16 January 2018
In this talk, Gerhard Fasol is joined by Sir Stephen Gomersall to discuss the reforms to Japanese corporate governance made in recent years, based on their direct experiences as non-Japanese Directors of Tokyo Stock Exchange-listed Japanese companies. The speakers will also discuss issues of diversity and its importance for the quality of management in Japanese corporations.
23 January 2018
For a James Bond locale, exotic Japan fits the bill nicely with sliding doors and ninjas, high-tech gadgetry and interesting options for expendable henchmen. Yet for Ian Fleming Japan offered more than literary background colour. Grab your Beretta, put on your tuxedo and fire up the Bentley… In this talk, Dr Damian Flanagan took us on a thrilling spy adventure, showing us Japan in a way we had never imagined before – the extraordinary untold true story of Bond, James Bond and Japan.
3 November 2017
Novelist Jayne Joso discussed Japan’s deep affinity with nature, how this permeates traditional everyday life and culture, and how it pulses through the country’s art and literature. She talked us through the insights she gained into Japan’s relationship with nature as one of a cycle of transmigration, as one that places the human in equal relation, and as one that is for forever fluid, dynamic and ultimately humbling.
9 November 2017
To Japan, the arrival of Commodore Perry and his Black Ships in 1853 was almost as shocking as if Martians had landed. In this talk, Lesley Downer began by setting the scene on the cusp of Perry’s arrival, telling the story of the Black Ships from both Japanese and American viewpoints. Her talk was illustrated with contemporary documents and pictures including woodblock prints of Perry and Harris as seen through Japanese eyes, and American drawings of the Japanese.
26 September 2017
In April 2016, Kumamoto Prefecture was hit by two massive earthquakes in two successive nights. The Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamoto, was damaged, but most of the artworks were saved, and it was able to reopen within a month as a cultural hub. Director of the Museum Takeshi Sakurai talked about his work there both before and after the earthquake, as well as the progress of reconstruction in Kumamoto more broadly.
29 June 2017
In this talk at the University of Cambridge, Professor Akio Takahara approached the bilateral relations in a comprehensive way and explore four areas of factors in the relationship, namely, domestic politics, economic interests, international environment and security, and people’s perceptions and identity.
20 June 2017
Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat based in the Japanese consulate in Kaunas, Lithuania in 1940, went against his superiors and granted more than 2,000 transit visas to Jewish refugees looking to escape Europe by travelling to Japan, helping as many as 6,000 Jews to flee. In this event, Akira Kitade shared the stories of the fateful encounters between Japanese civilians and Jewish refugees at a time of life and death during the Second World War.
1 June 2017
The House of Illustration hosted the UK’s first ever exhibition of handmade background illustrations for classic sci-fi anime films. It featured drawings and paintings from some of the most influential productions in the genre’s 1990s heyday, including Production I.G’s phenomenally influential 1995 film Ghost in the Shell. In this talk, House of Illustration curator Olivia Ahmad, was joined in conversation by the exhibition’s curator Stefan Riekeles and Helen McCarthy, author of The Anime Encyclopaedia.
10 March 2017
The Hiruzen Plateau in Maniwa City, Okayama Prefecture, is visited by over 2 million tourists per year. Gobara, a small village hidden away in one of the plateau’s corners, is home to Gobara lacquerware, a type of lacquerware that is made for everyday use. Join artisan Kunimitsu Takatsuki to discover more about the history and techniques of this unique urushi.
14 March 2017
In this talk, Dr Damian Flanagan explored the shifting sexual norms of Japan’s literary history from the Edo Period to the present. How have the great writers of Japan from Ihara Saikaku and Natsume Soseki to Yukio Mishima and Haruki Murakami responded to the challenge of these shifting sexual norms and how does understanding the sexuality of the age change our understanding of their works?
