Hardening Hierarchy

Rotem Kowner is professor in the Department of Asian Studies at the University of Haifa.

• Note on Translations and Conventions ixPreface xiiiAcknowledgments xvIntroduction: Japan and the Issue of Race 3Phase One Classification: The Tempest of Racial Separation (1735–1793) 211 The Linnaean Revolution and the Japanese 242 Becoming Members of an East Asian Race 423 The Yellowing of the Japanese Skin 644 Turning Physically Deficient and Ugly 835 The Widening Gap between Text and Visuality 103Phase Two Consolidation: The Age of Racist Downgrading (1793–1854) 1256 Under the Shadow of Asia’s Declining Image 1297 Visitors to Late Edo Japan and Their Racial Perspective 1498 The Radical Transformation of Visuality 1779 The Rise of Scientific Racism and Its Repercussions 19910 Mid-Nineteenth-Century Racial Thinking and the Forced Opening of Japan 222The Parallel Phase Entanglement: The Rise of a Proto-Racial Discourse in Japan (1720–1854) 25111 Antecedents of Proto-Racial Thought on the Eve of the Edo Era 25412 Early Edo-Era Views of Self and Other 27013 Harbingers of an Elaborate Proto-Racial Discourse 29514 The Late Edo-Era Rise of Ethnography 31415 Redrafting Regional and Global Ethnic Hierarchies 34216 Interactions and Barriers on the Eve of a Mature Discourse 363Conclusion: The Emergence of a Full-Blown Discourse on Race and the Japanese 385Tables, Maps, and Figures 409Notes 417Bibliography 519Index 625

“With enormous erudition and meticulous analysis of materials, Rotem Kowner traces the parallel development of racial perspectives in early modern Europe and Japan. The result is a study compelling in scope, wealth of detail, and insight.” - Kate Wildman Nakai, Sophia University “A work of uncommon depth and ambition. Drawing on sources across a dozen languages, Kowner reconstructs with meticulous precision how the Japanese came to be cast as immutably inferior within an increasingly rigid global racial hierarchy while simultaneously recovering the indigenous proto-racial discourse taking shape within Japan itself. Indispensable for anyone studying the formation of Western views of Japan or the global history of racial thought.” - Frederik Cryns, International Research Center for Japanese Studies “A fitting continuation of his epic first volume on race. By examining the longue durée of racial thought through the lens of Japan, an imperialist non-white nation, Rotem Kowner complicates prevailing narratives and offers a deeper, genuinely global perspective on the emergence of modern ideas of race.” - Kiri Paramore, University College Cork “Who are the Japanese? Or rather, how has this question been posed over time, on the basis of what information, and with what agendas? Rotem Kowner’s explorations of these questions will be essential reading for all scholars on racism and racial identify, and, of course, of Japan, for decades to come.” - Timon Screech, International Research Center for Japanese Studies “The long-awaited second volume in Kowner's series on Japan and race is perhaps even better than the first. Full of insight on the elusive idea of a Japanese race, it should be required reading.” - Michael Keevak, National Taiwan University