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##  History Textbook Controversies in Japan. ERIC Digest.                        

There is an ongoing controversy in Japan about textbook treatments              of Japanese military actions during World War II.  This Digest                  examines (1) the importance of history textbooks in schools in Japan            and the United States; (2) the context of history textbook                      controversies in Japan; (3) the current issues and contending                   positions in the Japanese history textbook controversies; and (4)               the lessons and implications of the textbook controversies in Japan             for educators in the United States. THE IMPORTANCE OF HISTORY                 TEXTBOOKS IN JAPAN AND THE UNITED STATES.The controversy                    surrounding the adoption of middle school history textbooks in Japan            raises this question: why are textbooks, history textbooks in                   particular, important enough to fight about? 
Textbooks are used               pervasively in Japanese and American schools. They are the dominant             instructional materials in most classrooms.  Thus, the content of               textbooks looms large in the teaching and learning of history and               other core subjects of the curriculum. 
American historians Laura              Hein and Mark Selden (2000, 3-4) tell us that "people fight over                textbook content because education is so obviously about the future,            reaches so deeply into society, and is directed by the                          state." 
Japanese historian Richard H. Minear says "As a practicing            historian, I encounter at every turn the power textbooks exercise               over my students' minds. ... And our students believe absolutely                what they read in textbooks"                                                    http://vcn.bc.ca/alpha/ienaga/support.htm#Minear. CONTEXT OF THE              TEXTBOOK CONTROVERSIES IN JAPAN.In Japan, each public and                   private school selects one history textbook from a list of seven or             eight authorized by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports,                 Science and Technology (Monbukagakusho) every four years. This                  screening process lasts one year.  Japanese textbook companies                  submit manuscripts to the Ministry of Education, whose appointed                committees examine them according to prescribed criteria.  The                  Ministry offers the textbook companies opportunities to revise their            drafts, and copies of the Ministry-approved manuscripts are then                available for consideration by the local districts. 
In 1965 Saburo            Ienaga, a prominent historian, filed the first of his three lawsuits            against the Ministry of Education charging that the process of                  textbook approval was unconstitutional and illegal.  The Ministry               had rejected Ienaga's history textbook because it contained "too                many illustrations of the 'dark side' of the war, such as an air                raid, a city left in ruins by the atomic bomb, and disabled                     veterans" (Nozaki and Inokuchi 2000, 108).  Ienaga's second suit two            years later also involved the issue of constitutionality and focused            on points related to Ienaga's characterization of Japan's foundation            myths and a description of the 1941 Japan-USSR neutrality pact. 
In            1982 the screening process in Japan became a diplomatic issue when              the media of Japan and neighboring countries extensively covered                changes required by the Ministry of Education.  The Ministry had                ordered Ienaga to remove critical language in his history textbook,             insisting that he write of the Japanese army's "advance into" China             instead of its "aggression in" China and of "uprising among the                 Korean people" instead of the "March First Independence Movement."              Pressure applied by China and Korea succeeded in getting the                    Ministry to back down and resulted in the Ministry adding a new                 authorization criterion: that textbooks must show understanding and             international harmony in their treatment of modern and contemporary             historical events involving neighboring Asian countries (Murai 2001,            28). 
Saburo Ienaga's lawsuits lasted 30 years.  Although in                   1997 -- in response to Ienaga's third lawsuit instituted in 1986 --             the Supreme Court of Japan unanimously upheld the Ministry's right              to continue screening textbooks, Saburo Ienaga and his fellow                   critics enjoyed a partial victory. THE CURRENT SITUATION.A                conservative movement toward reform in the Japanese history                     curriculum was initiated in the early 1990s by Nobukatsu Fujioka and            his Liberal View of History Study Group.  Fujioka, a professor of               education at Tokyo University, set out to "correct history" by                  emphasizing a "positive view" of Japan's past and removing from                 textbooks any reference to matters associated with what he                      calls "dark history." 
