Taylor Easum Course Proposal / Sample Syllabus

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Japan & Siam: Differing Trajectories of

Colonialism and Imperialism in Asia
Course Description: The expansion of Western Colonialism throughout Asia (and beyond)
proceeded in fits and starts, and resulted in a wide variety of manifestations, ranging from direct
conquest to indirect rule. Two Asian statesSiam (Thailand after 1939) and Japansimilarly
faced the West in the 19th c., and emerged as formally independent nations, though on very
different historical paths through the murky waters of Empire. This course will engage in a
critical comparison of these two states, their confrontation with the West, political and cultural
integration, economic development, and eventual confrontation with each other during WWII, as
a way to examine the subtleties of Empire and Colonialism.
Siam and Japan faced with the expansion of Western power and trade in the mid-nineteenth
century, culminating in the signing of the unequal treaties. Thereafter, Siam remained formally
independent, buffeted between the expanding British and French Empires. Japan also remained
independent, but by the turn of the century, would become a model for Siam and other Asian
states by successfully modernizing and militarily confronting the West. How did these two
kingdoms approach and respond to the mid-nineteenth century overtures of the West? What
accounts for these divergent historical paths away from the threat of Western Imperialism?
In the twentieth century Japan became an imperial power; often overlooked, however, is what we
might call internal colonialismthe integration of states and peoples within the boundaries of
the modern nation-state. Both Siam and Japan embarked on what might be called internal
colonization of their respective peripheries. What does the formation of modern nation state
look like from these internally colonial peripheries? How are these peripheral integrations
remembered?
Finally, though both nations similarly confronted Western Empire in the mid-19th century,
Empire had come full circle by WWII, as Japan extended its own empire into Southeast Asia.
Japan became a model for Thai nationalists, while Siamrenamed Thailand in 1939became a
key cog (and problem) in the Japanese Imperial machine in Southeast Asia, in part because of its
never-colonized status. With the end of the war and Japans defeat, however, another era of
informal empire began, with the American Era in Thailand, and the American occupation in
Japan. Thus, the seminar will close by asking how notions of empire, imperialism, and
colonialism interact with states and histories that can only be described as anything BUT notcolonial.

Course Aims: The main goals of the course are: 1) to understand the expansion of Western

Empire in Asia in the mid-19th century, and the various responses of Asian states and peoples to
the West; 2) to examine and compare the divergent historical trajectories of two states that
avoided colonial conquest; and 3) to analyze the internal colonialism of both Siam and Japan,
and its historical implications for understanding Colonialism and Empire.

Taylor Easum Course Proposal / Sample Syllabus

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Grading: Grades will be based on two short essays, a seminar presentation, a 15-20 page
research essay, and seminar participation:
Presentation: 20%
Short essays: 30%

Research Essay: 50%

Participation: 20%

Each student will be expected to give a concise and well-prepared presentation of no more than
10 minutes to the class once during the semester. The purpose of this is to both practice your
presentation skills, as well as to provide an overview of the main themes/topics/questions for that
weeks discussion. The first short essay will be due in Week 2, and the second will in Week 8
see the Course Outline below for details on the assignment. In Week 10, students will hand in an
outline and bibliography for their research essay, the final draft of which will be due at the end of
Week 15. Our final meeting will be dedicated to open discussion of the intersections between
Empire, Colonialism, and the historical trajectories of Siam/Thailand and Japan; students will
also be expected to come to that session prepared to discuss their research essays with the class.

COURSE OUTLINE
[Note: This is a draft syllabus. ** denotes optional readings that provide either an overview or
additional detail on the topic.]

PART I: EMPIRE, INFORMAL AND INTERNAL

Week 1: The Context of Empire
Mommsen, Wolfgang, Theories of Imperialism (New York: 1980), pp. 3-27, 70-112.
Wolf, Eric, Europe and the People Without History (Berkeley, 1982), pp. 232-61.
Wallerstein, Immanuel, The Capitalist World Economy (Cambridge, 1979), pp. 1-36.
Magdoff, Harry, Imperialism without Colonies, in, Roger Owen & Bob Sutcliffe, eds., Studies in the
Theory of Imperialism (London, 1972), chapter 6.
Parsons, Timothy. The British Imperial System, 1815-1914: A World History Perspective (Lanham, MD,
1999), Introduction and pp. 16-32.
Hechter, Michael, Internal colonialism: the Celtic fringe in British national development (Transaction
Publishers, 1999), pp. xiii-xxiii, 3-46.
Wolfe, Patrick, The world of history and the world-as-history: twentieth century theories of
imperialism, in Prasenjit Duara, ed., Decolonization Perspectives from Now and Then, Rewriting
Histories (London: Routledge, 2004), pp. 101-117.

