Daniel Botsman
Courses
HIST 030, EAST 030
Tokyo
Four centuries of Japan’s history explored through the many incarnations, destructions, and rebirths of its foremost city. Focus on the solutions found by Tokyo’s residents to the material and social challenges of concentrating such a large population in one place. Tensions between continuity and impermanence, authenticity and modernity, and social order and the culture of play.
HIST 304J, EAST 304
Japanese Historical Documents
Few pre-industrial societies anywhere in the world have bequeathed us a body of historical documents as varied and plentiful as those Tokugawa Japan (1600-1867). This class offers students who already have a solid command of modern Japanese an introduction to these remarkable sources, focusing particularly on what they can teach us about life in the great cities of Edo (now Tokyo), Osaka, and Kyoto—three of the largest urban centers anywhere in the pre-industrial world.
HIST 883
Urban Japan Workshop: Cities and Society, c. 1500–2000
Japan is not only home to the largest and, by some measures, most livable, city in the world today, but also it boasts one of the richest archives for the study of urban history. The Urban Japan Workshop offers graduate students and advanced undergraduates the opportunity to explore the rich scholarly literature on Japanese cities across time, while also developing their own individual research projects.