Timothy Y Tsu
Biographic Data
| ID | 6491327 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Timothy Y Tsu |
| GIVEN NAMES | Timothy Y |
| FAMILY NAME | Tsu |
| SIGNATURE | TSU T Y |
| AFFILIATIONS | Kwansei Gakuin University |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 16 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 13 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1997 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2021 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Who Cooked for Townsend Harris? Chinese and the Introduction of Western Foodways to Bakumatsu and Meiji Japan
This study offers an alternative view of Japan's encounter with the West in the nineteenth century through the lens of Chinese cooks. The conventional narrative of the introduction of modern Western foodways to Japan is oblivious to the contribution of Chinese. This article restores the forgotten Chinese cooks to their place in modern Japanese culinary history. Moreover, it places them in the context of the transnational Western imperial practice…
The Chinese Joint Family as a “White Lie”
This article examines the ideological scaffolding of family division contracts (jiushu) in 19th-century Taiwan. It analyses how the island’s Han Chinese inhabitants negotiated with the traditional Chinese joint family ideal as they betrayed it through frequent family divisions (fenjia). Borrowing Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of the “white lie”, this study argues that the Chinese of late-Qing Taiwan not only saw through the “white lie” about the join…
Jews of the East’
From the late nineteenth century until the end of the Pacific War, Japanese expansionist discourse urging the country to take on an ever greater role in Southeast Asia had a great impact on how Japanese people imagined their destiny as a nation. That this discourse took Western colonial powers in the region as presumed adversaries is well known, but the fact that it also posited the Chinese diaspora there as a main competitor has received little …
Chinese and Japanese Films on the Second World War
The chapter discusses a wide selection of movies from the 1990s onwards to highlight continuity in both the ‘anti-war’ and ‘revisionist’ traditions of postwar Japanese cinema. On the one hand, a nationalist tendency in war movies stresses loyalty, self-sacrifice and the righteousness of the Japanese cause through the use and reuse of such cultural icons as the kamikaze pilots, the battleship Yamato, and the war hero Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku as we…
East Asia Beyond the History Wars
Forgotten by whom? On 27 May 2009, the government of the Democratic People s Republic of Korea (DPRK, North Korea) provoked worldwide alarm and protest by announcing that it no longer considered itself bound by the 1953 armistice ending the Korean War. Amongst the mass of western media reports deploring this announcement, however, only a few noted the fact that the armistice has never been signed by the Republic of Korea (ROK, South Korea), becau…
Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan, and
Reviewed by: Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan, and: Japanese Foodways, Past and Present Timothy Y. Tsu (bio) Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan. By Eric C. Rath. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2010. xiv, 242 pages. $49.95, cloth and E-book. Japanese Foodways, Past and Present. Edited by Eric C. Rath and Stephanie Assmann. University of Illinois Press, Urbana, 2010. ix, 290 pages. $80.00, cloth; $28.00, paper. One might say th…
Black Market, Chinatown, and Kabukichō
This paper examines postwar Japanese experiences of kakyō, or “overseas Chinese,” focusing on three “sites”: the black market, Chinatown, and Kabukichō. It argues that Japanese society assigns to the Chinese immigrant community stereotypical meanings that reflect first and foremost Japanese preoccupations in domestic and international affairs. Nonetheless, it also contends that the immigrants are not completely detached or passive, for they colla…
Japan's “Yellow Peril”
Chinese emigrants or kakyō occupy an important but little acknowledged niche in the history of modern Japan. They mediated Japan's relations with China and the West in the Meiji period, they competed against Japanese economic interests in Korea before and after it became a Japanese colony, and they were a controversial source of labour for the Japanese economy. This article recovers the history of Chinese migrants in Japan and Korea in the late n…
Fat, Spices, Culture and More
Chinese cooking is popular in contemporary Japan. It is also a favourite subject of gastronomic writings that discuss not only the cooking techniques and ingredients but also the cultural meaning of the cuisine. This paper analyses the central concerns of this literature and points out its broader cultural-political implications. It contends that Japanese writings on Chinese food share a set of common concerns with the fat and spices in the food …
Making Virtues of Disaster
Nature, Development and Disaster in Postwar Kobe