Week 2: The Historiographical Context

[First Short Essay (4 pages) due. Write an essay critically examining the various theories and
perspectives of empire and colonialism offered in the readings from Week 1. Form an
argument for either one approach over another, or for a new direction you feel is needed. Feel
free to relate these readings to what you know about Japan or Thailand, or whatever historical
background you have.]
Anderson, Benedict R. O'G, Studies of the Thai State: The State of Thai Studies. In The Study of
Thailand: Analyses of Knowledge, Approaches and Prospects in Anthropology, Art History,

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Economics, History, and Political Science (Athens, OH: Ohio University Center for International
Studies, Southeast Asia Program, 1978), pp. 193-247.
Gluck, Carol, House of Mirrors: American History-Writing on Japan, in Anthony Molho and Gordon S.
Wood, Imagined histories: American historians interpret the past (Princeton University Press,
1998).
**Jackson, Loos, Thongchai, and Herzfeld in Rachel V. Harrison and Peter A. Jackson, eds., The
Ambiguous Allure of the West: Traces of the Colonial in Thailand (Cornell Southeast Asia
Program Publications, 2010).

PART II: STRANGERS AT THE GATE CONFRONTING THE WEST

Week 3: The Opening of Japan
**Wiley, Peter Booth, Yankees in the Land of the Gods (New York: Viking Penguin, 1990).
Auslin, Michael R., Negotiating with Imperialism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004).
Beasley, W. G., The Foreign Threat and the Opening of the Ports, in Marius B. Jansen, ed. Cambridge
History of Japan, Volume 5: The Nineteenth Century (1989: Cambridge University Press), pp.
259-307.

Week 4: Siam Opens Up

Chris Baker and Pasuk Phongpaichit, A History of Thailand (Cambridge University Press, 2005), Chapter
2 (The old order in transition), and Chapter 3 (Reforms).
Pasuk Phongpaichit, and Chris Baker, Thailand, Economy and Politics. 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford
University Press, 2002), pp. 95-113.
Tarling, Nicholas, Harry Parkes Negotiations in Bangkok in 1856. Journal of the Siam Society
[Thailand] 53, no. 2 (1965): 153-180.
. The Cambridge History of Southeast Asia. Volume 2, Part 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1999), pp. TBD.
Terwiel, B.J. Thailand's Political History: From the Fall of Ayutthaya to Recent Times (River Books
Press Dist A/C, 2006), Chapters 5 and 6, especially pp. 107-118, 128-132, 143-157.

PART III: NATIONAL PERIPHERIES INTERNAL COLONIALISM OR STATEFORMATION?

Week 5: Internal Frontiers and Peripheries
Morris-Suzuki, Tessa, The Frontiers of Japanese Identity, Chapter 2 in Asian Forms of the Nation,
edited by S. Tnneson and H. Antlov. (Richmond: Curzon, 1996), pp. 41-66.
--or-Morris-Suzuki, Tessa, A Descent into the Past: The Frontier in the Construction of Japanese Identity,
chapter 5 in Multicultural Japan, edited by D. Denoon, et. al. (New York: Cambridge, 1996), pp.
81-94.
Thongchai Winichakul, Siam Mapped: A History of the Geo-body of a Nation (Honolulu: University of
Hawaii Press, 1994), Introduction, Chapters 5-7, and Conclusion.
**Tej Bunnag, The Provincial Administration of Siam 1892-1915 (Oxford Univ Press, 1978).
Grabowsky, Volker, ed. Regions and National Integration in Thailand, 1892-1992 (Wiesbaden:
Harrassowitz, 1995), Introduction.
Chaiyan Rajchagool, The Rise and Fall of the Thai Absolute Monarchy: Foundations of the Modern Thai
State from Feudalism to Peripheral Capitalism, vol. 2, Studies in contemporary Thailand
(Bangkok: White Lotus, 1994), Chapter 2.

