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Empire of Dogs: Canines, Japan, and the Making of the Modern Imperial World

Online ISBN:
9780801463235
Print ISBN:
9780801450259
Publisher:
Cornell University Press
Book

Empire of Dogs: Canines, Japan, and the Making of the Modern Imperial World

Aaron Herald Skabelund
Aaron Herald Skabelund
Assistant Professor of History, Brigham Young University
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Published:
10 November 2011
Online ISBN:
9780801463235
Print ISBN:
9780801450259
Publisher:
Cornell University Press

Abstract

In 1924, Professor Ueno Eizaburo of Tokyo Imperial University adopted an Akita puppy he named Hachikō. Each evening Hachikō greeted Ueno on his return to Shibuya railway station. In May 1925 Ueno died while giving a lecture. Every day for over nine years the Akita waited at Shibuya Station, eventually becoming nationally and even internationally famous for his purported loyalty. A year before his death in 1935, the city of Tokyo erected a statue of Hachikō outside the station. The story of Hachikō reveals much about the place of dogs in Japan's cultural imagination. This book examines the history and cultural significance of dogs in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Japan, beginning with the arrival of Western dog breeds and new modes of dog keeping, which spread throughout the world with Western imperialism. It highlights how dogs joined with humans to create the modern imperial world and how, in turn, imperialism shaped dogs' bodies and their relationship with humans through its impact on dog-breeding and dog-keeping practices that pervade much of the world today.

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