The State Bearing Gifts: Deception and Disaffection in Japanese Higher Education

by Brian J. McVeigh University of Arizona

Overview

Written to be read as both a political and philosophical commentary and anthropological investigation, this work has theoretical implications for comparative studies of political systems, particularly regarding the relation between self-deception and the ideological manufacture of legitimacy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780739113448
Publisher:	Lexington Books
Publication date:	09/01/2006
Pages:	308
Product dimensions:	6.38(w) x 9.41(h) x 0.96(d)

About the Author

Brian J. McVeigh is visiting assistant professor in the Department of East Asian Studies at the University of Arizona.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 The Paradox and Price of the Gift Chapter 2 The Burden of the Beneficiary: Schooling, Legitimacy, and Alienation Chapter 3 Exchange Dramatics: Evaluating the Realness of Value Chapter 4 Dramatizations, Deceptions, and Fronts Chapter 5 Bureaucratic Fetishism and Mutating Institutions Chapter 6 The State as Gift-Giving Machine and Stage Manager Chapter 7 Japan's Strategic Schooling: Education as a Gift from the State Chapter 8 Faces and Fronts: The Licit and Illicit Facets of Japan's Higher Education Chapter 9 Exchanging Untruths at Amadera Women's Academy Chapter 10 Learning National Identity at Amadera Women's Academy Chapter 11 "Examocracy": Examinations as Dramatizations of Self-Worth Chapter 12 Guiding Students through the Official Exchange Circuitry Chapter 13 Education Reform-Mongering: Real and Rhetorical Change Chapter 14 Self-Deception as Alienation: Rethinking Estrangement in Modern Society Chapter 15 Appendix: Varieties of Exchange Chapter 16 A Précis of Alienation

Editorial Reviews

This book is an ethnographic, participant-observer study based on the author's extensive experience with ten post-secondary institutions in Japan, in a variety of roles including graduate student, researcher, professor and department chair....It is an intriguing approach that helps us see the data in a different light, to see connections that we might otherwise not see. . . . Presents a fascinating, but disturbing, case study of undergraduate education in Japan.

Canadian Journal of Higher Education

This book is an ethnographic, participant-observer study based on the author's extensive experience with ten post-secondary institutions in Japan, in a variety of roles including graduate student, researcher, professor and department chair....It is an intriguing approach that helps us see the data in a different light, to see connections that we might otherwise not see. . . . Presents a fascinating, but disturbing, case study of undergraduate education in Japan.

Canadian Journal Of Higher Education