Episode 337 - Let the Games Begin, Part 2

History of Japan

Isaac Meyer

Japan, History, Japanese

4.8 • 744 Ratings

🗓️ 8 May 2020

⏱️ 36 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This week, Japan finally gets the Olympics; but what does that really mean for Japan? What does hosting really accomplish for Japan's image, and how do the games themselves unfold?

Show notes here.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This week's episode is brought to you by Audible.
0:03.2	Audible has over 425,000 titles to choose from, all compatible with iPhone, Android, Kindle, or your MP3 player of choice.
0:13.1	For listeners of the show, Audible is offering a free 30-day trial membership, complete with credit for a free audiobook of your choice.
0:20.4	You can cancel any time and
0:21.8	keep the free book or keep going with one of Audible's subscription offers. Go to audibletrial.com
0:27.6	slash Japan to claim your offer. This week, I'm going to recommend to you the Fire Next
0:33.2	Time by James Baldwin. This is actually a book that I teach for work as a part of my 11th grade
0:39.4	course that covers, among other things, modern U.S. history. James Baldwin is, in my opinion,
0:45.5	one of the best writers on the history of race in the United States, and the fire next time
0:51.3	is one of his best and, I think, most accessible works.
0:55.1	If you've never encountered it before, this is a great way to do it.
0:59.1	Go to audibletrial.com slash Japan to claim your copy. Hello and welcome to the history of Japan podcast, episode 337, Let the Games begin, part two.
1:28.3	When the Olympic Games resumed in 1948, the world was a very different place.
1:34.8	The 1948 Olympics were held in London and received the extremely charming nickname of
1:40.3	The Austerity Games.
1:42.7	After years of war, nobody really had the budget to blow on grand
1:46.1	new venues and expensive celebrations, and so the games made use of existing infrastructure
1:51.4	and a minimum of spectacle to the greatest degree possible. Not that they really needed that
1:57.6	much hype. It had been 16 years since the last Olympics had been held,
2:03.1	as both the 1940 Tokyo Games and the 1944 games, which had been slated for London, were canceled
2:09.5	due to the Second World War. A chance to bring back pre-war tradition and get back some
2:15.1	semblance of normalcy was all the PR the Olympics required.
	...

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