Asia Books

An outstanding book! This series has been a wonderful source of information concerning the more obscure air combat scene in the Asia/ Pacific warzone. The day-to-day accounts of allied air activity combined with personnel insights and photos provide a stark picture of the war's early days. British, Dutch, American, Aussie, and Japanese accounts of the signifcant early battles are compared and contrasted, highlighting the "fog of war" and the abilities of both sides to grossly overestimate their combat results. Volume one was so outstanding that I ended up purchasing the remaining books in the series immediately after finishing it. You will not regret purchasing this or any of the other books in this series. Volume 2 contains some minor corrections for Volume 1, as well as a chapter that was originally intended for the first book.
I find Christopher Shores one of the best aviation writers out there. This book is really better then 5 stars; the illustrations earn it a 6!

This book, yet another in the wonderful series of air war accounts done by Christopher Shores and Brian Cull is a great review of the early air war in the Pacific Theater. Mr. Shores and Mr. Cull use interviews with the participants as well as the actual unit reports to bring an idea of the constant struggle that the air war represented. Rather than being dry, these books are easy to read and a great resource.

Let me first say that both volumes in the Bloody Shambles series are excellent and far superior to ANY other text on the subject of air warfare in the first six months of the Pacific War that I've ever seen.

Nonetheless, having conducted extensive research into the role of the Royal Netherlands Naval Air Service (MLD) during the Japanese invasion of the former Netherlands East Indies (NEI), I can tell you that both volumes of Bloody Shambles contain some fairly substantial errors on the MLD. However, this can be overlooked somewhat given that the role of the MLD in the Pacific War is not particularly well covered in English and there is very little information available for the non-Dutch speaking historian. It is unlikely that I would have noticed the errors in question had I not spent 11 years researching my own manuscript on the naval air war in the NEI.

But from what I can tell though, the rest of the information detailing the air war in the Philippines, NEI, Singapore and Burma appears to be incredibly accurate. Having grown up hearing and reading stories about how the "invincible" Japanese blew through Allied air defenses with nary a loss, these texts go a long way in educating the reader that in many cases, the Allies gave just as much as they received from the Japanese.

All in all, a must read for anyone interested in learning more about the true nature of the air war in the first six months of the Pacific War.

Christopher Shores is an international treasure, a man who has made it his task to suss out the truth about aerial combats in far corners of the globe, usually with the assistance of a fellow historian or two from the countries most involved. In this particular case, he is one of the few who have accessed Japanese records, and he compares them with Allied accounts on a day-by-day basis. This is great stuff, especially for those of us who already know something about the campaigns. My particular interest is the Flying Tigers of Burma, and I was delighted to have Shores's version, especially since he gives equal time to the RAF squadrons that fought alongside the AVG. But I confess that it took a great deal of concentration for me to slog through the Philippines campaign, about which I knew very little. So my conclusion is this: the more you know already, the more you will learn from this account. -- Dan Ford

Few Asian companies have been successful in developing international brands. It is now a sophisticated process that puts together and sustains a complex mixture of local and international attributes and values , something that is tangible.Its interesting how Temporal have chosen the different products ( over 20 )from leading Asian and Western brands to show good examples of how companies have used the fundamentals of branding to achieve global success. He has provided illustrative examples, techniques , exercises and invaluable advice for any company in Asia regardless of size that strives for more than being just another local household name.

Asian market is unique with their traditional cultural. Brands should be though for leading in this area. This book must be read for the company who : - want to build a strong image - want a competitive advantage - struggle in asian market

One of the ways to achieve sustainable growth in any market is a recognisable brand name. While many Western companies have successfully developed international brands, Asian companies have been slow to follow suit. How is it that Asia, a region that has such high brand appreciation, produces so few international brands of its own?

In this groundbreaking book, Asia's leading brand architect addresses this unusual situation, explains the fundamentals of branding and shows how companies can use them to achieve outstanding performance. Containing over 20 case studies of leading Asian and Western brands, this book is packed with illustrative examples, advice and exercises.

Branding in Asia is an invaluable book that is a must for anyone responsible for business growth in the 21st century.

