Designing History in East Asian Textbooks

Gotelind Müller is Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Heidelberg, Germany.

"This book makes an important contribution to the on-going multi- and transnational research into history education and the politics of history in East Asia by combining a refined approach to this critical topic with an up-to-date overview of the seminal issues in the field." - Torsten Weber; Monumenta Serica 59 (2011)"This edited volume gives an excellent overview on the present state of schoolbook discussions in East Asia from a national and multilateral perspective; at the same time, it presents multiple ways of solving the problem of how to revise traditional narratives in school textbooks, e.g. by a transnational perspective, to further historical reconciliation via history education." - Eckhardt Fuchs, Vice director of the Georg Eckert Institute for Textbook Studies, Braunschweig; Geschichte heute (2012)."The volume remedies an important lacuna for historians, textbook scholars, political scientists and all those interested in pursuing the goal of deescalating historical textbook didactics, and those concerned with potentials of conflict in the realm of educational materials." - Ylva Monschein, Chinese Studies, University of Munich; Asien (2012)."In this book which incorporates contributions not only from scholars but also from people involved in textbook writing and curriculum reform, the role of History Education in the process of political socialization all over East Asia is discussed from a historical perspective... Different from a mere collection of academic papers, this book is very thorough in its overall structure and will serve as basic reference for studies of history consciousness and history textbook problems in East Asia."- Prof. SHIBA Nobuhiro, Tokyo University; Rekishigaku kenkyû (2012)."The need for and the potential for a memorial reconciliation among Japan, China, and Korea are effectively put into perspective in Müller’s work, whose weighty contributions offer a detailed and painstaking analysis of the aspirations and identity politics at play in the region." - Yves Russell, EHESS, Paris; China Perspectives (2013).

• Introduction Part I The Ambivalence of National Self/Selves: Historical shifts 1 The Predicament of Compiling East Asia Schoolbooks 2 A Divided "Self" and an Overwhelming "Other"? 3 Learning to Love the Motherland 4 Telling Histories of an Island Part II Designing "Self" and "Other" in School Textbooks: Practical Considerations 5 Teaching "the Others’ History" in Chinese Schools 6 New Curriculum Reform and History Textbook Compilation in Contemporary China 7 The "Others" in Chinese History Textbooks 8 Rewriting history in a textbook in contemporary Japan 9 The Construction of "Self" and Western and Asian "Others" in Contemporary Japanese Civics and Ethics Textbooks Part III Self-Assertion, Revisionism and Historical Reconciliation: Conflicts and Perspectives 10 The "Tokyo Trial View of History" and its Revision in Contemporary Japan / East Asia 11 History Conflicts and Dialogues between Korea and Japan 12 Historical Reconciliation between Germany and Poland as seen from a Japanese Perspective 13 Mediating Textbook Conflicts