EALC 24422 Study Guide - Spring 2018, Comprehensive Midterm Notes - East Asian Studies, Samurai, Confucianism
12 Oct 2018
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EALC 24422
MIDTERM EXAM
STUDY GUIDE
Fall 2018
Most important feature of Tokugawa history: lack of warfare
Important People:
Oda Nobunaga: One of the first so-called unifiers
Toyotomi Hideyoshi: brilliant political strategist; pursued politics of alliance building; turned
against Jesuit missionaries
Ieyasu: harsh leader
Lecture
I. What do we mean by ‘Japan?’
A. Identity is cobbled together in the face of a resistant geography
1. Ie. Hokkaido, didn’t consider them to be a part of Japan until the 19th cent
B. Domains (regions) 国, kuni
1. Even more autonomous than the reading describes, in the Tokugawa
period and previously, they really were autonomous. Post Tokugawa, they
were only semi-autonomous
2. Didn’t pay taxes! Helped make them autonomous
3. Now, we see “prefectures” (ken) 県
II. Japan: root of the sun, land of the rising sun. 日本
A. Not always the name of Japan. Came to use these characters at the end of the
6th century
B. Used to be called (wa) 倭
III. Perception of themselves in relation to China
A. China was basically “superior” to the rest of the world in China’s eyes, so they
expected Japanese to be subordinate. However, Japan didn’t really follow this
IV. Role of the ocean
A. Multiple failed invasions of Korea
B. Trade
C. Economy, development of its nation
D. Encourages isolation (?) More of a buffer zone, however
V. What did the Japanese take from the Chinese?
A. Ideas of rank of officials
B. Urban planning
C. Characters (kanji)
1. How did China, Korea, and Japan talk to each other? They basically all
used Chinese characters to communicate. This is because Chinese
characters were just more versatile
D. Buddhism and Confucianism
E. Medicine, science, technological innovations
F. Japanese did take certain things from China, but they more modified the thing
rather than completely adopting it, like the Koreans did
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
1. Considered all the imported things to be “forms” of things that already
existed in Japan
VI. Samurai procession
A. Sankin Kotai
1. Many had to walk to Ido
2. Shogun
a) Top military leader of Japan, supposed to be elected by the
emperor but gradually took more power
b) Controlled foreign and political policy
c) What provides legitimacy to them?
(1) The relationship of the emperor to them
B. Tokaido (road of the eastern sea)--> Where the samurai had their procession
VII. The emperors of Japan (big 3)
A. All began as samurai (military power, leadership skill) and ended up as
statesmen
VIII. Relationship between the dainyo (大名) and shogun
A. Subgroups of 大名
1. Fu dai
a) Side of Tokugawa family, given larger fiefs and had more honors
2. Tosama
a) Looked down upon as the outer 大名, had a lesser salary, etc
B. 御(royal)三家 Respected Three Families (below); most important and closest
families to the Shogun. So certain requirements were lifted from them.
1. Mito
2. Ki
3. Owari
IX. So who has constituted the society in Japan? Caste system:
A. Samurai 侍 (serve, wait upon); used to be 武士, BuShi (warrior)
1. Ronin: samurai who had lost their lords
a) Occasionally became scholars, etc
2. Actual level of power these people had
a) Interesting because some of the samurai actually had a lower
quality of life than the merchants, who they are supposed to be
higher in rank than. Why?
(1) Peasants were free to do as they wanted as long as they
paid taxes, while the dainyo really didn’t have as much
freedom. It’s a curious phenomenon, because you would
expect the dainyo and the samurai to have better, freer
qualities of life
(2) Answer: to be dainyo, you could easily be moved to
another part of the country on a whim, and all of your
wealth and success was dependent on the shogun. The
shogun had immense control on the dainyo’s lifestyle
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
