Yukiko Koga
Biographic Data
| ID | 80195 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Yukiko Koga |
| GIVEN NAMES | Yukiko |
| FAMILY NAME | Koga |
| SIGNATURE | KOGA Y |
| AFFILIATIONS | Department of Anthropology Hunter College—City University of New York 695 Park Avenue New York NY 10065 |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 11 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 21 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 11 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Post-imperial Reckoning
This essay explores what it means to reckon with imperial violence decades after the Japanese Empire’s demise in 1945. Through legal, historical, and ethnographic analyses of civil lawsuits filed in courts across Japan since the 1990s by Chinese and South Korean victims seeking apologies and monetary compensation from the Japanese government and corporations involved in enslavement, I explore how the lawsuits exposed a politics of abandonment tha…
Restless Reconciliation
What does it mean to reckon with imperial violence through legal means decades after the formal end of violence? What do out-of-court settlements settle, and what does reconciliation look like on the ground? This essay ethnographically explores Chinese slave labor settlements that came out of a series of lawsuits filed within Japan since the mid-1990s by survivors against the Japanese government and the corporations that enslaved them in the 1940…
Memory, Postmemory, Inheritance
“From Memory to Inheritance: Postimperial Topography of Guilt in Changchun” examines Japanese encounters with Manchukuo remnants in Changchun, which has become locale for displacement of guilt and “real history” in the Japanese popular imaginary. Based on participant-observation as official tour guide at Palace Museum of the Puppet Emperor of Manchukuo, this chapter follows Japanese tourists—repatriates (hikiagesha), schoolchildren, backpackers, …
Inheritance and Betrayal
“Inheritance and Betrayal: Historical Preservation and Colonial Nostalgia in Harbin” shows the dynamics of inheritance and betrayal as they play out in the politics surrounding historical preservation of colonial-era architecture in Harbin, China, built mostly by Russians and Japanese in the beginning of the twentieth-century and the ensuing nostalgia industry related to “Old Harbin,” as locals affectionately refer to Harbin during the era of col…
The Political Economy of Redemption
“The Political Economy of Redemption: Middle-Class Dreams in the Dalian Special Economic Zone” looks into political economy of redemption, mode of generational transmission where moral economy of seeking redemption for unaccounted-for pasts is inexorably linked to formal economy of exports, consumption, and citywide pursuit of middle class dreams. Against backdrop of national mythology premised on anti-Japanese struggles, municipal government lit…
Epilogue
“Epilogue: Deferred Reckoning and the Double Inheritance” takes readers to second decade of the twentieth-first century, pervaded by heightened political tension over Japan’s “history problem” within East Asia’s new geopolitics. Readers will find victims of mustard gas exposure in Qiqihar––delayed violence inflicted by their unexpected encounters with chemical weapons abandoned by retreating Imperial Japanese Army at end of World War II––in Tokyo…
Industrious Anxiety
Chapter 5 examines the latent anxiety about modernity inherent in excess produced by the political economy of redemption. Looking at Dalian’s postgenerations, it examines the double usage of the concept of renzhen (conscientiousness/conscience) to describe both an excessively conscientious work ethic and a lack of conscience regarding Japanese apologies for past violence, capturing the tension between Japan as model of emulation and object of hos…
Inheritance of Loss
Between the Law
Asian victims of Japanese imperialism have filed lawsuits against the Japanese government and corporations since the 1990s, which became prime sites for redress decades after Japan's defeat in World War II. As this ethnography demonstrates, this process paradoxically exposes a legal lacuna within this emergent transnational legal space, with plaintiffs effectively caught between the law , instead of standing before the law. Exploring this absence…
Accounting for silence
Legal efforts seeking official apology and compensation for Japanese colonial violence have, since the 1990s, become a prime site of Chinese and Japanese attempts to come to terms with the past. This ethnography explores what it means to legally account for Japanese imperialism decades after the original violence ended with Japan's defeat in World War II. Examination of recent compensation lawsuits filed by Chinese war victims against the Japanes…
Dancing with the Dead
Accounting for silence
Legal efforts seeking official apology and compensation for Japanese colonial violence have, since the 1990s, become a prime site of Chinese and Japanese attempts to come to terms with the past. This ethnography explores what it means to legally account for Japanese imperialism decades after the original violence ended with Japan's defeat in World War II. Examination of recent compensation lawsuits filed by Chinese war victims against the Japanes…
Between the Law
