Research Talk at EALAC Department, Columbia University, on April 22, 2026.
The Pacific as a Method: Prompts and Perspectives for Modern Japan
Japan is an archipelago in the Pacific, though its history remains scarcely linked to the Pacific world. This talk foregrounds three maritime locations in the vicinity of “Japan” that illustrate how a new set of questions arises, once historians turn their attention to the material and ecological properties of the ocean and to the metabolic and intellectual processes formed in Japan’s oceanic frontiers. How did currents, winds and migrating animals shape interaction in the northwestern Pacific? When and where did Japan become an empire? Who were the all but invisible actors on the forefront of this process? I argue that engaging with the Pacific context of nineteenth century Japan prompts a reevaluation of its archives, under questions that are otherwise asked pertaining to colonial and post-colonial places of Oceania.
