1943,” NOAG 64 (1943), 1–11. Among the guests were the minister of education, Hashida Kunihiko, Vice-Foreign Mnister Matsumoto Shunichi, and two former Japanese ambassadors to Germany: Count Mushakōji Kintomo and Togo Shigenori.
See the mostly Chinese book Outeman Jiao Shou Ai Si Lu (Gedenkschriften an Prof. Dr. Wilhelm Othmer), ed. Ku Teng (Nanking: Guo Hua Yin Shu Guan, 1934), which consists of various obituaries and remembrances by former colleagues and students. The book is accessible online at http://www.nla.gov.au/apps/cdview/?pi=nla.gen-vn6225630 (accessed October 17, 2015).
See Christian W. Spang, “Die Deutsche Gesellschaft für Natur- und Völkerkunde Ostasiens (OAG) zwischen den Weltkriegen,” in Flucht und Rettung. Exil im japanischen Herrschaftsbereich (1933–1945), ed. Thomas Pekar (Berlin: Metropol, 2011), 65–90.
For some comments on Glombik, see Nikola Herwig, Thomas Pekar and Christian W. Spang, ed., Heinz Altschul, As I Record These Mémoires… (Munich: Iudicium, 2014), 26, 40, and 113 n.52.
For further details, see Nakamura Ayano, “The Nazi Party and the German Colonies in East Asia,” in Japan and Germany. Two Latecomers on the World Stage, 1890–1945, ed. Kudo Akira, Tajima Nobuo and Erich Pauer. Vol. 3 (Folkestone: Global Oriental, 2009), 446.
See Nakamura, “The Nazi Party,” 437, and Christian W Spang, “Die OAG zwischen den Weltkriegen,” in Flucht und Rettung, ed. Thomas Pekar (2011), 73–74, and 88–90.
See Johannes Barth, Als deutscher Kaufmann in Fernost. Bremen—Tsingtau—Tokyo 1891–1981 (Berlin: Erich Schmidt, 1984), 190. Barth explained here that he had joined the party because everyone else had done so and not joining would have been an economic risk he had not been prepared to take.
Donat’s role as outspoken representative of Nazi ideology in Japan has been confirmed by many former German Japan-residents. See Dietrich Seckel’s narration in Gelebte Zeitgeschichte. Alltag von “Deutschen in Japan 1923–1947, ed. Franziska Ehmcke and Peter Pantzer (Munich: Iudicium, 2000), 50. Equally telling are the comments by the Jewish-German philosopher, Klaus Löwith in his book Mein Leben in Deutschland vor und nach 1933 (Stuttgart: Metzler, 2002), 117.
Nakamura, “The Nazi Party,” 448 n.66, mentions a 1936 police report, which shows the police’s view very clearly: “The German East Asiatic Society (OAG) […] hold[s] various seminars, lectures and film showings to coordinate all political and other activities by the National Socialist regime.” The quote is Nakamura’s translation. The original is taken from Gaiji keisatsugaikyō 2, ed. Naimushō Keihōkyoku (Tokyo: Fuji Shuppan, 1994), 370.
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Spang, C.W. (2016). The German East Asiatic Society (OAG) during the Nazi Era. In: Cho, J.M., Roberts, L.M., Spang, C.W. (eds) Transnational Encounters between Germany and Japan. Palgrave Series in Asian German Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137573971_8
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