NAJS Conference 2025

The 19th Annual Conference of the Nordic Association for the Study of Contemporary Japanese Society (NAJS) will be held at the University of Iceland, Reykjavík, on May 22-23, 2025. Venue: Veröld – House of Vigdís (Faculty of Languages and Cultures).

We invite you to submit paper proposals on modern and contemporary Japanese society, including economy and business, politics and international relations, sociology and anthropology, history, popular culture, literature, religion, art, and other related topics. We welcome proposals from scholars at all career stages and from all countries/regions.

The conference is open to all who are interested, and we are very happy that our network is growing with researchers and doctoral students from all over the world.

NAJS Conference 2025 at the University of Iceland

Programme, May 22-23, 2025
Printable PDF version here

Venue: Veröld – House of Vigdís, University of Iceland, Reykjavík (main campus).

The conference is for registered participants only, except for the keynote lecture.

Thursday 22 May

09:00-10:00 Registration, badge pickup, coffee (Veröld, bottom of stairs)

10:00-10:20 Opening of the conference: Practical information and welcome from the NAJS Steering Committee (group photo)

10:30-12:00 Parallel Session 1 & 2

Session 1, Food & exports
Chair: Kamila Szczepanska

Eva Liias & Erja Kettunen-Matilainen (co-authors): Exporting Nordic food to Japan: SME perspective on the EPA enforcement and trade barriers (Stegewerns, Popovics)
Kristín Ingvarsdóttir: Icelandic whaling for the Japanese market: whaling diplomacy & trade (Hijino, Ström)
Lenka Vyletalova: Economic Ties, Cultural Affinities, and Culinary Innovation: The Case of Japanese Food in the Czech Republic (Teschner, Sanada)

Session 2, Japanese literature & magazines
Chair: Jens Sejrup

Rebecca Suter: Standing with the Egg: Murakami Haruki’s Two World Literature (Niskanen, Bianco)
Francesco Eugenio Barbieri: Kawakami Mieko, Neoliberal Feminism, and the Global Resonance of Natsu Monogatari (Iwata-Weickgenannt, Koch)
Jana Aresin: Alternatives to Democratic Capitalism? The Shifting Politics of Labor Activism in 1950s Japanese Women’s Magazines (Wulansari, De Togni, Rehm)

12:00-13:00 Lunch break

13:00-14:30 Parallel Sessions 3 & 4

Session 3, Technology and cultural industry
Chair: Eva Liias

Giulia De Togni: Imaginaries of Care Robots in Contemporary Japanese Society (Saeki, Koch)
Lixin Lu: Navigating Digital Transformation in Japanese Cultural Industry: Challenges and Collaborative Solutions (Hamano, Teschner)
Eija Margit Niskanen: Koreanization of J-pop (Suter, Spremberg)

Session 4, Japanese literature & cinema
Chair: Jens Sejrup

Andrea Bianco: The Emergence of the Onsen Imagination in Modern Japanese Literature and Cinema (Vyletalova, Barbieri)
Zsófia Keller: Indigenous Rights Issues in Japanese Graphic Life Narratives (Arthur, Nakaya)
Kristina Iwata-Weickgenannt: The Cultural Catch: Literature, National Identity, and the Politics of Nostalgia (Puntervold, Ingvarsdóttir)

14:30-15:00 Coffee break

15:00-16:15 Keynote lecture by Pekka Korhonen, Professor Emeritus of World Politics at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland
Open lecture

Chair: Dick Stegewerns
Keynote title: On Being an Ally of the United States in Cold War II
Venue: Auditorium (Auðarsalur)

16:30-17:30 Reception and optional guided tour of the Vigdis Finnbogadottir Exhibition,
building next to the conference venue. Former president Vigdís Finnbogadóttir was the first democratically elected female president in the world, President of Iceland 1980-1996.

18:00-20:00 Conference dinner, Plantan Bistro at the Nordic House in Reykjavik.

Friday 23 May

09:00-10:30 Parallel Sessions Session 5 & 6

Session 5, Pureness as commodity
Chair: Patrik Ström

Tamara V. Teschner: Cosmetics Industry in Japan (Wulansari, Ferreira, Ström)
Gabriele Koch: “Feeling the Forest with Your Whole Body”: Attention and Forest Therapy in Contemporary Japan (Saeki, Yoshihira)

Session 6, History
Chair: Kristín Ingvarsdóttir

Dick Stegewerns: The Modern History of Sake: From the Birth of Sake to the Triumph of Pure Sake (Vyletalova, Liias & Kettunen-Matilainen)
Jonathan Puntervold: „The Emperor’s New Grammar“: Yamada Yoshio and the myths of Meiji grammar writing (Bianco, Keller,)
Chantal Weber: Cultural Internationalism in Japan during the 1920s – Personal Networks in the Public and Private Sphere (Spremberg, Rhys Jones)