Dr Paul Temporal is Asia's leading expert on brand creation, development and management, having lived in the region for over 14 years. He has worked with leading companies and governments, and is well known his results-oriented and hands-on approach. He is the author of Corporate Charisma.

My expectations were mainly about redressing the balance on geographical origins of brand case studies. Our literature suffers from being far too US centric. This imbalance is unfortunate for several reasons including: - living in the US for the last 2 years has taught me how atypical the US consumer is of any other I have met in 25 countries that I have worked - from the oldest brand models (which assumed brands were advertising led) to the newest ebrand models, there's huge share of voice reflecting the culture of corporate America and the case theories of its business schools. These powerful systems shouldn't be unquestioningly exported as being de facto paradigms for local organisational excellence or social value.

My expectations were exceeded because this book - unlike most on the brand which start with chapters on advertising and marketing communications - opens up from the very beginning on the leadership importance of branding. Here we are on pages 1-2: "Strong brands endure many challenges. This is becoming increasingly relevant in an era of unprecedented change, upheaval and uncertainty. This change is strategic, unlike the incremental change of more predictable times, and therefore requires a strategic response. Brand building is exactly such a response. If successful, it can be the strongest weapon in a company's armory and the best guarantee of corporate survival. The challenge that lies ahead is that of change management.

And by page 4, we're invited to join in a cataloguing of worldwide changes to marketing: -the breakdown of market boundaries -globalization and the development of global brands -increasing market fragmentation -product diversity and shorter life cycles -greater customer sophistication -digital business -economic instability and market volatility

So this book flies, and yet at the same time when you read it you will continually pick up useful advice whether your brain is looking for practical or academic stimulation. For example, the book closes with an appendix of very worthwhile brand exercises, and it resonates with case studies, 24 in all. Each case study ends with a summary of that brand's strengths.

This book will be good for you whether this is the first one you read on branding, or as in my case the twenty first, including two of my own. For example, I learnt a lot from Temporal's consistently strong advice on brand values and the way they shape corporate personality on its outside and inside.

It's a very good book, good analysis of Nikkei life in Japan.

I read this book and I found that it was more than a simple academic book with statistics, and numbers...It's a realy good view of what is a migrant life in Japan .

The topic of Japanese Brazilian migrants in Japan is one that very few people outside of Japan or Brazil know about. I'm glad to see that there was a book written about this issue, especially since it involves the complexity of race vs. ethnicity and issues dealing with feelings of isolation, sense of belonging and cultural acceptance, something which we all strive for. Mr. Hotaka Roth did an excellent job of researching the experiences of these migrant workers and presented them in a very honest way. You could tell that he dove into this project fullheartedly by the fact that he made an effort to not only learn Japanese and about Japanese culture, but that he also learned Portuguese and the different nuances of Brazilian culture. Unlike a lot of research books, this book was not dry and did not drag on forever. It was quick paced and easy to read and understand. It keeps the reader interested and each chapter presents itself with new themes.

Here is a short, simple book examining the role and place of the ever-growing Japanese-Brazilian population in Japan. Overall, it is a well written piece of work that I found helpful in my reseach. Although it is not the most comprehensive book on Japan's new ethnic minoritiy population,the Brazilians, Roth's work is worthwhile nonetheless.

In Japan, a country that is thought to be "ethnically pure", the new phenomenon of return migration poses an interesting problem. Nikkei (those who are of Japanese ancestry outside of Japan) Brazilian nationals began migrating to Japan for economic reasons in the 1990s (the government made it particularly easy for them to enter the country, assuming they would adapt to Japanese culture better than those with no ties to the country), and many decided to stay, creating minority enclaves with a culture distinctly their own and NOT Japanese. Joshua Hotaka Roth provides an analysis of Nikkei life in Japan.

Although I read this book as part of a research project, I found that it was much, much more than a dry academic book with lots of statistics (although there certainly were plenty of statistics for anyone looking for solid numerical data). Roth didn't just write about this subject; he experienced it: he worked in a factory side by side with Nikkei Brazilians, lived and associated with Nikkei, and truly participated in his subjects' way of life in Japan. The result is an intimate view of the "return" migrant's experience, including sections on the actual factory work, injury and health insurance issues, and some ways in which Brazilian Nikkei in Japan maintain Brazilian identities while adapting to Japan.

