Ruptured Histories

Sheila Miyoshi Jager is the author of Brothers at War: The Unending Conflict in Korea and Narratives of Nation-Building in Korea: The Genealogy of Patriotism. A specialist on modern East Asian and Korean history and politics, she has written for the New York Times, Politico, and the Boston Globe. She is Professor of East Asian Studies at Oberlin College. Rana Mitter is the author of several books, including A Bitter Revolution: China’s Struggle with the Modern World and Forgotten Ally: China’s World War II, 1937–1945, named a Book of the Year in The Economist and Financial Times. He has commented on Asia for the BBC, NPR, CNN, the New York Times, the History Channel, and the World Economic Forum at Davos. Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China at the University of Oxford, he is also a Fellow of the British Academy and an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.

This original and imaginative book uses the study of twentieth-century Pacific wars to clarify the subtle yet radical changes sweeping through East Asia with the ending of the Cold War. Penned by some of the best known and most respected voices in the field, these essays are a reminder that within ruptured histories, familiar themes endure: expanding American military power in the Asian Pacific; resurgent nationalisms; and the continuing dominance of war memories in cherished national myths.

• List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction: Reenvisioning Asia, Past and Present Sheila Miyoshi Jager and Rana Mitter 1. Relocating War Memory at Century's End: Japan's Postwar Responsibility and Global Public Culture Franziska Seraphim 2. Operations of Memory: "Comfort Women" and the World Carol Gluck 3. Living Soldiers, Re-lived Memories? Japanese Veterans and Postwar Testimony of War Atrocities Daqing Yang 4. Kamikaze Today: The Search for National Heroes in Contemporary Japan Yoshikuni Igarashi 5. Lost Men and War Criminals: Public Intellectuals at Yasukuni Shrine Ann Sherif 6. The Execution of Tosaka Jun and Other Tales: Historical Amnesia, Memory, and the Question of Japan's "Postwar" Harry D. Harootunian 7. China's "Good War": Voices, Locations, and Generations in the Interpretation of the War of Resistance to Japan Rana Mitter 8. Remembering the Century of Humiliation: The Yuanming Gardens and Dagu Forts Museums James L. Hevia 9. Frontiers of Memory: Conflict, Imperialism, and Official Histories in the Formation of Post-Cold War Taiwan Identity Edward Vickers 10. The Korean War after the Cold War: Commemorating the Armistice Agreement in South Korea Sheila Miyoshi Jager and Jiyul Kim 11. The Korean War: What Is It that We Are Remembering to Forget? Bruce Cumings 12. Doubly Forgotten: Korea's Vietnam War and the Revival of Memory Charles K. Armstrong 13. Revolution, War, and Memory in Contemporary Viet Nam: An Assessment and Agenda Christoph Giebel Epilogue: New Global Conflict? War, Memory, and Post-9/11 Asia Sheila Miyoshi Jager and Rana Mitter Notes Contributors Index