Asian victims of Japanese imperialism have filed lawsuits against the Japanese government and corporations since the 1990s, which became prime sites for redress decades after Japan's defeat in World War II. As this ethnography demonstrates, this process paradoxically exposes a legal lacuna within this emergent transnational legal space, with plaintiffs effectively caught between the law , instead of standing before the law. Exploring this absence…
Restless Reconciliation
What does it mean to reckon with imperial violence through legal means decades after the formal end of violence? What do out-of-court settlements settle, and what does reconciliation look like on the ground? This essay ethnographically explores Chinese slave labor settlements that came out of a series of lawsuits filed within Japan since the mid-1990s by survivors against the Japanese government and the corporations that enslaved them in the 1940…
Dancing with the Dead
Accounting for silence
Legal efforts seeking official apology and compensation for Japanese colonial violence have, since the 1990s, become a prime site of Chinese and Japanese attempts to come to terms with the past. This ethnography explores what it means to legally account for Japanese imperialism decades after the original violence ended with Japan's defeat in World War II. Examination of recent compensation lawsuits filed by Chinese war victims against the Japanes…
Memory, Postmemory, Inheritance
“From Memory to Inheritance: Postimperial Topography of Guilt in Changchun” examines Japanese encounters with Manchukuo remnants in Changchun, which has become locale for displacement of guilt and “real history” in the Japanese popular imaginary. Based on participant-observation as official tour guide at Palace Museum of the Puppet Emperor of Manchukuo, this chapter follows Japanese tourists—repatriates (hikiagesha), schoolchildren, backpackers, …
Inheritance and Betrayal
“Inheritance and Betrayal: Historical Preservation and Colonial Nostalgia in Harbin” shows the dynamics of inheritance and betrayal as they play out in the politics surrounding historical preservation of colonial-era architecture in Harbin, China, built mostly by Russians and Japanese in the beginning of the twentieth-century and the ensuing nostalgia industry related to “Old Harbin,” as locals affectionately refer to Harbin during the era of col…
The Political Economy of Redemption
“The Political Economy of Redemption: Middle-Class Dreams in the Dalian Special Economic Zone” looks into political economy of redemption, mode of generational transmission where moral economy of seeking redemption for unaccounted-for pasts is inexorably linked to formal economy of exports, consumption, and citywide pursuit of middle class dreams. Against backdrop of national mythology premised on anti-Japanese struggles, municipal government lit…
Epilogue
“Epilogue: Deferred Reckoning and the Double Inheritance” takes readers to second decade of the twentieth-first century, pervaded by heightened political tension over Japan’s “history problem” within East Asia’s new geopolitics. Readers will find victims of mustard gas exposure in Qiqihar––delayed violence inflicted by their unexpected encounters with chemical weapons abandoned by retreating Imperial Japanese Army at end of World War II––in Tokyo…
Industrious Anxiety
Chapter 5 examines the latent anxiety about modernity inherent in excess produced by the political economy of redemption. Looking at Dalian’s postgenerations, it examines the double usage of the concept of renzhen (conscientiousness/conscience) to describe both an excessively conscientious work ethic and a lack of conscience regarding Japanese apologies for past violence, capturing the tension between Japan as model of emulation and object of hos…
Inheritance of Loss
Between the Law
Asian victims of Japanese imperialism have filed lawsuits against the Japanese government and corporations since the 1990s, which became prime sites for redress decades after Japan's defeat in World War II. As this ethnography demonstrates, this process paradoxically exposes a legal lacuna within this emergent transnational legal space, with plaintiffs effectively caught between the law , instead of standing before the law. Exploring this absence…
Restless Reconciliation
What does it mean to reckon with imperial violence through legal means decades after the formal end of violence? What do out-of-court settlements settle, and what does reconciliation look like on the ground? This essay ethnographically explores Chinese slave labor settlements that came out of a series of lawsuits filed within Japan since the mid-1990s by survivors against the Japanese government and the corporations that enslaved them in the 1940…
Post-imperial Reckoning
This essay explores what it means to reckon with imperial violence decades after the Japanese Empire’s demise in 1945. Through legal, historical, and ethnographic analyses of civil lawsuits filed in courts across Japan since the 1990s by Chinese and South Korean victims seeking apologies and monetary compensation from the Japanese government and corporations involved in enslavement, I explore how the lawsuits exposed a politics of abandonment tha…
Political science (9 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Japanese History and Culture (7 works) · Law (7 works) · Chinese history and philosophy (6 works) · History (6 works) · Empire (5 works) · Politics (5 works) · Colonialism (4 works) · Economics (3 works)