This book is great for anyone who wants to know more about Japan in this time of internationalization, anyone who is interested in international migration, issues of national identity, or anyone who just wants an interesting non-fiction read.

I savor my time to read "Buddhist Goddesses of India". The energy it brings me is very specific to the Goddess I am reading about. It must have been quite a journey writing it, connecting so deeply with each Goddess. Reading the book helps me stay centered in myself in what feels like a masculine world. Anyone like myself, who is sensitive to the many currents of energy in the world, or who would like to experience the energy of the Goddess, will have a good time with this book. It is also very useful for practitioners of Buddhism.

This book is more than worth it for the pictures alone. The images of Buddhist goddesses are simply gorgeous--whether clear black and white, or glorious color. Representing architectural elements, reliefs, gates, sculptures, painted cloth, and more, these images provide an invaluable visual document of the female images of divinity populating Buddhist history.

Even so, the book offers far more. Shaw not only gathers these visual images for us, she helps us understand them--why they exist, why they appear as they do, and what they teach us about Buddhist thought and practice. For each goddess, Shaw considers the visual representations alongside the goddess's appearances in literature, history, ritual practices, and other Hindu and folk traditions. Moving among these various representations, Shaw creates compelling accounts of each deity's religious significance. She also documents change over time, charting the ascension of goddess figures through three stages of Buddhist history, early, Mahayana, and Tantra. The female Buddhas of Tantra occupy the third section of the book. And all along the way, Shaw deftly moves from persuasively engaging issues in Buddhist scholarship to telling vivid stories about the goddesses themselves.

This comprehensive, accomplished book is for everyone and anyone who is interested in Buddhism, India, goddesses, South East Asia, Indian art and architecture, comparative religions, or the religious significance of art in general. Its stories and pictures engage and delight. At the same time, it is a must-read for scholars in all these fields for the ways in which it stretches and prunes our understanding of Buddhism. As Shaw persuasively documents, there is far more to the tradition than teachings of renunciation. Equally integral to the tradition are life-affirming, female-celebrating expressions of wisdom, creativity, and devotion.

This magnum opus will remain a serious resource for information about Buddhist Goddesses of India for decades. The scholarship is impeccable. Not only does it bring numerous texts and information into English for the first time, it explicates vast amounts of material loaded with insightful interpretations that only an expert authority can provide. This text will also reward those seeking inspiration from the Buddhist pantheon of goddesses. The prose is lyrical, compelling, and transports the reader into the powerful and colorful worlds of these ancient goddesses.

Ms. Shaw is an impeccable scholar whose transcendent writing captures the imagination. This inspired text is a compilation of unparalled research on an amazing array of Buddhist deities. Beautiful book.

Louis Allen, who was there, has captured the completeness of the longest war, the three year non-stop struggle for Burma, magnificently. This largely forgotten war, which saved the Indian sub-continent from Japanese dominance, has been well described, mostly in fragments, based on their personal experiences, by several authors but none has undertaken a complete description that encompasses both the Allied and the Japanese perspectives and Allen's work does this brilliantly.
Based on many interviews with both Allied and Japanese personnel this book captures the struggle from the initial defeat through the retreat into India to the final overthrow of the Japanese military in this large, often beautiful, and unfortunately, today mostly closed ,country.
Fought over widely varied terrain and with a savagery akin to that of the German-Russian experience this book is a tribute to the bravery of military personnel from a wide variety of backgrounds. On the Allied side soldiers from Britain, China, America, India, Nepal ( Goorkas), East and West Africa and Burma were motivated by excellent leadership to stop and then defeat the Japanese.
Interestingly it was to prove to be both the proudest moment and the swansong of the world's largest volunteer army---the British Indian Army. In the Burmese campaigns this army, with its mixture of races and religions form today's India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Burma truly came into its own only to be broken up two year later.
One must not forget the part played by the logistics services. Both the Allied and the Japanese forces were low in priority for equipment and at the end of a long supply chain. Much of the Allied success was due to a superior supply capability, and in particular, the concept of aerial supply was perfected in the ejection of the Japanese army from Burma.
This book is an excellent read for any student of military history if only to ensure that we never forget the Kohima Memorial inscription.

