Japan and Italy History

Professors  Rambelli  and  Snyder   ITAL139HX/JAPAN180   Spring  2019   Take-­‐home  final  questions     INSTRUCTIONS:     Your  exam  will  consist  of  3  Long  ID  essay  answers  (1.5  pages,  typed  and  double-­‐ spaced,  for  EACH  answer)  and  1  short  ID  answer  (1/2  page).  Each  Long  ID  essay   answer  is  worth  11  points;  the  short  ID  answer  is  worth  2  points;  the  optional  extra   credit  is  worth  a  possible  10  points.       For  each  of  the  3  essay  answers,  1.5  pages  are  approximately  500  words.   For  the  short  answer  ID,  1/2  page  is  approximately  200  words.   For  the  extra  credit  answer,  2  pages  are  about  650  words.       That  means  a  total  of  5  written  pages  for  the  final  exam,  plus  another  2  pages  for  the   extra  credit.       You  will  use  only  your  notes,  readings,  study  guides  and  reflections  in  answering  all   questions.  No  research,  no  Wikis—we  want  to  see  how  you  think.     Read  the  passage  and  determine  where  the  reading  is  from,  who  wrote  it,  and  then   analyze  its  content,  messages,  and  deeper  meanings  in  relation  to  the  themes  and   issues  discussed  in  class.  Show  us  your  own  original  thoughts  about  the  passage.  Do   this  in  as  much  detail  as  possible.  Don't  just  tell  us  what  a  text  or  film  says  (that's   called  "paraphrase");  tell  us  what  it  means.         Be  sure  to  write  clearly  and  correctly.  Poor  syntax  and  spelling  errors  can  affect  our   ability  to  understand  what  you  are  trying  to  say,  and  in  turn  that  can  have  an  impact   on  your  grade.  If  you  are  going  to  include  a  citation  from  one  of  the  assigned  course   readings,  you  must  insert  the  page  number  in  your  essay  as  per  the  following   example:     An  ironic  result  of  economic  global  trade,  according  to  Roberto  Saviano,  is  that  “Chinese  factories  in   China  were  competing  with  Chinese  factories  in  Italy”  (32).     The  online  libretti  do  not  have  page  numbers;  you  may  refer  to  the  act  and  scene  (if   there  are  scenes)  instead.     Do  not  attempt  to  write  the  entire  exam  in  one  sitting.  Try  to  work  on  it  every  day   over  several  days,  re-­‐reading  your  work  to  see  if  your  writing  contains  errors  or  can   be  improved  further.  Think  carefully  about  the  themes  of  this  course,  and  keep  them   in  mind  when  composing  your  answers.  Please  remember  that  we  cannot  read  your   mind;  we  can  only  read  your  exam!      

2  

The  final  will  be  due  on  Thursday,  June  13,  at  4  pm,  as  a  PDF  uploaded  to  the  course   site.  Early  submissions  are  welcome.  :-­‐)         PART  I:  SHORT  IDs     Please  select  any  one  (1)  of  the  following  Short  ID  questions  (2  points)  to  answer.         (1)"Unfortunate  was  Italy's  need  for  Mussolini,  but  fortunate  was  Italy's  finding  of   Mussolini."     (2)  “Lucius…  emerges…  amid  a  group  of  strange-­‐looking  foreigners  with  the  most   peculiar  bathhouse  customs.”         (3)  “My  name  and  my  life  I  give  you  together.  I  am  Calaf,  son  of  Timur!”       PART  II:  LONG  IDs     Please  select  any  three  (3)  of  the  following  Long  ID  questions  (11  points  each)  to   answer.         (1)  "Everywhere  in  the  world   the  roving  Yankee   takes  his  pleasure  and  his  profit,   indifferent  to  all  risks.   He  drops  anchor   at  random,  [...]   till  a  sudden  squall  wrecks   the  ship,  hawsers,  rigging  and  all.   He's  not  satisfied  with  life   unless  he  makes  his  own   the  flowers  of  every  shore.  [...]   If  beaten,   he  tries  his  luck  again.   He  follows  his  bent   wherever  he  may  be."   (2)  "Such  a  fate,"  he  sighed.  "And  all  because  of  one  young  woman."   He  was  going  to  give  up  everything  for  her,  everything,  even  the  sea  he  loved  and   called  his  own!  It  would  fall  to  those  men  he  had  fought  so  relentlessly  for  the  past   twelve  years,  to  the  very  men  that  had  stolen  his  throne  and  hurled  him  into  the   mud,  the  men  that  killed  his  mother,  brothers,  sisters!   "You  too  are  restless,"  he  continued,  turning  his  eyes  to  the  sea,  listening  to  it  roar   beneath  the  prahu's  bow.  "You  do  not  wish  to  be  ruled  by  the  British."      

3  

(3)  “I  walked  through  the  crowd  …  and  was  able  to  study  in  detail  this  historic   encounter  of  two  peoples.  …  I  noticed  that  the  crowd  insensibly  grew  thinner  at  my   approach,  as  might  happen  at  the  approach  of  someone  with  an  infectious  illness,  or   perhaps  a  personage  of  great  importance.  …  But  when  I  stopped  for  a  brief   conversation  …  their  faces  lit  up  in  a  smile  …  and  their  breath  came  in  nervous,  short   pants,  rather  like  a  dog  not  sure  whether  he  is  going  to  be  stroked  or  given  a  bone,   or  whether  he  is  going  to  get  the  whip.”       (4)  “For  Uesugi,  Mussolini  was  a  ‘monster  dictator’  whose  politics  contradicted  the   Japanese  ‘kingly  way’  (ōdō),  which  was  based  on  ‘love  and  justice’  that  emanated   from  the  emperor.”  Discuss  Japanese  critiques  of  Italian  fascism.       (5)  One  of  the  assigned  readings  mentions  that  Italians  can  only  think  of  “eating,   drinking,  singing,  and  loving.”  Which  reading  is  this?  What  does  it  refer  to?  How  did   we  elaborate  on  this  sentence  in  class?     (6)  “But  in  fact  this  East  is  more  closely  linked  to  the  port  of  Naples  than  to  any   other  place.  There’s  nothing  far  about  the  East  here.  It  should  be  called  the   extremely  near  East,  the  least  East.  Everything  made  in  China  is  poured  out  here.  .  .  .   The  port  of  Naples  handles  20  percent  of  the  value  of  Italian  textile  imports  from   China,  but  more  than  70  percent  of  the  quantity.”  Analyze  this  in  relation  to  the   author’s  arguments  about  contemporary  globalized  commerce  and  criminality.     EXTRA  CREDIT  (10  points):     Watch  director  Yasujirô  Ozu's  film  There  Was  A  Father  (Chichi  ariki,  1942),  available   on  YouTube  via  a  link  on  our  Gauchospace  course  site,  and  analyze  the  following   10-­‐minute  segment:  Minute  2:00  -­‐  Minute  12:00.       Focus  your  analysis  on  the  film's  representation  of  Japanese  fascism.  We  know  that   fascism  was  opposed  to  many  aspects  of  modernity.  Nevertheless—and  this  is  a  key   paradox—the  conceptual  framework  and  technological  interests  of  fascism  were   essentially  modern.  In  Japan,  for  example,  the  fascist  vision  of  traditional  national   culture  relied  heavily  on  the  modern  'invention'  of  that  tradition.  What  elements  of   this  paradoxical  or  self-­‐contradictory  fascist  ideology  are  represented—sometimes   subtly  and  sometimes  not  so  subtly—by  Ozu  in  this  wartime  film?  Why  did  the   director  select  these  particular  elements  for  inclusion  in  the  film?