HIST 287 Traditional Japan

Major Requirement: History of Asia

This course presents an examination of Japan’s history and culture from prehistoric times to the mid-nineteenth century.   Important themes will include Japan’s creation of a unique culture through both isolation and cultural receptivity, the formation and preservation of enduring values, the structure and transformation of Japanese society, the role of religions in Japanese culture, Japan’s “cult of aesthetics,” and the tensions between civilian and military rule through the rise of the samurai class and the ethics of bushidō (the “way of the warrior”).