Takahashi Tetsuya

Philosopher Takahashi Tetsuya offers a wide-ranging critical assessment of Japan's 3.11 triple disaster and current plans to resume nuclear power. Positing the existence of a 'sacrificial system', he assesses not only the responsibility of the Japanese state and TEPCO for the disaster, but also the Japanese people, particularly those (himself included) who had benefited from the nuclear power system in the Tokyo metropolitan region.

The Department of Asian Studies, Cornell University is pleased to announce a prize honoring the life and work of their colleague Kyoko Selden. The prize will pay homage to the finest achievements in Japanese literature, thought, and society through the medium of translation. Kyoko Selden's translations and writings ranged widely across such realms as Japanese women writers, the atomic bomb experience, Ainu life and culture, historical and contemporary literature, poetry and prose, Japanese art, and early education (the Suzuki method). In the same spirit, the prize will recognize the breadth of Japanese writings, classical and contemporary.

The winning translations will be published online at The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus. Deadline application: May 31, 2014. For more information see here.

Have you used the APJ search engine? The best results may be obtained by going to the left home page and typing in key words such as Okinawa, 3.11, energy, or Vietnam War under Title.

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Thanks to  the generous support of our readers, we succeeded in raising more than $12,000 to fund the Journal for 2014. The Journal will remain free. You can still support the journal at our home page with your 501 (C) tax-deductible gift.

 

The disaster at Fukushima is ongoing. Radiation concerns persist, and there are still more than 130,000 people who live as refugees from Fukushima. Cleanup workers at the Fukushima Daiichi Power Plant struggle in precarious working conditions. In this article, the author explains "nuclear-power-as-sacrificial-system" through an exploration of his childhood memories in Fukushima and the People's Tribunal against Nuclear Power Plants.Takahashi, in examining the 'sacrificial system' assesses not only the responsibility of the Japanese state and TEPCO for the disaster, but also the Japanese people, particularly those who had benefited from the nuclear power system in the Tokyo metropolitan region.

Philosopher Takahashi Tetsuya's work has focused on mainstream phenomenology and Deriddean problems of of justice in the context of the Holocaust and wartime Japanese aggression. He has participated vigorously in debates on historical consciousness and directs his attention to the issues presented by the former military comfort women and the legacy of Japanese colonialism.