A blog from Gale International
|By Rais Asylnaz, Year 11 Student at Nazarbaev Intellectual School in Pavlodar|
Throughout the years, cults have captured the attention of many people. Whenever cults are discussed it’s impossible to avoid talking about the controversies surrounding them. These organisations have sparked interesting debate as to why people engage with and end up involved in cults. In this blog post, I will explore cults’ characteristics, the psychology of those involved, and the reasons behind their appeal.
│By Emery Pan, Associate Development Editor│
In 2001, the Korean television series Empress Myeongseong became a massive hit in many Asian countries. Empress Myeongseong, also known as Queen Min [闵妃], was the wife of Gojong [高宗], the ruler of Korea from 1864 to 1907. Her real life, explored below using primary sources from the Gale archive China and the Modern World, was actually far more complicated and bloody than it appeared in the historical drama.
|By Tetsuhiko Mizoguchi, Senior Marketing Executive, Gale Japan|
If you have been to Kyoto in Japan, you might have dropped in at the temple of Nishi Honganji. As the head temple of the Jodo Shinshu Buddhist sect, it attracts many tourists and was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1994. Even if you stopped by at the temple, however, you might not know that it plays a fascinating part in the history of archaeological expeditions of Central Asia. Kozui Otani was the twenty-second abbot of Nishi Honganji temple. He also led exploratory expeditions, and came to exchange letters with Sven Hedin, a famous Swedish explorer, who even visited the Nishi Honganji temple during his trip to Japan.
Digging through Gale’s digital archive China and the Modern World: Diplomacy and Political Secrets, I found that the India Office Records covered not only diplomats and soldiers, but also explorers like Otani, Hedin and many others. Why? Central Asia, where these explorers were operating, was also the stage on which Western countries played an intelligence war called the “Great Game”. This blog post attempts to shed light on the involvement – or entanglement – of explorers in the Great Game, through the example of Otani and Hedin.
| by Masaki Morisawa, Senior Product Manager, Library Reference, Tokyo |
Last year, an American high school student’s twitter account flamed up when she posted prom pictures of herself wearing a cheongsam, or Chinese dress. Some Asian Americans accused her, who is not of Chinese descent, of cultural appropriation. “My culture is NOT your [expletive] prom dress,” wrote one particularly upset commenter. Others, including many Asians living in Asia, defended her actions and dismissed such criticism as irrelevant.
While “cultural appropriation” is a fairly recent term, similar debates have arisen in the past where the borrowing of “exotic” elements from foreign cultures have been criticised as offensive or disrespectful. One such example is Gilbert and Sullivan’s opera The Mikado, a work that is often hailed as the duo’s masterpiece, yet at times has stirred controversy due to its use of Japanese costume and settings. In this post I would like to take a look at the history of Mikado performances and the controversies surrounding them.
│ By Harry Walker, Gale Ambassador at the University of Birmingham │
Today the Rugby World Cup comes to a close, and it’s fair to say it’s been a somewhat turbulent journey. Controversial refereeing decisions, shock defeats, unlikely Japanese heroes, the smell of lager at nine in the morning and, of course, that devastating typhoon. Within this thrilling pandemonium, a constant has been the high standard of rugby that always seems to justify that 3pm hangover. Off the pitch, a less noticeable but equally heroic constant has been the dignity with which ITV pundit Gareth Thomas has conducted himself, despite his shock revelation prior to the tournament.
Sir Ernest Mason Satow, British diplomat and renowned Japanologist, was a lynchpin of Anglo-Chinese and Anglo-Japanese relations in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During his long diplomatic career, Satow wrote many books on the region, including several on Japan during the transition from rule by the Tokugawa shogunate back to imperial power in the … Read more
By Emery Pan, Gale Editor in Beijing
On April 17, 1895, the first Sino-Japanese War (hereinafter, the “War”) came to a truce, and a treaty was signed at the Japanese city of Shimonoseki. Newspapers around the world competed with each other to report on this event. Japan: an ancient, mysterious country and a new power rising from the Far East dominated all the headlines that day. It is universally acknowledged among those with any knowledge of history that a treaty never ends the chaos, instead it gives rise to new conflicts. The Treaty of Shimonoseki is no exception.
In the December 21, 1867 issue of the Illustrated London News there appears a striking full-length portrait of a samurai. He is neatly dressed in formal kimono, his left hand holding a sword and his right hand resting on a stool, calmly gazing towards the viewer. Something is odd about this picture, however: the sword looks too large for his body, his forehead too high, and his entire stature seems rather diminutive, even for a Japanese.
Sir Ernest Mason Satow (1843–1929) was a legendary British diplomat. He played a key role in Anglo-Japanese and -Chinese relations, particularly in Bakumatsu and Meiji Era Japan, and in China after the Boxer Rebellion. He also served in Siam (present-day Thailand), Uruguay, and Morocco, and represented Britain at the Second Hague Peace Conference in 1907. Satow passed away eighty-seven years ago on August 26, 1929.
