Kushner, Barak 1968-

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Kushner, Barak 1968-

PERSONAL:

Born April 7, 1968. Education: Attended Université de Montpellier, 1988-89; Brandeis University, B.A., 1990; Inter-University Center, Yokohama, Japan, graduate studies, 1994-95; attended Beijing Normal University, 1997, 1998, University of Tokyo, 1999-2000, and National Taiwan University, 2000-01; Princeton University, Ph.D., 2002.

ADDRESSES:

Office—University of Cambridge, Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Sidgwick Ave., Cambridge CB3 9DA, England. E-mail—barakkushner@hotmail.com.

CAREER:

Bernard Zell Day School, Chicago, IL, teacher, 1990-92; National Institute for Research Advancement, Tokyo, Japan, translator and editor, 1995-96; Davidson College, Davidson, NC, assistant professor of East Asian history, 2002-05; U.S. Department of State, Washington, DC, political officer for East Asian Affairs, 2005-06; University of Cambridge, Cambridge, England, lecturer in modern Japanese history, 2006—.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Has received numerous fellowships, including from the Foreign Language and Area Studies, the Freeman Foundation, for research in Japan, China, and Korea, and 2004, for travel to Mongolia, and a History Department Fellowship, from Princeton University; Faculty Summer Language Study Award, Bernard Zell Day School; David L. Boren National Security Education Program Graduate International Fellowship.

WRITINGS:

The Thought War: Japanese Imperial Propaganda, University of Hawaii Press (Honolulu, HI), 2006.

Contributor to books, including America's War in Asia: A Cultural Approach to History and Memory, edited by Phillip West and others, M.E. Sharpe, 1997; Propaganda and Mass Persuasion: A Historical Encyclopedia, edited by David Culbert, David Welch, and Nicholas John, ABC-Clio, 2003; The Role of Japan in Lian Qichao's Introduction of Modern Western Civilization to China, edited by Joshua A. Fogel, Institute of East Asian Studies, 2004; In Godzilla's Footsteps, edited by William Tsutsui, Palgrave Macmillan, 2006; and Looking Modern: Taisho Japan and the Modern Era, edited by Wu Hung, University of Chicago Press. Contributor to periodicals, including Journal of Popular Culture, International History Review, Diplomatic History, and Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television.

SIDELIGHTS:

Barak Kushner has spent years studying and teaching in China and Japan. Fluent in Japanese, Chinese, and French, he also has a background in history, including a doctorate in the subject, and has worked for the U.S. Department of State specializing in East Asia. Kushner is interested in the cultures of China and Japan, and has focused especially on the role of the media.

After earning an undergraduate degree at Brandeis University, he was a social studies teacher at a Chicago high school, then traveled to Japan, where he taught English while learning Japanese. After finishing classes in advanced Japanese from Tokyo University, he was an editor and translator for a think tank in Tokyo called the National Institute for Research Advancement. Next, Kushner moved to China, where he improved his knowledge of Chinese while teaching Western history at Shenyang Teacher's University. Returning to the United States, he completed his Ph.D. and became a university professor, eventually moving to Cambridge, England.

Kushner's first book is The Thought War: Japanese Imperial Propaganda, which reveals just how differently the Japanese people have viewed propaganda when compared to many Western countries. In the United States, for instance, the word propaganda evokes images of deception and dishonesty. In Japan, both during and after World War II, propaganda is viewed more positively as a tool that helps unify the people of a nation. Kushner focuses on the years from 1931 to 1945. He discusses how the art of propaganda evolved, how it was used by the government, the police, advertising, entertainment, and popular culture, and how Japanese propaganda was more influential on the citizens of that country than it was in fascist Germany, Italy, and Spain.

"Kushner correctly observes that, despite American misconceptions, ‘the image of the emperor is not what sold wartime propaganda’ …; instead, what did so was the vision of Japan as a non-Western success story," related Tom Havens in the Journal of Japanese Studies. "He points out the seemingly paramilitary role of the Japanese police during both wartime and the occupation, the media's desire to retain some control over their own destiny by cooperating with state propaganda, and the commercial benefits accruing to the advertising and entertainment companies that supported the war. Especially effective are the accounts of how advertising agencies and comedy troupes (mainly those of the impresario Yoshimoto Kāgyā) generated their own prowar propaganda." The majority of Japanese people, Kushner shows, favored the war and saw Westerners as invading barbarians. They accepted propaganda as a means to create solidarity among the people in their unified and correct purpose. Thus, protests against the government's actions against China and then the United States were minimal, and even within academia and other intellectual communities—unlike in Germany—few Japanese left the country or tried to resist. "Barak Kushner leaves no doubt that the effort to produce propaganda to support Japan's wars in China during the 1930s and the war against the Anglo-American powers after 1941 involved not just the military but also civilians from a number of different professions: academics, journalists, entertainers, and advertisers," as W. Miles Fletcher put it in the American Historical Review.

Several critics found much to appreciate in The Thought War, although Pacific Affairs contributor James L. Huffman felt there are "narrative problems [that] render this work frustrating." Huffman noted that Kushner never properly defines what he means by propaganda and that the author lumps anything into the category that could be construed as aiding the war effort. Huffman concluded: "While specific insights and pieces of information provide wonderful moments of understanding, the general argument is rendered obscure, the effort to perceive it unnecessarily difficult. And that is regrettable, since the material here is so rich and promising." In contrast, Japan Times reviewer Donald Richie praised the work in every way, noting that Kushner draws on primary sources and, when unavailable, translates them from Japanese into English. Richie asserted that the author "has given us an eminently readable account of an unknown aspect of the war and has defined our understanding of it."