Progress Report: Modern Perspectives on Goryokaku and the Japanese Civil War

We had the opportunity to visit Goryokaku Tower this past week which provided us a lot of information about Goryokaku and the Civil War in Japan. We were especially intrigued by the merchandise available for purchase at the tower. For example, the tower itself was shown on magnets as a cute, smiling personified version of the tower. While tourist attractions in Canada also have magnets available, it is always a mere depiction of the building itself and rarely a cartoon. We were also very intrigued by the large variety of merchandise featuring Hijikata Toshizo and other samurai. He is shown as an cartoon, an anime character, and there was even a Domo-kun dressed up like him.



We had the opportunity to speak with two Japanese university students about Japanese history and Goryokaku. Yuka works in Goryokaku Tower selling ice cream, and she said that the majority of people visiting the tower are Japanese (with some Chinese visitors as well.) She knew Hijikata Toshizo by name but did not know other things about him. She said that in her education experience, students were not taught much Japanese history. Students get the option to choose what subjects they study in high school and social studies is a given option, but it is not required.

Misato also knew Hijikata Toshiba by name but also did not know much else about him. She spoke about major changes that occurred during the Meiji Restoration (for example, Western influence on clothing styles) but she said that in her education experience students were given the choice between world history and Japanese history and she chose world history. We asked her if the general opinion held by Japanese people was in support of the Meiji insurgence and she said they supported it, which is interesting as the exhibits and merchandise at Goryokaku Tower seemed to support the shogunate.

Considering the lack of knowledge on Hijikata Toshizo among these Japanese students, we considered the possibility that he was used as a marketing tactic to appeal to foreigners. As previously mentioned, we saw him presented as a handsome tragic hero and we wanted to see if that was catering to Japanese culture’s conception of revered people or another culture’s. We asked both Yuka and Misato about the characteristics of heroes in Japanese stories and legends but they did not have much to say other than the qualities of bravery and sacrifice. We will consider another way to examine this idea but so far, it doesn’t seem like our theory was correct. We found several portrayals of Hijikata Toshizo in pop culture (for example, he is a character in the otome game Hakuōki and the anime Shiro no Kiseki) we will look at to further understand his relevance to Japanese culture.

We are also exploring other ways to examine the perspectives on Goryokaku as the sample we have spoken to so far did not have much knowledge of it. The potential conclusion here is that it does not have much relevance to Japanese culture today, but we will be finding ways to examine the unconscious ways that it potentially affects culture today.

- Krista Breiteneder