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Week 6: Japan from North and South

Japan to the North Ainu:
Siddle, Richard, Race, Resistance and the Ainu of Japan (Sheffield Centre for Japanese Studies/Routledge
Series. New York: Routledge, 1996).
**Walker, Brett L., The Conquest of Ainu Lands: Ecology and Culture in Japanese Expansion, 15901800 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001).
Japan to the South Okinawa:
**Kerr, George H., Okinawa, the History of an Island People (Rutland, Vt.: C. E. Tuttle Co, 1958), pp.
TBD.
Christy, Alan, The Making of Imperial Subjects in Okinawa, Positions 1, 3 (winter 1993): 607-39.
(reprinted in Formations of Colonial Modernity in East Asia, ed. Tani E. Barlow (Durham: Duke
University Press, 1997).
Furuki Toshiaki, Considering Okinawa as a frontier, chapter 2 in Japan and Okinawa: Structure and
Subjectivity, ed. G. D. Hook and R. Siddle (New York: Routledge, 2003).
Koji Taira, Troubled national identity: the Ryukyuans/Okinawans, in Japans Minorities: The Illusion
of Homogeneity (New York: Routledge, 1997), pp. 140-77.
Siddle, Richard, Colonialism and identity in Okinawa before 1945, Japanese Studies 18, 2, (1998):
117-133.

Week 7: Siamese Internal Peripheries

Paitoon Mikusol, Administrative Reforms and National Integration: The case of the Northeast, in
Regions and National Integration in Thailand, 1892-1992, ed. Volker Grabowsky (Wiesbaden:
Harrassowitz, 1995), pp. 145-153.
Sarassawadee Ongsakul, History of Lanna (Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2002), pp. TBD.
Rujaya Abhakorn, and David K. Wyatt, Administrative Reforms and National Integration in Northern
Thailand, in Regions and National Integration in Thailand, 1892-1992, edited by Volker
Grabowsky (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1995), pp. 68-81.
Ramsay, James Ansil, The Development of a Bureaucratic Polity: The Case of Northern Siam (Ithaca,
N.Y., Cornell University, 1971).
**Brailey Nigel, J., Chiengmai and the Inception of an Administrative Centralization Policy in Siam
(I). 11, no. 3 (1973): 299-320.
**, Chiengmai and the Inception of an Administrative Centralization Policy in Siam (II). 11, no.
4 (1974): 439-469.

PART V: POLITICAL-ECONOMIES OF THE STATE

Week 8: Contested Nationalism(s)
[Second Short Essay (4 pages) due. Write a brief essay analyzing the integration of peripheral
states and peoples in both Japan and Siam, and relate this history to the broader questions of
Colonialism and Empire. You may refer to readings from week 1 and 2, as well as to other
works you may have read on your own.]
Chaiyan Rajchagool, The Rise and Fall of the Thai Absolute Monarchy: Foundations of the Modern Thai
State from Feudalism to Peripheral Capitalism (Bangkok: White Lotus, 1994), Chapter 6 (The
Birth of Thai Nationalism).
Scot Barm, Luang Wichit Wathakan and the creation of a Thai identity (Institute of Southeast Asian
Studies, 1993).

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Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker, Thailand: Economy and Politics (Oxford University Press, USA,
2002), Chapter 8 (esp. pp. 258-268).
Dick Stegewerns, ed., Nationalism and internationalism in imperial Japan: autonomy, Asian
brotherhood, or world citizenship? (Psychology Press, 2003). pp. 1-4 (Stegewerns, Doak), 45-68
(Schad-Seifert).

Week 9: Divergent Fortunes Economic Development behind the Open Doors

Chaiyan Rajchagool, The Rise and Fall of the Thai Absolute Monarchy: Foundations of the Modern Thai
State from Feudalism to Peripheral Capitalism (Bangkok: White Lotus, 1994), Chapter 3
(Economic Transition and Class Formation at the Beginning of the Twentieth Century).
Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker, Thailand: Economy and Politics (Oxford University Press, USA,
2002), pp. 3-34, 44-5 (Rice Frontier); 49-51, 89-91 (Uplands Frontier); 95-113 (Traders, Tax
Farmers, and Kings); 187-95 (Urban Labour).
**Johnston, David Bruce, Rural Society and the Rice Economy in Thailand, 1880-1930 (1975).
Crawcour, E. Sydney, Economic change in the nineteenth century, Chapter 9 in Marius B. Jansen, ed.,
The Cambridge history of Japan: The nineteenth century (Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp.
569-617.

