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Japanese Collections

Tag: Special Collections

Announcing the Thomas Gregory Song Research Fellowship, Spring 2023

November 11, 2022 / / Comments Off on Announcing the Thomas Gregory Song Research Fellowship, Spring 2023

Thomas Gregory Song ca. 1940 in school uniform in Japan-occupied Dairen
(present-day Dalian, China). Image courtesy of Rare Books & Manuscripts Library

The Ohio State University Libraries is pleased to announce the Thomas Gregory Song Research Fellowship for an independent research project that makes substantial on-site use of the Thomas Gregory Song (TGS) Papers in the Rare Books and Manuscripts Library (https://library.osu.edu/collections/ SPEC.RARE.0195/collection-inventory). Written predominantly in Japanese and English (with some documents in Korean), the TGS Papers include Song family genealogical records; personal photographs from Song’s childhood; an Oral History Interview; over 2300 blog posts; and personal correspondence, journals, and essays. The TGS Papers shed significant light on topics of World History, East Asian Studies, Asian American Studies, Asian diaspora, migration, and gender and sexuality studies.  For more detailed information on the Song Family history and related collections held at the University Libraries, please visit the recently launched Thomas Gregory Song Family Exhibit.

Applications are due by on Dec. 15, 2022 at 5:00pm.

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Learning from Woodblock Prints at OSU

June 23, 2022 / / Comments Off on Learning from Woodblock Prints at OSU

Within the depths of our libraries’ shelves, cases, and drawers lie hundreds of special materials you may have never have imagined were there! With so much to explore, today we’d like to bring your attention to our collection of woodblock prints and one of the many ways we enjoy sharing these materials with faculty and students.

Students of HISTART 2003 observing original Meiji-era prints
by artists Kyōsai, Kiyochika, and Toshinobu

As our reading rooms opened up again last year, we were thrilled to hold several open houses, featuring our manga collection as well as substantial holdings of  woodblock prints (many of which are considered precursors to contemporary manga). Held across the University Libraries in the Theatre Research Institute, the Rare Books and Manuscripts Library, and the Billy Ireland and Cartoon Library,  these historic prints were gathered and displayed together in the reading room of the Billy Ireland for students in Artistic Media and Techniques (HISTART 4005) last October and again for those in Art & Visual Culture of East Asia (HISTART 2003) in December and April.

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Night Parade of One Hundred Demons: Kyōsai’s Hyakki Gadan Now at OSU Libraries

October 23, 2019 / / Comments Off on Night Parade of One Hundred Demons: Kyōsai’s Hyakki Gadan Now at OSU Libraries

Japanese Studies invites you to learn about the mythology and artistic culture of Meiji Japan (1868-1912) through the newly acquired Kyōsai Hyakki Gadan (暁斎百鬼画談), a color woodblock print by eccentric painter and manga forerunner, Kawanabe Kyōsai (河鍋 暁斎, 1831-1889). The long, accordion book (orihon) depicts a parade of all manner of weird and wicked yōkai (妖怪), spirits and demons from Japanese mythology. This particular scene is evocative of the hyakki yagyō (百鬼夜行) idiom, a historic theme in Japanese visual representation wherein a procession of legendary creatures sets foot upon the communities of mortal men and women.

For more information about this new acquisition, please check out the full article on our Manga Blog at OSU Libraries, available here: https://library.osu.edu/site/manga/2019/10/02/night-parade-of-one-hundred-demons-kyosais-hyakki-gadan-now-at-osu-libraries/

Focus on Japan in WWII: Kōa Shingun Ezu Iri (興亜進軍絵図入)

May 4, 2017 / / Comments Off on Focus on Japan in WWII: Kōa Shingun Ezu Iri (興亜進軍絵図入)

Interior of aerogram depicting Japanese battles in the Pacific

On February 14th, I wrote a blog introducing the Pearl Harbor Exhibit that was hung last winter in commemoration of the 75th anniversary of Pearl Harbor (December 7, 2016). In order to showcase the Japanese military perspective, the exhibit included a very special document, a fold-up aerogram that was made by the Japanese wartime government.  The present blog will feature that document, known as gunji yūbin (軍事郵便), or “military mail” in English.

Gunji Yūbin (軍事郵便)

Gunji yūbin was the military mail service that connected soldiers on the front lines to their families back in the metropole. It was established in 1894 (Meiji 27) during the Sino-Japanese War. Because the gunji yūbin was responsible for handling all letters going back and forth between the soldiers and their families, its extant pieces can be a treasure trove for researchers of war-time and Imperial Japan.

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