Research
Forum:
This site will provide information on archives and libraries
with materials related to Sino-Japanese conflict between 1931
and 1945. Scholars or archivists are welcome to email Steven
Phillips at sphillip@towson.edu
with experiences or notices concerning archives or libraries.
Please specify the archives where you performed research, and
summarize your experiences with respect to access, availability
of cataloguing, fees, photo-copying regulations and any other
matters that might be of interest to other scholars. In particular,
if you found previously unknown materials that would be of interest
to others, include that in your report. Please specify clearly
whether or not you would like your identity revealed to others
who might contact you, and provide an e-mail address if you
so choose. Thank you for your contribution.
For further information on the experiences of researchers in
China see the Chinese History Research Site at the University
of California at San Diego (http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/chinesehistory/chinese_archives.htm).
Hong Kong: Archive of children’s and illustrated material
related to the Sino-Japanese War, 1931-45
For the past several years, Don Cohn, writer, translator, and
former book review editor at the Far East Economic Review,
has been accumulating an archive of children’s and other
illustrated material dealing with Manchukuo, the Japanese occupation
of China, and Japanese colonial expansion in Asia. At present,
a portion of this material belongs to the Cotsen Children’s
Library at Princeton University. The material was sourced in
both China and Japan.
The illustrated material in the archive, particularly that
for children, is a unique source for the study of this period,
as it reflects in a didactic and graphic manner the social,
political, racial and other values of the day.
To date, the archive consists of over 200 items, in the following
general categories:
1. Primary and middle school textbooks (Japanese and Chinese
["Manyu"] language, ethics, history, mathematics)
and works on pedagogy for use in Manchukuo, written in Japanese
and Chinese, published in Japan and Manchukuo
2. Children’s periodicals in Chinese published in Japan,
China and Manchukuo for distribution in Manchukuo and elsewhere
in China
3. Chinese, Japanese and bilingual (Chinese-Japanese) picture
and story books for children, concerned with Manchukuo, published
in Japan, China and Manchukuo
4. Children’s picture and story books published in Japanese,
dealing with Japanese expansion in Asia and the Greater East
Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, including Mongolia, with some relevance
to Manchukuo
5. Classroom and other educational and propaganda posters (including
the Twenty-Four Exemplars of Filial Piety) published in Japan
and Manchukuo during the period 1931-45.
6. Japanese sugoroku printed board games with contents related
to the Manchurian Incident, Greater East Asia Co-prosperity
Sphere, Kanto army, Puyi’s ascension to the Manchukuo throne,
etc.
7. Ephemera: postcards, new year cards, toys and advertising
material showing Manchukuo, Chinese and Japanese children, the
flags of China, Japan and Manchukuo in various contexts, printed
material related to "care packages" and gifts sent
to Japanese soldiers overseas, etc.
Don Cohn would be most interested to know if there are any
similar archives of illustrated and/or children’s materials
related to Manchukuo, and whether any academic research has
been carried out on this material, or on primary education and
children’s publishing in Manchukuo
For information on examining these materials, please contact
Don Cohn at donjcohn@hotmail.com.
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- updated
2-14-01
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