"When you go home,
Tell them of us and say.
For your tomorrow
We gave our today."

This is an outstanding book that must be considered the definitive single-volume account of the campaign in Burma in WWII. The author is a veteran of the campaign in the British Army where he was an intelligence officer. What is especially enjoyable about this book is that it includes many firsthand Japanese accounts in addition to Allied. The author speaks Japanese and drew upon official Japanese histories and personal interviews with participants. I have read several other books about this often forgotten Theater in WWII ( including Viscount Slim's "Defeat Into Victory" ), but this is the first book that includes Japanese sources. The author starts with the Japanese invasion of Burma and discusses the political situation in Burma prior to the invasion and how the Japanese used this to their favor. It includes the retreat of the British into India, their recovery, the British offensive in the Arakan, and Wingate and the birth of the Chindits. The author goes into great detail about Kohima-Imphal and this is where the Japanese perspective is so interesting. It follows with battles of North Burma and Stillwell, Mandalay/Meiktila and the race to Rangoon and the Japanese breakout of the 28th Army and then the surrender of Japanes forces. The book has good maps and it is not to difficult to follow forces on the battlefield. The most daunting task is trying to remember the Burmese and Indian names for places and trying to remember all the names of the Japanese sources and officers. But all this helps to add to the authenticity of the book. This book is a must read for anyone interested in WWII. It is well written, easy to read and very enjoyable. I highly recommend it.

This is an outstanding book that must be considered the definitive single-volume account of the campaign in Burma in WWII. The author is a veteran of the campaign in the British Army where he was an intelligence officer. What is especially enjoyable about this book is that it includes many firsthand Japanese accounts in addition to Allied. The author speaks Japanese and drew upon official Japanese histories and personal interviews with participants. I have read several other books about this often forgotten Theater in WWII ( including Viscount Slim's "Defeat Into Victory" ), but this is the first book that includes Japanese sources. The author starts with the Japanese invasion of Burma and discusses the political situation in Burma prior to the invasion and how the Japanese used this to their favor. It includes the retreat of the British into India, their recovery, the British offensive in the Arakan, and Wingate and the birth of the Chindits. The author goes into great detail about Kohima-Imphal and this is where the Japanese perspective is so interesting. It follows with battles of North Burma and Stillwell, Mandalay/Meiktila and the race to Rangoon and the Japanese breakout of the 28th Army and then the surrender of Japanes forces. The book has good maps and it is not to difficult to follow forces on the battlefield. The most daunting task is trying to remember the Burmese and Indian names for places and trying to remember all the names of the Japanese sources and officers. But all this helps to add to the authenticity of the book. This book is a must read for anyone interested in WWII. It is well written, easy to read and very enjoyable. I highly recommend it.

This excellent book is hard to put down but I am afraid that in going from a hardcover edition to a smaller paperback that the maps have become very hard to read. The letters are so small on some of the maps that they are nearly impossible to read. Hope the editors do something about it but I doubt it will happen. Minor flaw in a great read.

Unlike some other reviewers, I found little in Gottesman's book that would inform an understanding of what is presently happening in Iraq or Afghanistan. The UNTAC mandate in Cambodia didn't even qualify as a half-hearted attempt at introducing democracy, and the attempts to analogize the situations are at best strained. In fact, the history Gottesman lays out has precious little to do with nation-building of any kind (my guess is the subtitle may have been some editor's marketing ploy). Rather, I found the book to be the clear, riveting, and ultimately pitiful inside story of a decaying communist regime. For those trumpeting the planned Khmer Rouge Trials as the day-of-reckoning for Cambodia's tormentors, guess again. After reading Gottesman's book, I'll eat my Mao cap if a single suspect is charged who, as Gottesman puts it, repented of the only real crime under communism-political opposition.

