Musashi: the difusion of the Japanese identity in the Bushido (1980 decade)

• Grant number: 11/20392-5
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: April 01, 2012
• End date: March 31, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - History - Modern and Contemporary History
• Principal Investigator: Samira Adel Osman
• Grantee: Bruno de Oliveira Mastrantonio
• Host Institution: Escola de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (EFLCH). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus Guarulhos. Guarulhos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

During the 1980 decade, the Japan's economy expanded and became one of the most economies of the world and the country's yearly development rate leaves behind the European countries, touched by the Oil's conflict. Who are, after all, the Japanese? This question persists all that decade, in assay to understand the nation which shows itself as the unique "national economy" performing in the end of the 20th century. The answer to this question was expressed in Japanese literature, through some novels which approach their society, under their traditional values. The novel Musashi, from Eiji Yoshikawa, translated to English in 1981, became a best-seller which represents a society deep-rooted in Japanese imaginary. Through the trajectory of a samurai who really existed in Japanese feudal ages, Yoshikawa showed not only an epic novel, but also the culture and the values of Japanese society, as a way to evidence how the Japanese see theirselves and how they like to be seen in the West. (AU)