Scholar Spotlight: Natalia Doan
“I study the influence of samurai on people and ideas outside Japan.”
Natalia Doan
Assistant Professor
Department of History
My most recent project examines how a teenage samurai became a national celebrity in the United States before the American Civil War, and, in doing so, challenged many of the ideas and values of antebellum American culture.
Much of the scholarship on US-Japan relations focuses on the way that the United States has influenced Japan, but there are many more untold stories if we take a closer look at how people engage with each other, determined to connect across borders of perceived difference.
My work explores Japanese transnational engagement across different times and spaces in the pursuit of solidarity and positive change. For example, I recently co-edited the volume Black Transnationalism and Japan, which discloses more than a century of cultural activity and intellectual movements created, shaped, and led by Japanese and Black people.
Why I Do What I Do
I took my first Japanese language class in college, and from the first day of class, I knew that was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. Even after many years of study and research, there are always new stories to discover and explore. I feel very fortunate to be living the dream and getting to research, teach, and write about Japan all day, every day!
Tennessee is a great place to do this work because of the deep and important relationships—both historically and today—between Tennessee and Japan. Even before the American Civil War, newspapers in Tennessee were printing articles about samurai. In my classes, I encourage my students to explore the various ways Japan has influenced intellectual and cultural history around the world.
Currently Working On
In 1860, a delegation of samurai visited the United States and inspired both celebration and controversy across the country due to reports of romance between American women and the Japanese. My forthcoming book, Civil War Samurai: The 1860 Japanese Embassy and Tateishi Onojirō in Antebellum America, reveals how teenage samurai Tateishi Onojirō and his fellow embassy members sparked a whirlwind of national optimism and cultural fantasy within the United States that challenged linked conceptions of race, masculinity, and power fundamental to many antebellum American concepts of civilization. (Watch Doan’s presentation of her work at the LancasterHistory Museum & Research Center on C-SPAN.)
One of the most wonderful parts of my recent research has been exploring thousands of primary sources—from children asking for autographs to adults engaging in serious reflections on the world in which they live—all because of their encounters with Japanese people and the idea of Japan. My hope is that these stories of samurai encounters will inspire people to think about and explore other ways people have pursued, at the transnational level, positive futures and alternate visions of what the world might be.