Postwar Kobe prides itself on being a "progressive" city. It attracted nation-wide attention in the Fifties and Sixties for bold and innovative infrastructure construction. Since the Seventies, without slowing down the pace of construction, it has acquired the reputation for being "environmentally enlightened." The city therefore appears to have achieved a balance between the imperatives of the "construction nation" and "green nation." This paper…
Toothless Ancestors, Felicitous Descendants
The A. first describes the secondary burial as it is performed in south Taiwan; second, he analyzes the symbolism of the rite. Although often mentioned by anthropologists in their writing on Chinese funerary and burial practices, secondary burial itself has seldom formed the focus of scholarly investigation. The narrative part of this study thus fills a gap in the English ethnographic literature. The analytical part shows that the traditional und…
From ethnic ghetto to ‘gourmet republic’
Geomancy and the Environment in Premodern Taiwan
This paper examines the relationship between the environment and the practice of geomancy in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Taiwan. Citing such legal records as rulings, contracts, and deeds, it demonstrates that the geomantic approach to the environment, which emphasized conservation of the numinous landscape, frequently came into conflict with the opposite, utilitarian approach, which treated nature as an exploitable economic resource. Howe…
Black Market, Chinatown, and Kabukichō
This paper examines postwar Japanese experiences of kakyō, or “overseas Chinese,” focusing on three “sites”: the black market, Chinatown, and Kabukichō. It argues that Japanese society assigns to the Chinese immigrant community stereotypical meanings that reflect first and foremost Japanese preoccupations in domestic and international affairs. Nonetheless, it also contends that the immigrants are not completely detached or passive, for they colla…
Toothless Ancestors, Felicitous Descendants
The A. first describes the secondary burial as it is performed in south Taiwan; second, he analyzes the symbolism of the rite. Although often mentioned by anthropologists in their writing on Chinese funerary and burial practices, secondary burial itself has seldom formed the focus of scholarly investigation. The narrative part of this study thus fills a gap in the English ethnographic literature. The analytical part shows that the traditional und…
From ethnic ghetto to ‘gourmet republic’
Japan's “Yellow Peril”
Chinese emigrants or kakyō occupy an important but little acknowledged niche in the history of modern Japan. They mediated Japan's relations with China and the West in the Meiji period, they competed against Japanese economic interests in Korea before and after it became a Japanese colony, and they were a controversial source of labour for the Japanese economy. This article recovers the history of Chinese migrants in Japan and Korea in the late n…
The Chinese Joint Family as a “White Lie”
This article examines the ideological scaffolding of family division contracts (jiushu) in 19th-century Taiwan. It analyses how the island’s Han Chinese inhabitants negotiated with the traditional Chinese joint family ideal as they betrayed it through frequent family divisions (fenjia). Borrowing Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of the “white lie”, this study argues that the Chinese of late-Qing Taiwan not only saw through the “white lie” about the join…
Fat, Spices, Culture and More
Chinese cooking is popular in contemporary Japan. It is also a favourite subject of gastronomic writings that discuss not only the cooking techniques and ingredients but also the cultural meaning of the cuisine. This paper analyses the central concerns of this literature and points out its broader cultural-political implications. It contends that Japanese writings on Chinese food share a set of common concerns with the fat and spices in the food …
Making Virtues of Disaster
Geomancy and the Environment in Premodern Taiwan
This paper examines the relationship between the environment and the practice of geomancy in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Taiwan. Citing such legal records as rulings, contracts, and deeds, it demonstrates that the geomantic approach to the environment, which emphasized conservation of the numinous landscape, frequently came into conflict with the opposite, utilitarian approach, which treated nature as an exploitable economic resource. Howe…
Geomancy and the Environment in Premodern Taiwan
This paper examines the relationship between the environment and the practice of geomancy in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Taiwan. Citing such legal records as rulings, contracts, and deeds, it demonstrates that the geomantic approach to the environment, which emphasized conservation of the numinous landscape, frequently came into conflict with the opposite, utilitarian approach, which treated nature as an exploitable economic resource. Howe…
From ethnic ghetto to ‘gourmet republic’
Toothless Ancestors, Felicitous Descendants
The A. first describes the secondary burial as it is performed in south Taiwan; second, he analyzes the symbolism of the rite. Although often mentioned by anthropologists in their writing on Chinese funerary and burial practices, secondary burial itself has seldom formed the focus of scholarly investigation. The narrative part of this study thus fills a gap in the English ethnographic literature. The analytical part shows that the traditional und…