Evan Gottesman's three years of field work in Cambodia with the American Bar Association Law and Democracy Project gave him an exceptionally solid base from which he launched this study of the history of the PRK and SOC regimes. His use of documents dug out of the National Archives is, as David Chandler has remarked, "masterful." His interviews with the former holders of power provide fascinating insights into the minds of key personalities seldom reached by Westerners. The epilogue is chock full of understated, reasonable, fair, and on-the-mark assessments of the reality on the ground in Cambodia today -- "Cambodian democracy often seems an abstraction...Although the methods of control have changed, the personnel governing the country remain largely the same ... (they) have accepted a new level of political discourse, but they do so only to the extent that it does not jeopardize their power." Life and work in Cambodia as a lawyer would frustrate all but the most idealistic of men. That Mr. Gottesman came away with such a patient and objective look at Cambodia says much about both his character and his intellect. This book is a must read for our new generation of "nation builders." It will allow them to bring to bear a better sense of time scale regarding their grand plans to democratize the world, clearly a task for multiple generations of good men like Evan Gottesman, not one to be attempted by one or two four-year administrations of ambitious politicians.

Mr. Gottesman paints a vivid picture of Cambodia after 1979 that is particularly relevant in this time of reconstruction and nation building in Iraq. This is on my all time top 10 books right after the Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing.

This is a fascinating telling of the politics of the PRK. The author has adroitly woven a tapestry of the give and take between the ideologically rigid Vietnamese liberators and the ideologically-opportunistic Khmer Rouge. The irony of the title is that there was no "after the Khmer Rouge:" indeed, they are still alive and well and running the PRK's successor state, which could be called the Democratic People's Republic of Royal Camobodia, an amalgam of ex-Pol Potists, Sihounoukists and genuine deomocrats.
Gottesman is to be congratulated on his shrewd observations and the skillful way he merged the ever-morphing political landscape in Phnom Penh with the relatively static, self-serving and corrupt provinical politics that tended to ignore any central dictums that reduced local prerogatives. In sum, pretty much the story of all socialist states; proclaim endless drivel ex cathedra from the capital and pray that somebody out there listens.
This is a must read for anyone interested in a little known asterisk in the cold war and anyone interested in third world politics. Foe all American ideologues eager to proclaim Iraq the next Japan, read, learn and repent!

This book is a page turner and brings back lots of memories. I spent six years on a Chinese state farm during the Cultural Revolution myself and can relate to some of what he described and went through as far as hard labor, but I can never describe with such vividness and power the heart-wrenching experiences of the disprivileged, deprived, discriminated, and victimized members of the Chinese society under Mao, indeed a virtual prison in every sense of the world. Professor Yang's book is a voice for the voiceless. Captive Spirits not only serves to preserve the history of the brutal laogai system that still exists in China today, but it is also a scathing indictment of a brutal regime under Mao that destroyed the lives of tens of millions of the best that China has to offer to herself and the rest of the humanity. This book alone is enough to put Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and their cronies to the hall of shame once and for all. Professor Yang is no longer with us. He has joined his prison mates Li Jiulong and Liu Fengxian as well as his dear mother to whom he dedicated this book, but his legacy and spirit will stay with us.

I simply can't put it down once I start reading it. It is a great account of the author's growth, from a naive ultra-leftist to someone with a sophisticated mind, who eventually embraced Milton Friedman. And it is a great history of post-liberation China in the eyes of different individuals from all social spectra. After reading it, I realize how naive my understanding of the "cultural revolution" was.

I also read its Chinese version, but I feel that the English version is much better written. Stongly recommended!

If you're into movies like Good Will Hunting, you'll like this book. The author walks us through the lives of his fellow prisoners while he relats his time spent in the prison. It was Cultural Revolution, many of the prisoners he came across were highly intelligent and well educated. Yang therefore made the best out of the time he had to spend there by learning English, Algebra, and Calculus from his fellow inmates. It's a tragic tale that so many people were jailed because their political views sway a fraction away from that mandated by the government, yet they were exactly the ones who have the knowledge and know-hows to improve the country's economy and living standards. It's also a uplifting tale because you see Yang dug himself out of the troubles he encountered, made it out of the prison, and now became an established economist. He has not let his past kept him hostage like many dissidents Chinese who migrated to the West. A fine tale about humanity and the will to survive that's inside us all. The chinese version of this book is also published by OUP.

