textbooks

[Abe-Nornes]

Lawrence writes:
>>1) Please recommend a good general introductory textbook for a survey

Junko writes:
>Can a course be conducted without
>Anderson and Richie's _The Japanese Film: Art and Industry_ or Burch's _To
>the Distant Observer_? 

Each time I've taught Japanese film, I've used a different combination of
books (that in itself says a lot about what's out there). The
Anderson/Richie book is great background material, but in the end it's so
dense with narrative history --- interrupted constantly by short film
descriptions --- that it's difficult and students often find it rough to
read. 

Reframing Japanese Cinema is another book I've assigned, or substituted for
A/R. It was clearly conceived for teaching, although some of the articles
are hard to make students read because they focus so tightly on one or two
films that I don't show. 

As for Burch, I always make students read at least a chunk. At least 61 to
99. Of course, it's tricky to use Burch. You have to spend time with the
students wading through and picking out what's useful and what's silly. But
that process is also a learning process. At the very least, it alerts the
students to their own desires to exoticize culture and reify tradition.
Last semester in a graduate seminar, I actually had students read the
entire book over the course of the semester. In the end, it was slightly
distracting because to really explain what's going on it takes
time...especially to explain the theory background. [By the way, Burch is
only available in hardback now.]

I always supplement the books with a reader. ALSO, I should point out that
the Yamagata Film Festival's DOCUMENTARY BOX (the tables of contents are on
Kinema Club) has a number of interviews and articles that can easily be
integrated into your course. Students like it because it doesn't cost them
anything, and I have yet to find a single student that has had difficulty
finding it. In fact, I think they've actually read it a little more
carefully, perhaps because it was such an unusual assignment. 

>Any Japanese-written books worth being translated as
>textbooks?

In that graduate seminar, we read only Japanese language texts (except for
Burch). An alternative motive for this was answering the question above for
myself. These are the Japanese texts we read:

________________

1918: Tanizaki Jun'ichiro, Kikuchi Kan, et al. "'Jidoshha' to 'Katsudo
Shashin' to 'Kafe" ("'Cars' and 'Movies' and 'Cafe'"); 1922: Tachibana
Takahiro. "Eiga no Hakairyoku to Kensetsuryoku" ("Cinema's Destructive
Power and Constructive Power"), in Eigageki to Engeki ("Photoplay and
Theater")

1933: Terada Torahiko. "Nyusu Eiga to Shinbun Kiji" ("News Film and
Newspaper Articles").

1928: Sasa Genju. "Gangu/Buki--Satsueiki" ("Camera--Toy/Weapon")

1931: "Haru no Kontinyuit$BG
(B" ("The Continuity of Spring"); 1952: Nakai Masak
azu. "Eiga no Jikan" ("The Time of Cinema"); 1952: Nakai Masakazu,
"Shikisai Eiga no Omoide" ("Memories of Color Films").

1937: Tosaka Jun, "Eiga Ninshikironteki Kachi to Fuzoku Byosha," ("The
Description of Custom and the Epistemological Value of Cinema"); 1937:
Tosaka Jun, "Eiga Geijutsu to Eiga-Abusutorakushon no Sayo E" ("Film Art
and Film-Toward the Operation of Abstraction"); 1936: Iwasaki Akira,
Eigaron ("On Cinema"), excerpts.

1937: Imamura Taihei, "Eiga Geijutsu no Seikaku" ("The Character of Film
Art"); 1943: Imamura Taihei, "Kokumin Eiga no Mondai" ("The Problem of
Citizen Films"); late 1930s: Paul Rotha, Documentary Film, excerpts of
translations.

1958: Tsurumi Shunsuke, "Gokaiken" ("The Right to Misunderstand"); 1957:
Tsurumi Shunsuke, "Senso Hihan no Me" ("The Eyes of War Criticism"); 1957:
Tsurumi Shunsuke, "Nihon Eiga no Namida to Warai" ("The Laughter and Tears
of Japanese Cinema"); 1962: Hanada Kiyoteru, "Taishu to wa Nanika" ("What
Are the Masses?"), from "Eiga-teki Shiko ("Cinematic Thought")

1955: Joseph Anderson, "Japanese Film Periodicals."

1970: Sato Tadao, "Nihon Eiga no Shisoshi" ("History of the Intellectual
Currents in Japanese Film"), excerpt

Hani Susumu. "Tsuchimoto Dokyumentarii Eiga no Hoho to Honshitsu" ("The
Essence and Method of Tsuchimoto's Documentary"); 1958: Masumura Yasuz$BQ
(B "Wa
takushi no Shucho Suru Engi" ("The Performance I Insist On"); 1963: Oshima
Nagisa, "Sengo Nihon Eiga no Jokyo to Shutai" ("The Subject and
Circumstances of Postwar Japanese Cinema").

1963: Matsumoto Toshio. Eizo no Hakken-Avangyarudo to Dokyumentarii ("The
Discovery of Images-Avant-Garde and Documentary"), excerpt; 1993: Oshima
Nagisa. 1960, excerpt.

1974: Suzuki Shiroyasu. "Sei no Komyunikeshon" ("Sexual Communication"), in
Eiga no Bensho ("Apologetics of Cinema"); 1993: Yomota Inuhiko. Den'ei Fuun
("The State of Electric Shadows"), excerpt.

1985: Kogawa Tetsuo. Johoshihonshugi hihan ("Critique of Informational
Capitalism"); 1992: Kogawa Tetsuo, Takemura Mitsuhiro, Ueno Toshiya, and
Imafuku Ryuta. Post Media-ron, excerpt. 

________________

So as for the question:  

>Any Japanese-written books worth being translated as
>textbooks?

I don't know if there are any monographs like this, however, one idea I
have been toying with is a reader of theory and criticism that could
supplement a course. This would be far more interesting and useful a
teaching tool than a narrative history to replace Richie and Anderson.

Markus