Claim OwnershipHistory of Japan
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This podcast, assembled by a former PhD student in History at the University of Washington, covers the entire span of Japanese history. Each week we'll tackle a new topic, ranging from prehistoric Japan to the modern day.
536 Episodes
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This week on the Revised Introduction to Japanese History: crises about during the late Edo period. A crisis of samurai identity! Questions around vengeance, honor, and duty! And of course, the most confounding subject of them all: macroeconomics. But hey, I'm sure we can figure this all out as long as no pesky Americans show up to ruin things, right? Show notes here.
This week on the Revised Introduction to Japanese History: "closed country" isn't quite the full story. How did Japan maintain its connections to the outside world during the Edo Period? And how do some of those connections, particularly in the Ryukyus and Hokkaido, lay the groundwork for future imperial expansion? Show notes here.
1This week on the Revised Introduction to Japanese History: what was life in the Edo period like? We cover everything from food to school to entertainment as we talk through daily life in Tokugawa-ruled Japan. Show notes here.
This week on the Revised Introduction to Japanese History: how did the Tokugawa bakufu operate? What did the political structure of the shoguns look like? And what makes the Tokugawa era unique in the history of warrior rule in Japan? Show notes here.
This week on the Revised Introduction to Japanese History: Hideyoshi may have brought peace, but Tokugawa Ieyasu would be the one to make it lasting. How did Ieyasu seize power from Hideyoshi, and what did he do to secure it? Show notes here.
With Nobunaga dead, we turn our attention to one of his generals: Hashiba Hideyoshi, who would take up leadership of the former Oda lands and within the course of a decade complete Japan's reunification. What do we know about the man and motives behind Japan's greatest rags to riches story? Show notes here.
This week on the Revised Intro to Japanese History: the beginning of the end of the age of war and the rise of Oda Nobunaga. How did Nobunaga go from the ruler of less than a single province to the most powerful man in Japan in just a few decades? And what do we really know about the man himself, his plans, and his vision for Japan's future? Show notes here.
This week on the Revised Intro to Japanese History: the social, religious, and economic changes of the Sengoku period. Though this is an age of civil war, it's also an age of tremendous growth and change, and one that will lay the groundwork of much to come in future centuries. Show notes here.
This week, we look at the flip side of the chaos of the Sengoku era in the form of two clans that rose to prominence from obscurity during the age of civil war. The first half is focused on the Mori family of western Honshu, while the second is focused on the Date, from the island's remote north. Show notes here.
This week on the Revised Introduction to Japanese History: our first foray into the age of civil war! We're looking to understand the conflicts of the Sengoku by examining the rapid falls from power during this time of the Yamana and Hosokawa clans. Show notes here.
This week: the Muromachi bakufu comes crashing down, thanks to a combination of structural weaknesses and a shogun who is more interested in painting than politics. As a result, Japan enters a new age of civil war, which will radically reshape the country. Show notes here.
This week: Go-Daigo's regime collapses, and a second samurai government, the Muromachi bakufu, emerges. How did Ashikaga Takauji successfully establish Japan's second shogunate--and perhaps set it up for long term failure in the bargain? Show notes here.
This week: the dramatic career of Emperor Go-Daigo, who brought down the Kamakura shogunate and ended Hojo rule in Japan. This despite the fact that just a few months before victory, his forces were on the verge of defeat! Show notes here.
This week, we're taking a look at some of the economic and social structures of Kamakura period Japan in order to answer the question: just what makes medieval Japan so...medieval? Also, I'll be taking next week off for the New Year. See you all in 2024! Show notes here.
This week: why did the Mongols invade Japan? How did a seemingly invincible military machine falter in its assaults on the island of Kyushu? And why, in the long term, did the Mongol invasions begin the process of bringing down the Kamakura shogunate? Show notes here.
This week: the advent of the medieval era brings with it new strands of Buddhism that will radically remake the image of the religion from an aristocratic faith to a distinctly Japanese one. So, how do the wildly different beliefs of Zen, Pure Land, and Nichiren Buddhism all grow out of the same moment in religious history? Show notes here.
This week: the rise of the Minamoto clan, the destruction of the Taira clan, and the birth of a new kind of political arrangement in the form of Japan's first shogunate. Show notes here.
This week, we're covering the beginnings of the rise of the samurai class by looking at the wars of the 1000s, as well as the Hogen and Heiji conflicts which secured the role of the military class in national politics. Show notes here.
This week, we turn our attention to two of the defining institutions of the Heian period, both of which will be very important for us going forward. First are the shoen, or private estates, the growth of which led to the fragmentation and decentralization of the government. The second is the rising power of the warrior class--known to history as the samurai. Show notes here.
This week on the podcast, we're all about literature. We'll be exploring the varieties of poetry and prose that have made the Heian period one of the golden ages of literary flourishing in Japanese history. Show notes here.
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STOP SWEARING. It demeans both you and your dimwitted female interlocutor. At a minimum, WARN listeners ahead of time, that the show contains gratuitous foul language likely to decrease listeners' respect for Japanese civilisation.
just finished replaying this series... Wow.
Do not swear. Do not have an airhead female interlocutor. This episode breaks both rules. You ought to be ashamed of it, given that your other episodes set a high standard. Leave bathos to the English.
FIVE continents, yes. 5 in 1707 and 5 in 2021 and 5 forever, Commie propaganda to the contrary notwithstanding.
😍😍
An otherwise interesting episode ruined. By what? By a stubborn refusal to use he and his, and an insistence on using instead THEY and THEIR. A lord of the 1500s-1700s was never 'they'. Defy political correctness and use the proper word, HE, please.
How many kids did the average Japanese family have, say, around the beginning of the 20th century?
Just as a thing cannot be "extremely unique" it cannot be "extremely unprecedented." To insist on this point is not pedantic. Terminological exactitude is what makes nuanced language possible.
There are no gradations within UNIQUE. Thus, contrary to what this episode asserts, something cannot be "extremely unique."
i like your podcast a lot and you are doing a great job , thanks for making this great podcast , i really want to know about mongols invasion of japan . i really hope there is a way that i can contact you for a project that im working on .
Lay off the cheek. British Empire rule was the best thing that ever happened to India.
show notes link leads to 404 error message
Thanks for a very good episode. (^^,) P.S. All the movies and TV series he talks about here, you can get at InternetArchive.com
LOVE this podcast! Really interesting, and has some really funny parts too! Highly recommend :)
This podcast is sooooo amazing!!!!
Thanks for your podcast! I've personally read 3 nonfiction books that have disagreed with my school teachings, eachother, Wikipedia & oddly manga/anime. (Yeah, I know the last one shouldn't be taken seriously but when it's set in the past & is from Nippon, one must assume there's some truth to it) but this seems to correct it all and put everything in place!
On Episode 30 - Listening 5 years late and loving the podcast so far. Apologies if you've already corrected this somewhere in the 230 episodes I haven't yet listened to, but Blackthorne was not single in the books. He was married and had children he left behind, and does feel some guilt and angst over the situation. And while he isn't offered the chance to return home in the book, you are given the sense that he increasingly considers Japan his home and very possibly wouldn't go back even if given the chance. And my theory on why the author would choose to change names is that that way, he can feel more free to take tons of creative license and invent fake love stories and whatnot without feeling like he's lying about real people. The characters are based on them - they aren't actually them.
An especially good episode, with excellent poetry quotations.
Idiotic analysis by female podcaster. You would do better without her "help".
Love this podcast