Accepted Paper
Paper short abstract
In 1933, the government endorsed the undefined slogan, “Japanese Spirit,” as a guiding principle for ideological policy. This study examines how officials and ideological offenders filled this empty concept in rehabilitation programs, revealing its mediating role in ideological conversion.
Paper long abstract
In previous research, the presenter has conceptualized a group of terms symbolizing the spiritual and national distinctiveness of Japan—such as the “Japanese Spirit” (Nippon seishin), the “Imperial Way” (Kōdō), and the “Yamato Spirit” (Yamato damashii)—as “Japanist slogans,” and has examined how, in Japanese discourse of the 1930s, when these slogans were widely shared, they functioned as mediating devices through which individual claims were legitimized and assigned social and national positioning. This presentation focuses on the fact that the most representative of these “Japanist slogans,” the “Japanese Spirit,” appeared with particular frequency in programs of ideological conversion (tenkō) for ideological offenders, a frontline site of ideological control.
In 1933, when the “Japanese Spirit” began to circulate widely, the government officially endorsed it as a national guiding principle for ideological policy. This endorsement, however, was essentially vacuous, as it lacked any concrete definition. From the mid-1930s onward, the “Japanese Spirit” came to be actively promoted in programs of ideological conversion for ideological offenders. For example, between 1935 and 1937, the Japan Culture Association—a cultural organization established under the leadership of the Ministry of Education—conducted “Japanese Spirit” training seminars for individuals involved in cases of ideological offenses (thought crimes) involving elementary school teachers, and collections of participants’ reflections on these seminars are extant. In addition, in the implementation of the Thought Criminals Protection and Probation Law enacted in 1936, the Ministry of Justice positioned the “Japanese Spirit” as a criterion for judging the success or failure of ideological conversion.
The meaning of the “Japanese Spirit” that emerged in these contexts was by no means self-evident. Officials promoting conversion and ideological offenders responding to them confronted one another as interpretive agents through the shared yet indeterminate term “Japanese Spirit.” By examining what kinds of meanings each side invested in this otherwise empty concept, this presentation aims to elucidate the mediating function that the slogan “Japanese Spirit” played in the practical context of ideological conversion. This inquiry should also contribute to a broader understanding of the discursive conditions of Japan at the time, when such “Japanist slogans” proliferated.
| Abstract in Japanese (if needed): | 報告者は、日本の精神・国柄の特殊性を象徴する用語群を〈日本主義的標語〉として捉え、それらが1930年代日本の言論において個々の主張を正当化し社会的・国家的な位置づけを与える媒介として機能した様を研究してきた。本報告は、代表的標語である「日本精神」が、思想犯転向指導という思想統制の最前線で頻繁に用いられた点に注目する。1933年に政府が思想対策の国家的指導原理として具体的な定義を伴わないまま公認した「日本精神」は、1930年代半ば以降、文部省や司法省による転向指導の現場で積極的に標榜されることとなる。当局と思想犯の双方が、それぞれ解釈の主体として「日本精神」にいかなる意味内容を充填したのかを検討することで、思想統制における「日本精神」の媒介的機能を明らかにする。 |
The Coexistence of Freedom and Constraint in Ideological Control: Theatre, Ritual and Slogan in Prewar Shōwa Japan