Overview

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

Content will vary according to interests of faculty and students but will involve Japanese-related study within one or more of the social science or humanities disciplines.

COURSE DETAILS:

In this seminar, students will examine the history and culture of Japanese society through food and drink. In most societies, food and drink consumption has meant more than just daily survival. Though eating is a solitary act, for most of history, including Japan’s, people have been eating in groups, whether as families or as part of a religious, military or other group. The study of food and drink reveals how the production, harvest, consumption, sale, and marketing of comestible products over the centuries has helped to shape national identity. Japan is a country whose national identity has been closely associated with food and drink – such as the tea ceremony, rice, and sushi – and even of foreign food it has refashioned according to its domestic consumers’ tastes and re-exported to a global audience, such as Chinese ramen and European beer.

This course will examine the role of food – and food scarcity – in Japan in the fields of history, anthropology, sociology, literary analysis, religious studies, and environmental studies. Major themes covered in the course include the role of food and drink in delineating Japanese national identity; the role of religion, particularly Buddhism, in the tea ceremony and the meat-eating taboo; adoption and adaptation of foreign foods and drinks; the role of manners in banquet and group functions; the impact of Japanese imperialism, war, and the Allied Occupation on food and dietary habits; the role of gender on the culinary world at home and beyond it; and cultural changes associated with Western fast food and beverages.

Grading