One of the most famous Chinese novelist BA Jing was also a "captive spirit" during the "Great Cultural Revolution". He kept reciting Divine Comedy in order to help himself endure the adversity. He always believes, there must be a new Dante some day to write a new Divine Comedy. Now I finally find this new Divine Comedy. Please have a read and get to know what is the Inferno in the communist China. You'll find the reason why the communism has to die.

Another fine bit of research from Eric Hammel. The author does a first rate job of bringing to life the struggle in the Soloman Island campaign. He includes fascinating bits of some of the fierce fighting on the ground, as the Japanese try to retake the island of Guadalcanal.
Hard to beat this story.

This book will leave the reader with a clear understanding of the progression of the battle as well as events that led up to it . For that alone this book merits four stars . Eric Hammel gave a thorough synopsis of the the events that led up to the actual battle . The weapons , logistics and even battle doctrine held by both the USN and the IJN at that time is explored . This prelude to the battle accounts for nearly half the book yet it doesn't get bogged down with insignificant details that can thwart the readers' interest .
Hammel presents the battle in such a manner that the outcome is not a foregone conclusion in spite of the fact that the events occured over sixty years ago .
The one flaw to this book is that while dealing with human drama as events unfolded for Americans , little is offered from the Japanese perspective . For example ; nothing is said of efforts to contain damage aboard the Shokaku after the American strike whereas almost every detail of the damaged Hornet and efforts to save the ship by it's crew are covered .
In spite of my critcism , the reader will have a good understanding of the events that led up to the battle , the battle itself as well as a decent epilogue to these events .

Eric Hammel's CARRIER STRIKE The Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, should be the definitive work on this, the last of the 4 major carrier battles of WWII. As the second of two volumes about the Guadalcanal/Eastern Solomons campaigns, CARRIER STRIKE carefully details the action in well researched form. In an almost minute-by-minute account, the clash of the two carrier task forces on Oct 26,1942 will leave you breathless. A fitting tribute to the brave warriors who gave their lives for the cause. A superb book, and a must have for those studying the campaigns in the Southern Pacific.

The subtitle of this 1999 work is "The Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands." It is that for sure, but there is much more. The front half of the book provides a rather complete telling of the first few months of the Guadalcanal campaign and the Battle of the Eastern Solomons, followed by a thorough history of the Santa Cruz battle, which saw the loss of USS Hornet (CV-8). The book is actually drawn from a larger work by Hamel, "Guadalcanal: the Carrier Battles," published in 1987.

As a chronicler of naval air action, Hamel's style holds the reader's interest from cover to cover. For one thing, he is exceptionally thorough. You get the feeling that virtually every sortie in the three battles, on both sides, is described with about all of the specifics you can imagine. When a Zero slashes at a TBF menacing the Shokaku, we not only know everything about the three men in the TBF, but also the name, rank, squadron, and ship of the Zero pilot. When three Kates bore in on the Hornet, we know who is leading them and where his plane is in the formation. It's hard to imagine how Hamel managed that level of detail in his research, but it's all there.

For me, the main attraction of the book was its coverage of the USS Hornet between Midway and Santa Cruz. To my knowledge, there is only one book that focuses totally on that carrier, "The Ship That Held the Line" by Lisle Rose, and it has been panned rather severely by historians and veterans who know a lot about that carrier. Hamel's book seems to provide a much better history of CV-8, as evidenced by the opinions of some of its vets. A Hornet pilot (retired USN captain) sent the book to me with a strong endorsement, and another one told me that "at least I'm still alive at the end of this one," alluding to one of the many errors in the Rose book.

This activity book has many fun kids activities from simple coloring to making lanterns for bigger kids. It also has dates on when each zodiac sign falls under which makes it fun for adults as well. I used it at my son's school and the kids had fun with the activities and learning about the Chinese New Year

"Celebrating Chinese New Year: An Activity Book" is an engaging tool for introducing a lively yet generally unfamiliar cultural event to children. Clear, child-oriented information about Chinese New Year customs is interspersed with charming hands-on projects, from paper plate pandas to candy containers. Straightforward graphics and text richly convey that a spirit of family closeness and a respect for tradition mark this holiday. Through a range of activities, from simple to sophisticated, a poignant awareness of an earlier time and way of thought is also transmitted. An excellent resource for schools and groups that want to foster cultural understanding!