By early 2000 Fujioka and his group had                 joined with others to form the Japanese Society for History Textbook            Reform, now headed by Kanji Nishio.  It is the Society's textbook,              THE NEW HISTORY TEXTBOOK (one of eight junior high school history               textbooks authorized by the Ministry of Education in April 2001),               that has caused much debate in Japan over the past year.  Nishio                summarized the views of the Society in an article in the August 2001            JAPAN ECHO, a bimonthly journal of opinion on a wide range of topics            of current interest in Japan.  The article maintained that rather               than asserting the Society members' personal views of history, the              textbook aims to restore common sense to the teaching of the                    subject. Nishio insisted that "history stop being treated like a                court in which the figures and actions of the past are called to                judgment" (Nishio 2001, 33). 
Widespread protests against the                  textbook erupted in Japan, China, and North and South Korea.  In                December 2000, reacting to a draft textbook circulated by the                   Society and shown on national television, a long list of Japanese               historians and history educators expressed misgivings about the                 content of THE NEW HISTORY TEXTBOOK and its rendering of Japan's                past. Their complaints centered around the text's presentation of               Japan's foundation myths as historical fact and its characterization            of wars launched by modern Japan as wars to liberate Asia. 
The                intellectuals' appeal to people inside and outside Japan appeared on            the Internet prior to authorization of the textbook by the Ministry.            Following authorization, their voices were joined by an                         international group of scholars.  They aimed to "ensure that                    textbooks are consistent with values of peace, justice, and truth."             It declared THE NEW HISTORY TEXTBOOK "unfit as a teaching tool                  because it negates both the truth about Japan's record in                       colonialism and war and the values that will contribute to a just               and peaceful Pacific and world community."  More information about              the scholars' claim is available on their Web site, which is                    maintained by the Center for Research and Documentation on Japan's              War Responsibility                                                              http://www.jca.apc.org/JWRC/center/english/index-english.htm.                   
Reactions in China and Korea took various forms.  China Radio                 International announced that the Chinese government and people                  were "strongly indignant about and dissatisfied with the new                    Japanese history textbook for the year 2002 compiled by right-wing              Japanese scholars." Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhu Banzao warned                that the Chinese people would not accept the interpretation of                  wartime events put forth by the new textbook                                    http://web12.cri.com.cn/english/2001/Apr/13714.htm. An article in               the August 25, 2001 issue of KOREA NOW, a biweekly magazine                     published in English, reported that as Seoul prepared to celebrate              its Liberation Day (celebrating Korea's liberation from Japanese                colonization and the establishment of the Republic of Korea) on                 August 15, angry Koreans continued to stage anti-Japan protests                 ignited by the new Japanese "textbooks that allegedly gloss over                atrocities by Japanese soldiers during World War II." 
Under the               Japanese system, local school authorities determine whether the new             textbook is to be used in district classrooms.  On August 15, the               deadline for school districts to make their selections, Associated              Press writer Mari Yamaguchi reported in THE JAPAN TIMES that the new            textbook had been shunned and that nearly all of Japan's school                 districts had rejected it. LESSONS FOR AMERICANS.As a mirror              for Americans, Japan's textbook controversy may shed light on what              could happen here if the dominant narrative, our "official" story of            our past, were challenged by a counter narrative, one that threatens            to alter or even replace a conventional textbook narrative. Japan               lost the war that is the center of the textbook controversy.                    American teachers and students might ask how that fact has                      influenced Japan's textbook narrative.  Does the victor's                       interpretation of the past differ from that of the vanquished?  For             example, James Loewen, author of LIES MY TEACHER TOLD ME: EVERYTHING            YOUR AMERICAN HISTORY TEXTBOOK GOT WRONG, points out that most                  American history textbooks published before 1990 omitted all the                important photographs of the Vietnam War (1995, 241). 
