Author : Abé Mark Nornes
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 366 pages
File Size : 46,91 MB
Release : 2021-11-21
Category : History
ISBN : 1000458466
With contributions from noted critics and film historians from both countries, this book, first published in 1994, examines some of the most innovative and disturbing propaganda ever created. It analyses the conflicting images of these films and their effectiveness in defining public perception of the enemy. It also offers pointed commentary on the power of visual imagery to enhance racial tensions and enforce both positive and negative stereotypes of the Other.
Author : Thomas W. Zeiler
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
Page : 230 pages
File Size : 17,92 MB
Release : 2004
Category : History
ISBN : 9780842029919
Unconditional Defeat-the second book in a Pacific War trilogy that is part of SR Books' Total War series-examines the concluding stages of World War II in Asia and the Pacific, from November 1943 until September 1945. Thomas W. Zeiler argues that this "war without mercy" could only come to one conclusion: the complete, unconditional defeat of Japan by a mobilized, overwhelming, vengeful United States. Zeiler describes these final 22 months of the Pacific War as a story of contrasts. While the U.S. launched a methodical, smothering attack with all the means at its disposal, Japan fought a fierce yet hopeless defense with diminishing supplies. By November 1943, Japan lacked the necessities not just for victory, as in the earlier phases of the war, but for adequate defense. The Japanese had no options. The strategic planning rested with the Americans. Zeiler's gripping and thorough overview discusses other contrasts between the two foes. The Americans planned multiple advances in the Pacific Ocean and on the Asian mainland. They used a massive number of troops, devised and adopted new amphibious techniques, and deployed the new nuclear category of weapons. The Japanese stubbornly but desperately clung to their territory, often with the basest of defenses. By August 1945, the United States' forces at sea, on land, and in the air had brought Japan near complete defeat. In addition, the Japanese Empire was diplomatically isolated. Japanese politics was in turmoil, the government faced rebellion, and the Emperor stood on the brink of extinction. Wracked by the destruction of the homeland from the air and blockade by sea, Japanese society veered near chaos and the people peered into the abyss of an uncertain future. In the meantime, America's military had experienced such horrors at the hands of Japan that the U.S. made the difficult decision to unleash the atomic bomb. Despite the stark differences between the U.S. and Japan, argues Zeiler, there was one aspect of the war that both sides held i
Author : Ronald H. Spector
Publisher : Free Press
Page : 624 pages
File Size : 31,52 MB
Release : 2020-11-03
Category : History
ISBN : 1982135239
“The best book by far on the Pacific War” (The New York Times Book Review), this classic one-volume history of World War II in the Pacific draws on declassified intelligence files; British, American, and Japanese archival material; and military memoirs to provide a stunning and complete history of the conflict. This “superbly readable, insightful, gripping” (Washington Post Book World) contribution to WWII history combines impeccable research with electrifying detail and offers provocative interpretations of this brutal forty-four-month struggle. Author and historian Ronald H. Spector reassesses US and Japanese strategy and shows that the dual advance across the Pacific by MacArthur and Nimitz was more a pragmatic solution to bureaucratic, doctrinal, and public relations problems facing the Army and Navy than a strategic calculation. He also argues that Japan made its fatal error not in the Midway campaign but in abandoning its offensive strategy after that defeat and allowing itself to be drawn into a war of attrition. Spector skillfully takes us from top-secret strategy meetings in Washington, London, and Tokyo to distant beaches and remote Asian jungles with battle-weary GIs. He reveals that the US had secret plans to wage unrestricted submarine warfare against Japan months before Pearl Harbor and shows that MacArthur and his commanders ignored important intercepts of Japanese messages that would have saved thousands of lives in Papua and Leyte. Throughout, Spector contends that American decisions in the Pacific War were shaped more often by the struggles between the British and the Americans, and between the Army and the Navy, than by strategic considerations. Spector vividly recreates the major battles, little-known campaigns, and unfamiliar events leading up to the deadliest air raid ever, adding a new dimension to our understanding of the American war in the Pacific and the people and forces that determined its outcome.
Author : John Roston
Publisher : John Roston
Page : 233 pages
File Size : 27,77 MB
Release : 1983-06-01
Category : History
ISBN :
The Office of War Information's influence on the portrayal of Japanese-Americans in motion pictures provides an unusual opportunity for a case study of the implementation of a motion picture propaganda policy. OWl 's motion picture program included the production and theatrical distribution of government films and the review before release of feature films produced by the Hollywood studios. The OWl policy on Japanese-Americans is examined to show how it called for three conflicting views. In government films, implementation of the policy became a problem of film technique for government filmmakers. In Hollywood films, the policy was implemented by a special OWl Hollywood Office. The change in that Office's attitude toward the portrayal of Japanese-Americans over the course of the war is detailed through an examination of its film reviews and correspondence. They suggest the emergence of bureaucratic attitudes to deal with the difficult social issues involved.
Author : John Dower
Publisher : Pantheon
Page : 411 pages
File Size : 11,83 MB
Release : 2012-03-28
Category : History
ISBN : 0307816141
WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD • AN AMERICAN BOOK AWARD FINALIST • A monumental history that has been hailed by The New York Times as “one of the most original and important books to be written about the war between Japan and the United States.” In this monumental history, Professor John Dower reveals a hidden, explosive dimension of the Pacific War—race—while writing what John Toland has called “a landmark book ... a powerful, moving, and evenhanded history that is sorely needed in both America and Japan.” Drawing on American and Japanese songs, slogans, cartoons, propaganda films, secret reports, and a wealth of other documents of the time, Dower opens up a whole new way of looking at that bitter struggle of four and a half decades ago and its ramifications in our lives today. As Edwin O. Reischauer, former ambassador to Japan, has pointed out, this book offers “a lesson that the postwar generations need most ... with eloquence, crushing detail, and power.”
