Awakening to Wildlife

This article examines shifting perceptions of wildlife in interwar Japan (1918–37) within the broader process of modernization and empire-building. While modernization efforts had treated the wild as an adversary to be subdued, a gradual awakening to wildlife’s intrinsic value emerged within sectors of urban Japanese society. This shift, reflected in print media such as Yachō (Wild birds) and Dōbutsu Bungaku (Animal literature) magazines, synthesized aesthetic and scientific perspectives. Counterintuitively, it also engaged with Western conservationist models as means of pursuing distinctly Japanese expressions of national identity. The article argues that this awakening marked an early, if temporary, emergence of postmaterialist and post-humanistic sentiments in Japan. Ultimately, it explores how the interplay between aesthetics, science, and politics redefined wildlife within the Japanese cultural imagination.