I found this colorful book to be informative, engaging, and easy-to-use. The author's overview of Chinese New Year provides a good background for her description of significant Lunar New Year traditions. These customs include special food, lucky money, scrolls, candy, lanterns, and dragons. There is a nice presentation of the zodiac animals and chart of corresponding birthdate years. The author provides easy-to-follow instructions and simple templates to carry out the wide selection of craft projects and activities. I would highly recommend this book to elementary school teachers and families with elementary school age kids in helping to understand and celebrate Chinese New Year.

This book offers fun, cute and easy to reproduce crafts to supplement Chinese New Year events for the classroom or any other setting with young children. I especially appreciate the author's narrative on explaining the traditions and rituals associated with this annual holiday that is celebrated world-wide. We couldn't wait for the next Chinese New Year (Year of the Rooster -2005) so, my kids and I tried making the hexagonal candy boxes. The instructions are clearly written making it easy for both a seven y.o. and ten y.o to follow independently. My kids are now using their crafty boxes with lids to hold little items on their desks. "Celebrating Chinese New Year: An Activity Book" is a wonderful addition to any classroom, library, and Asian or multi-cultural book collection. I highly recommend for teachers/educators and parents.

This is the best collection of essays on the "uses" of history and construction of national "memories" that I have read. This should be required reading in every high school social studies/history teacher certification program, and should be read by all who want to enter the debate on standardized testing and prescriptive curriculum content. I have used selections of it in my college level Japanese history course, my college level world history courses, and recommend it to my colleagues and also to the many high school teachers with whom I work. It shares valuable lessons on the manipulation of history for nationalistic and/or militaristic purposes. It should also be read by educational, defense, and foreign policy-makers as well as journalists who often seem too quick to pass on widely held myths as truths. Alas, I am afraid that many in these positions are more comfortable with the myths.

Censoring History: Citizenship And Memory In Japan, Germany, And The United States is a fascinating, challenging, well written and highly informative anthology of essays about how history is almost inevitably distorted and revised by subsequent generations to meet their social, political and cultural needs and myths -- and how such unwarranted revisions must be countered with an coherent understanding of the politics of education, from the writing and publication of textbooks to curriculum development and classroom instruction practices. Censoring History is critically important reading for anyone seeking to understand how and why the needs of nationalism would and do distort the recording and transmission of history, and the peril future generations are put to as those who do not know their history are so often doomed to repeat it in an age where nuclear war could end civilization and even the human race.

In Censoring History: Citizenship and Memory in Japan, Germany, and the United States Laura Hein and Mark Selden provide a critical investigation of how Japan, Germany, and even the United States recognize, think about, and then articulate their role during times of war. Hein and Seldon place their work within a larger viewpoint and try to concentrate on two main issues: [1] the connection between citizens and the state, and [2] a nation's actions in wartime and its implications vis-à-vis other countries. Censoring History is "really" about what has been left out of the public space in the development or reification a national narrative. The focal point of Censoring History is the many manifestations of such censorship and how it seeps into particular national spaces of memory. Vis-à-vis the Japanese, Germany has made tremendous strides in terms of how it deals with its past. Reading Hein and Seldon one gets the impression that on a "self-reflexivity" scale of 1 to 10 Germany is perhaps an 8 while the Japanese gaze thorough a less critical lens situating themselves in about a 5 position and the United States perhaps at and about the 3 positions. Different angles of war and internal conflict not only create problems within a nation-state, but also increasingly affect the state of affairs between them.

Germany not only looks at issues such as textbooks but they also perceive themselves as part of a developing European Community, as per Hein and Seldon a key distinction from how Japan deals with is history, hence its "place" in the region. Compared with Japan, German textbooks contain large segments analyzing controversial issues and creatively augment those entries with projects and field trips. Perhaps unfairly judged and there is movement in this area but vis-à-vis their Japanese counterparts, German textbooks have more of a propensity to motivate students to investigate and explore historical and juxtapose those sites and sounds against present-day similarities and contrasts. Not only that, a student is made to poke and prod and reflect on people's prejudices and such.

