Medium Post #2 (Week 3)

In all honesty, although Sonia Ryang’s argument was very compelling, I found it quite far-fetched. The first part of “The Great Kanto Earthquake and the Massacre of Koreans in 1923: Notes of Japan’s Modern National Sovereignty” made sense as it simply provided background. But comparing it to the paradoxical figure of homo sacer and theorizing that it is somehow connected to Koreans, the “sacred and accursed outsider” (739), who were massacred after The Great Kanto Earthquake is simply absurd. Not to mention that the term homo sacer was a figure of law in ancient Rome, almost 2,000 years before the earthquake.

Moreover, Japanese society is made up of four classes: samurai, farmers, artisans, and merchants. The imperial family, including the emperor, was above these classes, while outsiders were below them. Ryang goes on to argue that as outsiders, Koreans do not fit the myth that all Japanese people are descendants of the sun goddess Amaterasu.

Furthermore, Ryang draws comparisons between the Emperor and the Koreans because they are polar opposites of the social hierarchy. Sovereignty passed from the emperor (who died a few years before the incident) to the police force and finally to citizens. (I have always had difficulty understanding the word sovereignty, but according to google, it is “supreme power or authority”). As a result, the Japanese vigilantes thought it was their duty to kill outsiders. Ryang even goes as far as to compare the Massacre of Koreans to the Holocaust: the Japanese saw the Koreans as less than human, similar to how Adolf Hitler saw the Jews as “lice”.

Ryang’s final argument is that “Japanese society in 2003 remains identical with that of 1923”. She believes that the massacre was a product of western modernity and a logical way that Japan emerged as a modern nation.

To answer the question, thinking of these terms helps me contextualize Ryang’s argument but does not help me understand her reasoning.

Post-World War One capitalist crisis

Cities had three identifying characteristics: change, instability, and an increase in violence. Japan saw unprecedented wealth and poverty; the city became a social, economic, and cultural space; and the city became equated with modernity.

Transformations in colonial policy

The Japanese government practiced gradualism in which they slowly assimilated locals through things such as education and baseball.

New conflict b/w colonial subjects and the Japanese people

Taiwan: the Japanese government planned to sell bamboo forests to Mitsubishi so that they could build a sugar factory. Taiwanese residents held an uprising against colonial rule.

Korea: at least 6,000 Koreans were killed in the aftermath of The Great Kanto Earthquake due to racism and prejudice towards Koreans