A Comprehensive Research on Circulation of Japanese-Language Books and Magazines between Japan and its Oversea Territories before the World War II

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 24720091
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Japanese literature
• Research Institution: Nagoya University
• Principal Investigator: HIBI Yoshitaka 名古屋大学, 文学研究科, 准教授 (80334019)
• Research Collaborator: WU Peizhen 台湾国立政治大学, 台湾文学研究所, 副教授 ; JUNG Byeongho 韓国高麗大学, 日語日文学科, 教授 ; LI Zheng 中国復旦大学, 外国語言文学学院, 教授 ; TED Mack 米国ワシントン大学, アジア言語文学部, 准教授 ; ASAOKA Kunio 中京大学, 文学部, 教授
• Project Period (FY): 2012-04-01 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: 外地 / 書店 / 書物流通 / 取次 / 朝鮮半島 / 台湾 / 満洲 / 内地

Outline of Final Research Achievements

The objective of this research is to clarify our understanding of the distribution network for print that linked the various cities and regions of the Japanese empire prior to World War II, with a focus on the distributors and the retail bookstores that operated overseas. Bookstores run by Japanese appeared from the beginning of the twentieth century in all of the areas that saw Japanese overseas expansion, including East Asia, Hawaii, and North America. From the 1910s, these overseas bookstores steadily began to organize, beginning to function as a distribution network linked with booksellers in Japan. This research reveals the distribution system for print that existed throughout the Japanese empire, with a particular focus on distributors such as Osakayago Shoten, Tokyodo, and Sanseido, and retailers throughout the Korean peninsula, Taiwan, Manchuria, Sakhalin, and Hawaii.

Free Research Field

近現代日本文学・文化史