다이쇼 일본과 ‘현대’의 가능성

Abstract

This paper examines the origin of modernity in Japan that is entangled with our own times. One of the distinctive forces that has shaped our times is the critiques and resistance against Eurocentric world orders and racializing norms in the form of emerging anti-imperial nationalisms around the world during the interwar period of early 20th century. The interwar period overlapped with the Taishō period (1912-1926) of Imperial Japan. This paper probes into the political and social developments of Taishō Japan that were entangled with the post-World War I world. In doing so, I claim that modern possibilities were created in which various actors emerged and organized to reform the state-centered Meiji order by discovering “world” and “society.”