A040 - Writing Japanese Women’s Biography As History Today

    Session will be held in person

    Thursday, March 14, 2024 Friday, March 15, 2024

    7:00 PM - 8:30 PM 2:00 AM - 3:30 AM 7:00 PM - 8:30 PM PDT 2:00 AM - 3:30 AM UTC

    • Jefferson B (4th Floor - Union St. Tower, Sheraton)
Biographies occupy a sizeable, significant place in the historiography of Japan. Among them are several biographies of Japanese women, such as Anne Walthall’s particularly influential study of pioneering poet-activist Matsuo Taseko (1811-1894), that have been fundamental in developing and legitimizing Japanese women’s history. As those trailblazers demonstrated, questions of academic rigor, representativeness, critical distance, positionality, and the biographer’s responsibilities to the subject can be both daunting and inspiring for historical biographers of Japanese women. While more recent biographies are still confronting these issues, the 2020s have also brought new opportunities and challenges. Rather than justifying the need for any biographies of Japanese women, historians may be required to justify the need for another Japanese woman’s biography. And newer lenses such as spatial history, memory studies, and digital history now build on but also complicate approaches framed by feminism and microhistory. However, whereas their Americanist and Europeanist colleagues have responded to parallel trends by developing forums about the craft of women’s historical biography, historians of Japan have not. Our roundtable will address this situation by describing the state of the field, suggesting future possibilities, offering aspiring biographers encouragement and methodological transparency, and stimulating discussion. It assembles scholars who are writing or have recently published nineteenth- and twentieth-century Japanese women's biographies. They will speak about research findings, methodologies, influential authors and ideas, and challenges encountered. Simon Partner will discuss his forthcoming book on the household labor, relationships, and economy of Kawai Koume (1804-1889), a relatively unknown, low-ranking samurai wife and artist. Garrett L. Washington will describe his study of the business accomplishments, family politics, philanthropy, and social activism of industrialist Hirooka Asako (1848-1919). Elyssa Faison will discuss her examination of the life, thought, activism, and marital relationship of socialist and feminist activist Yamakawa Kikue (1890-1980). Lori Watt will present on her study of the family history, academic career, and international preeminence of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Ogata Sadako (1927-2019). Amy Stanley, author of a recent award-winning profile of an unconventional woman who fled her rural priestly family for more independence, and precarity, in Edo, will chair and moderate.
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