Ben Waber reviewed The forgotten Japanese by Tsuneichi Miyamoto
An Eye-Opening Classic
5 stars
I listened to the Japanese audiobook version, which if you speak the language I highly recommend for the amazing voices the narrator uses throughout the book.
Miyamoto provides a possibly never-to-be-repeated ethnography of people whose lives span an almost unimaginable divide - growing up in the dawn of the Meiji era in rural towns and islands with a way of life that is extremely similar to that from the 1600s, these communities were gradually connected and then incorporated into the world of the industrialized 20th century. Changes around work, child rearing, marriage, socialization, education, and more are covered here through fascinating interviews combined with high level commentary from Miyamoto. I do wish there was a bit more macro context for these discussions, but given the paucity of data in the period covered in these geographies that's probably impossible. For me the Japanese vocabulary was challenging given its now archaic …
I listened to the Japanese audiobook version, which if you speak the language I highly recommend for the amazing voices the narrator uses throughout the book.
Miyamoto provides a possibly never-to-be-repeated ethnography of people whose lives span an almost unimaginable divide - growing up in the dawn of the Meiji era in rural towns and islands with a way of life that is extremely similar to that from the 1600s, these communities were gradually connected and then incorporated into the world of the industrialized 20th century. Changes around work, child rearing, marriage, socialization, education, and more are covered here through fascinating interviews combined with high level commentary from Miyamoto. I do wish there was a bit more macro context for these discussions, but given the paucity of data in the period covered in these geographies that's probably impossible. For me the Japanese vocabulary was challenging given its now archaic nature, but the book helpfully provides updated terminology throughout (at least updated as of the 1950s). Highly recommend