How to Reach Japan by Subway

America's Fascination with Japanese Culture, 1945–1965

Meghan Warner Mettler

• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN:
  9780803299634
• eBook ISBN:
  9781496206862
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Japanese History
• Index: History

Japan's official surrender to the United States in 1945brought to an end one of the most bitter and brutal military conflicts of the twentieth century. U.S. government officials then faced the task of transforming Japan from enemy to ally, not only in top-level diplomatic relations but also in the minds of the American public.Only ten years after World War II, this transformationbecame a successas middle-class American consumers across the country were embracing Japanese architecture, films, hobbies, philosophy, and religion. Cultural institutions on both sides of the Pacific along with American tastemakers promoted a new image of Japan in keeping with State Department goals. Focusing on traditions instead of modern realities, Americans came to view Japan as a nation that was sophisticated and beautiful yet locked harmlessly in a timeless "Oriental" past. What ultimately led many Americans to embrace Japanese culture was a desire to appear affluent and properly "tasteful" in the status-conscious suburbs of the 1950s. In How to Reach Japan by Subway, Meghan Warner Mettler studies the shibui phenomenon, in which middle-class American consumers embraced Japanese culture while still exoticizing this new aesthetic. By examining shibui through the popularity of samurai movies, ikebana flower arrangement, bonsai cultivation, home and garden design, and Zen Buddhism, Mettler provides a new context and perspective for understanding how Americans encountered a foreign nation in their everyday lives.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1. Humble Leaders of the Free World
• 2. Samurai at the Sure Seaters
• 3. Friendship through Flowers
• 4. How to Be American with Shibui Things
• 5. Satori in America
• 6. Zen Goes “Boom”
• 7. Japan for the Rest of Us
• Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index
• About Meghan Warner Mettler
• Series List