Japanese

=The Japanese: A Perspective On American History=

by Daria Ostman
= =

**Introduction:**
The Japanese are an East Asian group. Pre-1492, they lived in the island archipelago (6852 islands today) now called Japan in Asia, which is near China, Russia, Taiwan, North/South Korea, etc. Geographical features that would have limited this group’s ability to move include: the Pacific Ocean. Pre-1492, this group probably interacted with its neighbors, especially the Chinese, the Koreans, and the Russians. Eventually, the Japanese would affect American history by being a significant immigrant group and by opposing the U.S. in WWII, especially in the Pearl Harbor attack of 1942.


 * Religion (Worldview)** **:** Shinto Buddhism. How the world began and where/how people were created was not important to them.


 * Population in the United States:** Just over 1 million people in the United States claim to be Japanese American, according to the 2000 U.S. Census.

(Sengoku Period Battle; 1467-1615)
 * HISTORY:**

When Columbus was arriving in the Americas, Japan was dealing with a civil war, which began in 1467 when the shogunate could not control the warring feudal warlords. This war would last one hundred years.
 * 1492: Columbus’ Arrival in the Americas**

Traders and missionaries from Portugal reached Japan, which began a trade relationship between Japan and the West.
 * 1521: Cortes Encounters the Aztecs in Mexico**

Leader Oda Nobunaga conquered numerous other daimyo by using European technology and firearms and had almost unified Japan when he was assassinated in 1582. Toyotomi Hideyoshi succeeded Nobunaga and united the nation in 1590. Hideyoshi invaded Korea twice, but following several defeats by Korean and Ming China forces and Hideyoshi's death, Japanese troops were withdrawn in 1598. After Hideyoshi's death, Tokugawa Ieyasu utilized his position as regent for Hideyoshi's son Toyotomi Hideyori to gain political and military support. When open war broke out, he defeated rival clans in the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600. Ieyasu was appointed shōgun in 1603 and established the Tokugawa shogunate at Edo (modern Tokyo). The Tokugawa shogunate enacted a variety of measures such as //Buke shohatto// to control the autonomous daimyo.
 * 1607: English Colonists Arrive at Jamestown**

In 1639, the shogunate began the isolationist //sakoku// ("closed country") policy that spanned the two and a half centuries of tenuous political unity known as the Edo period. The study of Western sciences, known as //rangaku//, continued during this period through contacts with the Dutch enclave at Dejima in Nagasaki. The Edo period also gave rise to //kokugaku//, or literally "national studies", the study of Japan by the Japanese themselves.
 * 1687: English Colonies Expand**


 * 1776-1787: American Revolution; U.S. Constitution

1802: Tlingit Battle the Russians at Sitka

1839: The Amistad; the Trail of Tears

1850: Fugitive Slave Law Made

1863: The U.S. Civil War; Emancipation Proclamation** (Samurai of the Satsuma Clan in the Boshin War; 1867)

March 31, 1895 was the day of the forcing of the opening of Japan to the outside world. 1894-1895 was the victories of the First Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War in 1904-1905. Japan gained control of Taiwan, Korea, and the southern half of Sakhalin.
 * 1890: Westward Movement; Reform Movements**

Japan now has a population of over 127,590,000 people, and because of the large population, Japan has problems with food, water, shelter, etc.
 * 2009: Today**

(Mount Fuji with cherry blossom trees and a shinkansen in the foreground—all three are iconic of Japan)
 * Works Cited: Accessed October 1, 2009:** http://wikipedia.org/Japan, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_American#Immigration