Nature, Development and Disaster in Postwar Kobe
Postwar Kobe prides itself on being a "progressive" city. It attracted nation-wide attention in the Fifties and Sixties for bold and innovative infrastructure construction. Since the Seventies, without slowing down the pace of construction, it has acquired the reputation for being "environmentally enlightened." The city therefore appears to have achieved a balance between the imperatives of the "construction nation" and "green nation." This paper…
Making Virtues of Disaster
Japan's “Yellow Peril”
Chinese emigrants or kakyō occupy an important but little acknowledged niche in the history of modern Japan. They mediated Japan's relations with China and the West in the Meiji period, they competed against Japanese economic interests in Korea before and after it became a Japanese colony, and they were a controversial source of labour for the Japanese economy. This article recovers the history of Chinese migrants in Japan and Korea in the late n…
Fat, Spices, Culture and More
Chinese cooking is popular in contemporary Japan. It is also a favourite subject of gastronomic writings that discuss not only the cooking techniques and ingredients but also the cultural meaning of the cuisine. This paper analyses the central concerns of this literature and points out its broader cultural-political implications. It contends that Japanese writings on Chinese food share a set of common concerns with the fat and spices in the food …
Black Market, Chinatown, and Kabukichō
This paper examines postwar Japanese experiences of kakyō, or “overseas Chinese,” focusing on three “sites”: the black market, Chinatown, and Kabukichō. It argues that Japanese society assigns to the Chinese immigrant community stereotypical meanings that reflect first and foremost Japanese preoccupations in domestic and international affairs. Nonetheless, it also contends that the immigrants are not completely detached or passive, for they colla…
Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan, and
Reviewed by: Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan, and: Japanese Foodways, Past and Present Timothy Y. Tsu (bio) Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan. By Eric C. Rath. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2010. xiv, 242 pages. $49.95, cloth and E-book. Japanese Foodways, Past and Present. Edited by Eric C. Rath and Stephanie Assmann. University of Illinois Press, Urbana, 2010. ix, 290 pages. $80.00, cloth; $28.00, paper. One might say th…
East Asia Beyond the History Wars
Forgotten by whom? On 27 May 2009, the government of the Democratic People s Republic of Korea (DPRK, North Korea) provoked worldwide alarm and protest by announcing that it no longer considered itself bound by the 1953 armistice ending the Korean War. Amongst the mass of western media reports deploring this announcement, however, only a few noted the fact that the armistice has never been signed by the Republic of Korea (ROK, South Korea), becau…
Chinese and Japanese Films on the Second World War
The chapter discusses a wide selection of movies from the 1990s onwards to highlight continuity in both the ‘anti-war’ and ‘revisionist’ traditions of postwar Japanese cinema. On the one hand, a nationalist tendency in war movies stresses loyalty, self-sacrifice and the righteousness of the Japanese cause through the use and reuse of such cultural icons as the kamikaze pilots, the battleship Yamato, and the war hero Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku as we…
Jews of the East’
From the late nineteenth century until the end of the Pacific War, Japanese expansionist discourse urging the country to take on an ever greater role in Southeast Asia had a great impact on how Japanese people imagined their destiny as a nation. That this discourse took Western colonial powers in the region as presumed adversaries is well known, but the fact that it also posited the Chinese diaspora there as a main competitor has received little …
The Chinese Joint Family as a “White Lie”
This article examines the ideological scaffolding of family division contracts (jiushu) in 19th-century Taiwan. It analyses how the island’s Han Chinese inhabitants negotiated with the traditional Chinese joint family ideal as they betrayed it through frequent family divisions (fenjia). Borrowing Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of the “white lie”, this study argues that the Chinese of late-Qing Taiwan not only saw through the “white lie” about the join…
Who Cooked for Townsend Harris? Chinese and the Introduction of Western Foodways to Bakumatsu and Meiji Japan
This study offers an alternative view of Japan's encounter with the West in the nineteenth century through the lens of Chinese cooks. The conventional narrative of the introduction of modern Western foodways to Japan is oblivious to the contribution of Chinese. This article restores the forgotten Chinese cooks to their place in modern Japanese culinary history. Moreover, it places them in the context of the transnational Western imperial practice…
Japanese History and Culture (13 works) · History (12 works) · Sociology (10 works) · History (8 works) · Asian Culture and Media Studies (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · Anthropology (6 works) · Law (6 works) · Ancient history (5 works) · Archaeology (5 works)