Many                    Americans see Japan as a harmonious, one-dimensional society; the               fact that teachers brought this textbook controversy -- which                   involved lawsuits supported by tens of thousands of Japanese                    people -- to the attention of their students may help diminish that             stereotype.  At least two individuals are prominent in the textbook             controversy in Japan.  By introducing Saburo Ienaga and Nobukatsu               Fujioka to students, American teachers add a human dimension to                 Japan's textbook controversy.  For years Japan's past adversaries,              its Asian neighbors, have scrutinized Japan's history textbooks.                With their students, American teachers might examine American                   textbook narratives while imagining that Mexican, Japanese, and                 Vietnamese scholars and students are reading over their shoulders as            they teach and learn about American interpretations of the war with             Mexico, the war in the Pacific, or the war in Vietnam.  Finally,                American teachers might also consider presenting this passionate                debate in Japan as an example for Americans to follow in                        constructively criticizing and improving textbooks in the United                States. REFERENCES AND ERIC RESOURCES.The following list of               resources includes references used to prepare this Digest.  The                 items followed by an ED number are available in microfiche and/or               paper copies from the ERIC Document Reproduction Service (EDRS). For            information about prices, contact EDRS, 7420 Fullerton Road, Suite              110, Springfield, Virginia 22153-2852; telephone numbers are (703)              440-1400 and (800) 443-3742.  Entries followed by an EJ number,                 annotated monthly in CURRENT INDEX TO JOURNALS IN EDUCATION (CIJE),             are not available through EDRS.  However, they can be located in the            journal section of most larger libraries by using the bibliographic             information provided, requested through Interlibrary Loan, or                   ordered from commercial reprint services. 
Cogan, John J., and                 Walter Enloe.  "The Japanese History Textbook Controversy                       Revisited."  SOCIAL EDUCATION 51 (October 1987): 450-454. EJ 358                613. 
Hein, Laura, and Mark Selden.  "The Lessons of War, Global               Power, and Social Change."  In Laura Hein and Mark Selden, eds.,                CENSORING HISTORY: CITIZENSHIP AND MEMORY IN JAPAN, GERMANY, AND THE            UNITED STATES.  Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2000.  ED 448                         112. 
Loewen, James W.  LIES MY TEACHER TOLD ME: EVERYTHING YOUR               AMERICAN HISTORY TEXTBOOK GOT WRONG.  New York: The New Press,                  1995.  ED 385 468. 
Murai, Atsushi. "Abolish the Textbook                      Authorization System."  JAPAN ECHO (August 2001):  28. 
Nishio,                Kanji. "Restoring Common Sense in the Teaching of History." JAPAN               ECHO (August 2001): 33. 
Nozaki, Yoshiko, and Hiromitsu                        Inokuchi. "Japanese Education, Nationalism, and Ienaga Saburo's                 Lawsuits."  In Laura Hein and Mark Selden, eds., CENSORING HISTORY:             CITIZENSHIP AND MEMORY IN JAPAN, GERMANY, AND THE UNITED STATES.                Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2000.  ED 448 112. 
Ogawa, Masato.  A                COMPARATIVE STUDY OF CONTEMPORARY JAPAN IN JAPANESE AND U.S. WORLD              HISTORY TEXTBOOKS. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the                 American Educational Research Association (Montreal, Quebec, Canada,            April 19-23, 1999). ED 442 725. 
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Kathleen Woods Masalski is            the Projects Director for the Five College Center for East Asian                Studies at Smith College in Northampton, MA.  She was the 2000                  recipient of the John E. Thayer III Award for a lifetime of work                furthering understanding between the United States of America and               Japan. 
This project has been funded at least in part with Federal             funds from the U.S. Department of Education under contract number               ED-99-CO-0016.  The content of this publication does not necessarily            reflect the views or policies of the U.S. Department of Education               nor does mention of trade names, commercial products, or                        organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.  ERIC                   Digests are in the public domain and may be freely reproduced and               disseminated.                                                                **Title:** History Textbook Controversies in Japan. ERIC Digest.                        **Document Type:** Information Analyses---ERIC Information Analysis Products (IAPs) (071); Information Analyses---ERIC Digests (Selected) in Full Text (073); **Available From:** ERIC Clearinghouse for Social Studies/Social Science Education, 2805            East Tenth Street, Suite 120, Bloomington, IN 47408. Tel:                       800-266-3815 (Toll Free); Fax: 812-855-0455; e-mail:                            [email protected]. For full text: http://ericso.indiana.edu/.               **Descriptors:** Foreign Countries,  Historical Interpretation,  History Textbooks,              Middle Schools, Perspective Taking,  Textbook Content, Textbook                 Evaluation,  Textbook Selection,  World War II                               **Identifiers:** Controversial Materials, Controversial Topics, ERIC Digests,  Japan          
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