10:30-10:45 Coffee break

10:45-12:15 Parallel Sessions 7 & 8

Session 7, Ethics, conspiracy, gender
Chair: Unnur Bjarnadóttir

Eiko Saeki: Regulating Reproduction, Resisting Restriction: State Control and Grassroots Advocacy in Japan’s Third-Party Reproduction Debate (Yoshihira, Ferreira)
Kamila Szczepanska & Yoko Demelius (co-authors): Kofuku-no-Kagaku as a conspiritual conglomerate? The usage of conspiracy theories in operations of KnK (2020-2025) (Korhonen, Aresin)
Sri Ayu Wulansari: Divergent Paths, Shared Struggles: Women’s Experiences of Gender Inequality in Japan and Indonesia“ (Barbieri, Arthur)

Session 8, Internationalization & immigration
Chair: Dick Stegewerns

Felix Spremberg: Internationalization in Japanese Moral Education Textbooks: Between Normalization and Nihonjinron (Rehm, Weber)
Maximilien Xavier Rehm (co-researcher: Richard East, Ph.D.): How does party politics influence debate on immigration in Japan? A quantitative analysis of National Diet records (Bochorodycz, Sejrup)

12:15-13:15 Lunch break

13:15-14:45 Parallel Sessions 9 & 10

Session 9, Arctic diplomacy & governance
Chair: Eva Liias

Edward Rhys Jones: From Science to Strategic Engagement: Japan’s Path to Arctic Council Observer Membership (Ingvarsdóttir, Korhonen)
Lindsay Elizabeth Arthur: Rights Matter Everywhere! Japan’s Engagement with Indigenous Rights in Arctic Governance from Policy to Practice (Szczepanska, Keller)

Session 10, Regional development
Chair: Dick Stegewerns

Kie Sanada, Patrik Ström, Peter Popovics (co-authors): Regional development via nurturing green service ecology: Is a lesson from Japan applicable to a case study from Sweden? (Hamano, Kettunen-Matilainen)
Ken Victor Leonard Hijino: The Political Discourses of Rural Shrinkage and Revitalization: Japan in Comparative Perspective (Lu, Sejrup)
Sumie Nakaya: “Building Back Better” in Action: Circular Economy and Post-Disaster Reconstruction in Japan (Hijino, Bochorodycz)

14:45-15:00 Coffee

15:00-16:30 Parallel Sessions 11 & 12

Session 11, Foreign policy
Chair: Dick Stegewerns

Beata Bochorodycz: The Three Security Documents of 2022 and the Policy Change in Japan: From Yoshida Doctrine via Salami-slicing Tactic to the Critical Juncture of the Abe Line (Nakaya, Szczepanska)
Pekka Korhonen: Japan in Cold War II (Weber, Rhys Jones)

Session 12, Heritage & community
Chair: Patrik Ström

Magokoro Yoshihira & Yuliya Osadcha Ferreira (co-authors): Destigmatisation of the Sanya Community: from a Poor District to an Inclusive Community (Aresin, Popovics)
Jens Sejrup: Re-inviting flows: Globalist metaphors at two reconstructed heritage sites in Japan (Niskanen, Sanada)
Takeshi Hamano: The emergence of a ‘boundary object’ through industrial tourism: Multiple ontologies of local heritage after their inscription on UNESCO’s World Heritage List in regional Japan (Lu, Suter)

16:30-17:00 Closing of the conference & discussion

Conference format

The aim of the NAJS Conference is for scholars to discuss each other’s research and for authors to receive feedback, and therefore the conference will mainly consist of discussions on full papers which will have been made available as PDF files to participants prior to the conference taking place. As participants are expected to have read the papers before coming to the conference, it is very important for all authors to have sent in their papers by the deadline on May 5, 2025. More information will be provided later in the process.

Authors will receive ca 30 minutes for intense discussion about the paper they submitted. The author may start by using a maximum of five minutes to state which type of publication or audience the paper is intended for and to mention any special requests about the feedback. The discussion is then led by two assigned discussants who will have five minutes each to bring up their prepared points of discussion. The author will be given five minutes to respond, after which there is an open debate.

The role of the chair for each session is to make sure that the discussion revolves around major issues rather than small details and to see to it that the time limit is kept. The 30 minutes of discussion time should not be used to summarize the paper, as participants are expected to have read the paper beforehand.

Important dates and participation

Application deadline for the 2025 conference was on January 14, 2025.

Your submission should include:

Your full name, title, affiliation and email address
An abstract in English (length 200-250 words), including preliminary title and up to five keywords
You will be notified whether your abstract has been accepted by early February 2025.

If your abstract is accepted, please submit a full paper by May 5, 2025. Papers should preferably be between 7,000 and 10,000 words, but shorter papers can also be submitted.

Should you wish to participate in the conference and discussions but not present your own work, please apply by May 1, 2025.

Program

Participants are encouraged to reserve the whole day on May 22-23, 2025. The conference will be held from morning to late afternoon on both days, and some social events will also be organized in conjunction with the conference. The program will be announced closer to the conference dates.

Inquires

For inquiries, please contact NAJS2025@hi.is

Main organizer:

Kristín Ingvarsdóttir, Assistant Professor of Contemporary Japanese Studies. University of Iceland

Conference committee:

Bart Gaens, Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Dick Stegewerns, University of Oslo
Jens Sejrup, University of Copenhagen
Patrik Ström, Stockholm School of Economics