Author : Markus Nornes
Publisher : U of Minnesota Press
Page : 292 pages
File Size : 50,51 MB
Release : 2003
Category : Performing Arts
ISBN : 9780816640461
Among Asian countries--where until recently documentary filmmaking was largely the domain of central governments--Japan was exceptional for the vigor of its nonfiction film industry. And yet, for all its aesthetic, historical, and political interest, the Japanese documentary remains little known and largely unstudied outside of Japan. This is the first English-language study of the subject, an enlightening close look at the first fifty years of documentary film theory and practice in Japan. Beginning with films made by foreigners in the nineteenth century and concluding with the first two films made after Japan's surrender in 1945, Abe Mark Nornes moves from a "prehistory of the documentary, " through innovations of the proletarian film movement, to the hardening of style and conventions that started with the Manchurian Incident films and continued through the Pacific War. Nornes draws on a wide variety of archival sources--including Japanese studio records, secret police reports, government memos, letters, military tribunal testimonies, and more--to chart shifts in documentary style against developments in the history of modern Japan.
Author : Loyd Lee
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Page : 528 pages
File Size : 36,46 MB
Release : 1998-10-23
Category : History
ISBN : 0313033153
A companion to World War II in Europe, Africa, and the Americas, this volume reevaluates the most enduring literature on basic aspects of the war in Asia and the Pacific. It also covers themes pertaining to societies at war, culture, the arts, and science and technology as well as international relations and the postwar world. Included are not only grand strategy, military and naval campaigns, and matters of diplomacy, but also resistance, collaboration, prisoners of war, and broad topics of the home front, including chapters on gender issues, film, literature, popular culture, and propaganda. This volume and its companion provide the first comprehensive historiographic reference work on the war. Each chapter describes the state of knowledge on the topic, relating each bibliographic reference to the chapter's themes and issues, and concludes with a bibliography. Recent original scholarship is included when it aids new understanding, and older works of enduring value also find a place. The essays in this volume will interest scholars and college teachers as well as advanced students and serious amateurs seeking insight into the history of the war and its literature.
Author : Louis G. Perez
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Page : 657 pages
File Size : 38,16 MB
Release : 2013-01-08
Category : History
ISBN : 1598847422
This compelling reference focuses on the events, individuals, organizations, and ideas that shaped Japanese warfare from early times to the present day. Japan's military prowess is legendary. From the early samurai code of morals to the 20th-century battles in the Pacific theater, this island nation has a long history of duty, honor, and valor in warfare. This fascinating reference explores the relationship between military values and Japanese society, and traces the evolution of war in this country from 700 CE to modern times. In Japan at War: An Encyclopedia, author Louis G. Perez examines the people and ideas that led Japan into or out of war, analyzes the outcomes of battles, and presents theoretical alternatives to the strategic choices made during the conflicts. The book contains contributions from scholars in a wide range of disciplines, including history, political science, anthropology, sociology, language, literature, poetry, and psychology; and the content features internal rebellions and revolutions as well as wars with other countries and kingdoms. Entries are listed alphabetically and extensively cross-referenced to help readers quickly locate topics of interest.
Author : Bernard F. Dick
Publisher : University Press of Kentucky
Page : 405 pages
File Size : 44,19 MB
Release : 2022-05-31
Category : Performing Arts
ISBN : 0813195691
The American World War II film depicted a united America, a mythic America in which the average guy, the girl next door, the 4-F patriot, and the grieving mother were suddenly transformed into heroes and heroines, warriors and goddesses. The Star-Spangled Screen examines the historical accuracy—or lack thereof—of films about the Third Reich, the Resistance, and major military campaigns. Concerned primarily with the films of the war years, it also includes discussions of such postwar movies as Battleground (1949), Attack! (1956), The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), and Patton (1970). This revised edition includes new material covering recent films such as Saving Private Ryan (1998), Pearl Harbor (2001), Dunkirk (2017), and JoJo Rabbit (2019), and their place in the war movie tradition. The Star-Spangled Screen makes a major contribution to popular culture by re-creating an era that, for all its tragedy, was one of the most creative in the history of American film.
Author : Yoshikuni Igarashi
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 295 pages
File Size : 16,44 MB
Release : 2012-01-09
Category : History
ISBN : 1400842980
Japan and the United States became close political allies so quickly after the end of World War II, that it seemed as though the two countries had easily forgotten the war they had fought. Here Yoshikuni Igarashi offers a provocative look at how Japanese postwar society struggled to understand its war loss and the resulting national trauma, even as forces within the society sought to suppress these memories. Igarashi argues that Japan's nationhood survived the war's destruction in part through a popular culture that expressed memories of loss and devastation more readily than political discourse ever could. He shows how the desire to represent the past motivated Japan's cultural productions in the first twenty-five years of the postwar period. Japanese war experiences were often described through narrative devices that downplayed the war's disruptive effects on Japan's history. Rather than treat these narratives as obstacles to historical inquiry, Igarashi reads them along with counter-narratives that attempted to register the original impact of the war. He traces the tensions between remembering and forgetting by focusing on the body as the central site for Japan's production of the past. This approach leads to fascinating discussions of such diverse topics as the use of the atomic bomb, hygiene policies under the U.S. occupation, the monstrous body of Godzilla, the first Western professional wrestling matches in Japan, the transformation of Tokyo and the athletic body for the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, and the writer Yukio Mishima's dramatic suicide, while providing a fresh critical perspective on the war legacy of Japan.