PART V: RACE AND IDENTITY BEING THAI, BEING JAPANESE

Week 10: Selves and Others in Modern Japan
[Outline and Bibliography for Research Essay due.]
Weiner, Michael, The invention of identity: Self and Other in pre-war Japan, in Japan's Minorities:
The Illusion of Homogeneity (Sheffield Centre for Japanese Studies/Routledge Series. New York:
Routledge, 1997).
Lie, John, Multiethnic Japan (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001), Chapters 4 and 5.
Hudson, Mark J., Ruins of Identity: Ethnogenesis in the Japanese Islands (Honolulu: University of
Hawai'i Press, 1999), skim Chapters 1 and 8.
Howell, David L., Geographies of Identity in Nineteenth-Century Japan (Berkeley, Calif.: University of
California Press, 2005), Introduction, and Chapters 5-8.

Week 11: Selves and Others in Modern Siam

Thongchai Winichakul, The Quest for Siwilai: A Geographical Discourse of Civilizational Thinking in
the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth-Century Siam, The Journal of Asian Studies 59, no. 3
(August 2000): 528-549.
Thongchai Winichakul, The Others Within: Travel and Ethno-Spatial Differentiation of Siamese
Subjects 18851910, in Civility and Savagery: Social Identity in Tai States, (Richmond, Surrey:
Curzon, 2000), pp. 3862.
Reynolds, Craig (ed.). National Identity and Its Defenders: Thailand Today, Rev. ed. (Chiang Mai:
Silkworm Books, 2002). (Choose at least two chapters from this book)

Week 12: Invented Traditions and Magnificent Monarchies

Takashi Fujitani, Splendid Monarchy: Power and Pageantry in Modern Japan (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1998).
Maurizio Peleggi, Lords of Things: The Fashioning of the Siamese Monarchy's Modern Image (Honolulu:
University of Hawaii Press, 2002).

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**Takashi Fujitani, Inventing, Forgetting, Remembering: Toward a Historical Ethnography of the

Nation-State, in Harumi Befu, ed. Cultural Nationalism in East Asia : Representation and
Identity (University of California Press, 1993), pp. 77-106.

PART VIII: EMPIRE COMES FULL CIRCLE

Week 13: Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity
Aldrich, Richard J., The Key to the South: Britain, the United States, and Thailand during the Approach
of the Pacific War, 1929-1942. South-East Asian Historical Monographs (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1993).
Batson, Benjamin A. The Tragedy of Wanit: A Japanese Account of Wartime Thai Politics. Special
Publications Series (Journal of Southeast Asian Studies); no. 1. (Singapore: Dept. of History
National University of Singapore, 1990).
, Siam and Japan: The Perils of Independence. in Southeast Asia Under Japanese Occupation,
Edited by Alfred W. McCoy (New Haven: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies, 1980).
Direk Jayanama, Siam and World War II, Translated by Jane Godfrey Keyes (Bangkok : Social Science
Association of Thailand Press: 1978).
Reynolds, E. Bruce. Imperial Japans Cultural Policy in Thailand. in Japanese Cultural Policies in
Southeast Asia during World War 2., Edited by Grant K. Goodman. New York: St. Martin's
Press, 1991.
. Thailand and Japans Southern Advance, 1940-1945 (New York: St. Martins Press, 1994).
Swan, William L. Japan's Intentions for its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere as Indicated in its
Policy Plans for Thailand. Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 27, (March, 1996): 139-149.
Thamsook Numnonda. Pibulsongkram's Thai Nation-Building Programme during the Japanese Military
Presence, 1941-1945. Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 9, no. 2 (September, 1978): 234-247.

Week 14: Defeat of Imperialism, Victory of Empire

John W. Dower, Embracing defeat: Japan in the wake of World War II (W. W. Norton & Company,
2000), Chapter 6 (Neocolonial Revolution).
Chris Baker and Pasuk Phongpaichit, A History of Thailand (Cambridge University Press, 2005), Chapter
6 (The American Era and Development), pp. 140-167.

Week 15: Final Discussion and Presentations

[Research Essay due at the end of Week 15]