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CULTURE / Books
May 18, 1999

Progress is fleeting in the fight for sexual equality

THE MOUNTAIN IS MOVING: Japanese Women's Lives, by Patricia Morley. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1999, 240 pp., $39.95 (cloth). The mountain is moving, according to Patricia Morley, but mountains are, by nature, difficult to budge, and this particular one is demonstrating a firm...
COMMUNITY
May 16, 1999

Yokota base gives Fussa its multicultural charm

Living next to a foreign military base may not seem like an ideal situation, given the antibase rallies in Okinawa, antinoise lawsuits elsewhere and new Tokyo Gov. Ishihara's calls for the return of Yokota Air Base.
CULTURE / Books
May 11, 1999

Coming of age, piece by piece

NAMAKO: Sea Cucumber, by Linda Watanabe McFerrin. Coffee House Press, 1998, 256 pp., $14.95 (paper). Like the sea cucumber, Ellen, the multicultural 9-year-old narrator of Linda Watanabe McFerrin's delightful first novel, cannot be easily classified. Animal or vegetable? Living and feeling, or merely...
LIFE / Travel
Apr 15, 1999

Healing society's ills from the roots up

BANGKOK -- As Thailand rapidly converts from agrarian state to economic dragon, a growing number of Thai people are looking for solutions to modern society's own brand of ills. The Bangkok-based Spirit in Education Movement (SEM) points to the country's traditional Buddhist roots for answers.
CULTURE / Books
Apr 7, 1999

Fading hopes for faltering Japan

JAPAN TODAY, by Roger Buckley. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1999, (3rd edition), 233 pp. This is a succinct and reliable introductory survey of post-World War II Japanese history. This third edition is substantially rewritten and updated by the inclusion of recent material and analysis....
JAPAN
Mar 26, 1999

Nostalgia buffs pay homage to 1918 brothel-turned-restaurant

When Tadafumi Yoshizato was in junior high school, his friends hocked his watch so they could go to Osaka's Tobita Shinchi district to enjoy the pleasures of the flesh. Now, Yoshizato, a 61-year-old illustrator, goes to enjoy pleasures of a more nostalgic nature.
CULTURE / Books
Mar 17, 1999

Last glimpses of a vanishing people

THE VANISHING TRIBES OF BURMA, by Richard K. Diran. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 240 pp., $60. Coffee-table photo books are usually too expensive, space-consuming or indistinguishable in content from the art of the glossy postcard for most of us to consider buying. Every once in a while, however,...
LIFE / Digital / CYBERIA
Mar 3, 1999

Wareware cyberjin

One of the great mysteries of Internet life is Japan. This country should be Net-crazy. It produces some of the world's best hardware, is quick to exploit new technologies in most walks of life and has an unquenchable passion for gadgets and trends. That should add up to a country that makes cyborgs...
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 23, 1999

A new bridge over the Pacific revealed

Is friendship between nations possible? Can Japan and the United States be friends as the U.S. is with Canada and Britain, or are they forever destined to have a relationship that turns on a calculation of mutual advantage?
COMMUNITY
Feb 23, 1999

Contest lets diplomats flex their Japanese-ness

Heard the one about the foreigner who wanted to get to Nakano and ended up in Nagano? She's actually pretty smart, and has no qualms about telling her embarrassing mishaps to complete strangers -- several hundred of them, in fact.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 20, 1999

Globalization, the world's whipping boy

For one brief moment less than a decade ago, the idea of "globalization" was viewed with more promise than peril. At the time, it represented an emerging economic reality: the merging of national markets into a single entity that traders and merchants anywhere could access at anytime. This "24-hour,...
CULTURE / Music
Feb 20, 1999

Kodo beats remixed for a dance groove

In ancient Japan, boundaries between rural villages were not drawn by geography, but by the deep, resonating rhythms of the taiko drum. Kodo, Sado Island's acclaimed taiko troupe, through the preservation, dissemination and study of one of Japan's most internationally celebrated performing arts, has...
JAPAN
Jan 29, 1999

Konishiki broadens kids' horizons with trek to Japan

A warm breeze blew into Tokyo last week and on its wings were 35 of Konishiki's Kids.
JAPAN
Aug 11, 1998

New law fails to preserve Ainu people's rights: U.N.

Staff writer
JAPAN
Jul 6, 1998

Museum reveals history of Tochigi

UTSUNOMIYA, Tochigi Pref. -- Tochigi Prefectural Museum, which opened in 1982, features exhibitions on the history, culture and natural features of the prefecture.
JAPAN
May 12, 1998

Ainu ready to sue Hokkaido over undervalued properties

Staff writer
JAPAN
Apr 28, 1998

Statue illumination kicks off 'Year of France' event

An 11.5-meter-tall statue of liberty was illuminated Tuesday evening on a man-made island in Tokyo Bay with French President Jacques Chirac, Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto and the Crown Prince and Princess attending a ceremony to kick off the Year of France in Japan.
JAPAN
Apr 14, 1998

U.S. experts advocate using info law to improve it

Staff writer
JAPAN
Feb 18, 1998

American teenager blazes path through Japanese schools

Staff writer
JAPAN
Oct 6, 1997

Sannai-Maruyama excavation illuminating Jomon life

Staff writerAOMORI -- Men wearing only a shred of coarse fur hunt animals in the mountains while women and children gather shells and forage for nuts.This was the prevalent image of people of the Jomon Period, which lasted from about 12,000 to 2,300 years ago. But when the Aomori Prefectural Government...
JAPAN
Jul 18, 1997

Business leaders say Japanese-style management outdated

KARUIZAWA, Nagano Pref. -- Japanese-style management must undergo reform to place more focus on shareholders and establish effective corporate governance, according to business leaders at the 12th summer seminar of the Japanese Association of Corporate Executives (Keizai Doyukai).
JAPAN
Jul 16, 1997

Departing German envoy discusses mutual benefits

Even though Germany is home to a number of Japanese culture centers and various collections of East Asian art, Japan should do more to promote its image there and in Europe as a whole, said departing German Ambassador Heinrich-Dietrich Dieckmann in a recent interview.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jun 21, 2023

Influential Japanese business leader Jiro Ushio dies at 92

Ushio founded Ushio Inc. in 1964 and grew it into a specialized manufacturer of industrial special light sources such as halogen lamps.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Jun 18, 2023

Artistic beauty in the eye of a Neolithic beholder

From Neanderthal funeral rites to the temples of the Nara Era, art has been a part of our lives. At what point was beauty considered for its own sake, though?
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jun 16, 2023

Remote work revolution becomes tug-of-war between bosses and fed-up staff

While workers don’t want to give up flexibility, leaders want teams back to boost collaboration and avoid a productivity slump.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 15, 2023

Japanese food firms take aim at U.S. market again

In a bid to boost earnings, companies are more actively opening new stores and engaging in business negotiations in the United States.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jun 12, 2023

Takashi Murakami loves and fears AI

Speaking at an exhibition opening in France, Japanese artist Takashi Murakami offered his thoughts on the positives and negatives of AI.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Jun 11, 2023

‘How Kyoto Breaks Your Heart’: Welcome sustenance for the Japan memoir genre

Author Florentyna Leow offers descriptive musings and pithy wisdom about love, food and Japan’s historical city as she traces the dissolution of a friendship in her new collection of essays.

Longform

Totopa in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward was picked by consultants TTNE as the best sauna of the year.
Japan’s sauna movement: Relax, refresh, repeat