The Warrior Culture of Japan

This course explores the 'rise' of the warrior culture of Japan. In addition to providing a better understanding of the judicial and military underpinnings of Japan's military 'rule' and the nature of medieval warfare, this course shows how warriors have been perceived as a dominant force in Japanese history, and will explore how the samurai myth was created in more recent times. This course culminates in an extended research paper. The goals of this course are to examine the role of warriors in Japanese history, to introduce historical debates concerning this topic, and to explore the use of primary sources in translation.