Kathleen Woods Masalski, an American high school teacher, communicates exchanges between American and Japanese teachers. In a lot of ways, most master narratives can be pegged to a sense of nationalism. Nationalist master narratives are created to make people feel good about being part of that national community. However, historians introduce self-criticism by problematizing histories makes history 'messy' (258). Masalski writes in Teaching Democracy, Teaching War: American and Japanese Educators Teach the Pacific War (258): "National narrative, master narrative, textbook narrative, counternarrative, multiple narratives - the language, though not the ideas behind it, was new to me and to most if not all the high school and college teachers in the audience when our keynote speaker at a National Endowment for the Humanities summer institute in 1994 challenged us to "problematize the national, the master, the textbook narrative ... to make history messy!"" (258). Masalski further writes: "The speaker was Jonathan Lipman (a historian at Mount Holyoke College), one of many scholars in the Five College area in western Massachusetts who has collaborated with social studies teachers throughout New England (and across the country) to bring serious historical thought and controversy into precollege classrooms" (258).

Not known to many in the United Stated but to a few interested scholars and teacher is the epic struggle of Ienaga Saburo. In Censoring History such notables as Nozaki Yoshiko and Inokuchio Hiromitsu offer a more sympathetic description of the decade-long effort by historian and educator Ienaga Saburo who challenged the state authority in censoring and sanitizing textbook content in Japan. Understandably in problematizing the hegemony we can expose the limitations contained within the narratives, much to the chagrin of most comfortable unreflective folk. At this point I wish to bring in Edward Linenthal who penned Anatomy of a Controversy in History Wars: The Enola Gay and other Battles for the American Past - who also focuses on issues of pedagogy - when he quotes Michael Kammen, president of the Organization of American Historians and a member of the Smithsonian Council during the Enola Gay controversy, "Historians become controversial when they do not perpetuate myth, when they do not transmit the received and conventional wisdom, when they challenge the comforting presence of a stabilized past. Members of a society, and its politicians in particular, prefer that historians be quietly irenic rather than polemical, conservators rather than innovators" (Linenthal 60). Such is the struggle of Ienaga Saburo. For those interested in pedagogy, Gregory Wegner's article on the Buchenwald Concentration Camp in educating youth is very informative.

Turning to a topic of a very different sort, Hein and Seldon present the argument that unlike the two "defeated" countries, the US has somehow managed to escape outside scrutiny and accountability over is "narratives" of its discredited war - Vietnam. The one thing that Censoring History does is drag the U.S. into this circle of examination. Hein and Seldon's research shows how the resulting clashes, wars, etc. have been sanitized, at times even deliberately ignored, when textbooks circulate this part of American history to its young. Taken together, these essays reveal that Japan is far from the only country caught in an ongoing conflict over its past. Masalski's essay reveals some instances of differences among American teachers over an American historians interpretation of World War II. Potential teachers like myself wish to view the work do Laura Hein and Mark Selden (and including, but not limited to, the works of Edward Linenthal and Tom Engelhardt) as unfinished projects. Pedagogical development is something that should be constantly and vigorously attended to, lest we forget.

Miguel Llora

The premise of this book is that "schools and textbooks are important vehicles through which contemporary societies transmit ideas of citizenship and both the idealized past and the promised future". The 10 chapters look at how World War II and the Vietnam War are represented in school history textbooks in the 3 countries. Almost 50 years after the end of the war, controversy over Japanese text books continues to rage, and this book is useful to put that into some sort of perspective. Of the 10 chapters, 6 deal with Japan, including a chapter with all the details of Saburo Ienaga's famous textbook lawsuits against the Japanese government, and a couple of chapters on joint history projects between Japan and Korea, and Japan and the U.S. The common conception is that Japan has not yet faced up to its wartime past, and while I agree, after reading this book my view has been somewhat softened. Compared with the U.S.A., Japan has done more to teach its young about the negative side of its wars. If you enjoyed reading Ian Buruma's Wages of Guilt, then you will enjoy this book.