This study shall explore the social and political significance of the so-called kyureki, the Japanese lunisolar calendar that was abolished by the Meiji government in 1872. This calendar was the principal method of timekeeping in Japan from 604 to 1872, but has received little attention from English speaking scholars. This study argues that the study of the lunisolar calendar is essential to gaining a comprehensive understanding of pre-Meiji society and political history. Chapter 1 uses a detailed analysis of an actual lunisolar calendar coupled with passages from pre-Meiji historical and literary texts to show that the lunisolar calendar reflects the value pre-Meiji society placed on minute seasonal changes, the phases of the moon, and divination controlled by various directional deities. It shall also demonstrate how an understanding of the lunisolar calendar is vital to fully comprehend classical Japanese texts. Chapter 2 explores how calendar reform has been enacted throughout Japanese history to promote the values of new political regimes. Chapter 3 discusses the state of the lunisolar calendar in modern Japan, first analyzing how the calendar survived the Meiji government's attempt to obliterate it and the effect the Meiji calendar reform had on how the lunisolar calendar is understood today. It then discusses how the current revival of interest in the lunisolar calendar reflects the value modern society places on nostalgia for the past, which has arisen as part of the modernization process.

Mini-set E: Sociology & Anthropology re-issues 10 volumes originally published between 1931 and 1995 and covers topics such as japanese whaling, marriage in japan, and the japanese health care system. For institutional purchases for e-book sets please contact [email protected] (customers in the UK, Europe and Rest of World)

This is Volume V of six in a collection on the Sociology of East Asia. Initially published in 1946, Dr. Embree's book is a description, based on direct observation, of the life of a Japanese village community. Its chief purpose is to provide material for that comparative study' of the forms of: human society that is known as social anthropology; but it should have an appeal to a wider audience of general readers as giving additional insight from a new 'angle into Japanese civilization.

This book approaches its subject from two angles. First, there is a detailed and descriptive analysis of the social organisation of, and place of marriage in, one community in Kyushu. To this extent, the study is a regional one and provides valuable ethnographic information. The second angle, however, is to analyse this material in the light of other historical ethnographical writings on Japan, which puts the regional material in a national context, and brings together a great deal of information about Japanese marriage hitherto unpublished in English.

Takes students inside today's pressing sociological issues and shows them how the compelling events on their minds--such as the current economic recession and the Obama presidency--relate to enduring sociological concepts -- from cover.

Vol. 1- includes Glossary of sociological and anthropological terms.