Transpacific field of dreams : how baseball linked the United States and Japan in peace and war /

"Baseball has joined America and Japan, even in times of strife, for over 150 years. After the "opening" of Japan by Commodore Perry, Sayuri Guthrie-Shimizu explains, baseball was introduced there by American employees of the Japanese government tasked with bringing Western knowledge...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Guthrie-Shimizu, Sayuri
Format: eBook
Language:English
Published: Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 2012.
Subjects:
Online Access:Connect to the full text of this electronic book
Description
Summary:"Baseball has joined America and Japan, even in times of strife, for over 150 years. After the "opening" of Japan by Commodore Perry, Sayuri Guthrie-Shimizu explains, baseball was introduced there by American employees of the Japanese government tasked with bringing Western knowledge and technology to the country, and Japanese students in the United States soon became avid players. In the early twentieth century, visiting Japanese warships fielded teams that played against American teams, and a Negro League team arranged tours to Japan. By the 1930s, professional baseball was organized in Japan. From early on, Guthrie-Shimizu argues, baseball carried American values to Japan, and by the mid-twentieth century, the sport had become emblematic of Japan's modernization and of America's growing influence in the Pacific world. Guthrie-Shimizu contends that baseball provides unique insight into U.S.-Japanese relations during times of war and peace and, in fact, is central to understanding postwar reconciliation. In telling this often surprising history, Transpacific Field of Dreams shines a light on globalization's unlikely, and at times accidental, participants"--provided by publisher.
Item Description:Electronic resource.
Physical Description:1 online resource (583 pages) : illustrations
Bibliography:Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN:9780807882665 (electronic)
0807882666 (electronic)