Past Events

In this lecture, Alex Hardie will explore the life of Lord Sempill (1893-1965), a distinguished aviator and a lifelong friend of Japan who was labelled “the traitor of Pearl Harbor.” He will argue that the archival evidence does not support the prevailing view of Sempill as a spy who betrayed British and American interests.

In this presentation, Mark Bookman will provide a regional history of physical disability policy and social movements in contemporary Japan explaining why interested parties have emphasized the needs of certain demographics over others when developing built environments, education, employment, entertainment, and medical systems.

What is the role of touching in modern Japanese literature? How have Japanese writers expressed the act of touching mediated through skin, objects, and memories? In this talk, Fusako Innami will explore the work of Japanese writers to analyse the desire for touch in modern Japanese fiction.

In this lecture, visual artist and researcher Eleanor Burkett will pay tribute to this area’s traditional craft practice offering a rare glimpse into a textile collection, archive photographs and handmade paper from Fukushima.

This lecture will explore the interactions of British Royal Family with Japanese art during the early twentieth century, placing them within the long history of the British Royal Family’s courtly and diplomatic engagement with Japan.

Museum collections of Japanese ceramics in Britain include numerous utensils for whipped tea (matcha) and steeped tea (sencha) gatherings along with diverse vessels for daily and special occasions collected from Meiji Japan. Who collected them and why, and how did these objects obtain value in Britain around the turn of the twentieth century?

In this lecture, British Ambassador to Japan, Ms Julia Longbottom will share her views on the political, diplomatic and business situation in Japan at the end of her first year in post.

In this lecture, Gill Steel will examine the importance of gender in understanding and explaining voting behaviour in Japan and Britain. Analysing decades of voting preferences, values, and policy preferences, she will explore the differences in women's and men's voting preferences.

To mark the publication of a new volume on Murakami Haruki, arguably Japan's most high-profile contemporary writer, we welcome the editors Gitte Marianne Hansen and Michael Tsang, together with contributors Annette Thorsen Vilslev and Patricia Welch, to discuss Murakami, his work and its reception.

In this lecture M.W. Shores will offer a history of Kamigata (Osaka) rakugo tradition from the seventeenth century to the present day, considering the art in terms of gender, literature, performance, and society.