News

For the first time ever, the prestigious Jiro Osaragi Prize for Commentary—Japan’s equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize—has been awarded to a foreigner, Kenneth J. Ruoff, director of Portland State University’s Center for Japanese Studies and associate professor in the Department of History.

Announced today by the Asahi Shimbun, Ruoff won for the Japanese translation of his book, The People’s Emperor: Democracy and the Japanese Monarchy, 1945–1995 (Harvard University Press, 2002), published in December 2003 under the title Kokumin no Tenno (Kyodo News Publications).

Ruoff will attend the award ceremony to be held at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo on January 27, 2005. Professor Takii Kazuhiro of Hyogo Prefectural University will also be recognized that day for his book Bunmeishi no naka no Meiji Kenpo (roughly translated, “The Meiji Constitution in the History of Civilization”).

The Asahi Shimbun is Japan’s second-largest daily newspaper with a circulation of 12 million, and is known for its in-depth investigative reporting and political commentary. The Jiro Osaragi Prize is named for Japanese author Jiro Osaragi (1898–1973) who wrote several novels, plays, and travel books, and who was one of Japan’s most influential writers of the postwar period. His novels include The Homecoming and The Journey, both available in English. The award includes a two million yen (approximately $20,000) cash prize.

Prof. Ruoff’s landmark book analyzes numerous issues, including the role of individual emperors in shaping the institution, the manner in which the emperor's constitutional position as symbol has been interpreted, the emperor's intersection with politics through ministerial briefings, memories of Hirohito's wartime role, nationalistic movements in support of Foundation Day and the reign-name system, and the remaking of the once-sacrosanct throne into a “monarchy of the masses” embedded in the postwar culture of democracy. Ruoff is recognized as a leading expert on the contemporary Japanese monarchy.

At PSU, Prof. Ruoff teaches courses in Japanese history, Japanese-American relations and the Japanese-American experience. He graduated with honors from Harvard College, and received his Ph.D. in Japanese history from Columbia University. From 1994 to 1996, Ruoff was a member of the Faculty of Law at Hokkaido University, where he taught, in Japanese, a seminar on Japan’s modern history. After a year as a postdoctoral fellow at the Reischauer Institute for Japanese Studies at Harvard University, he joined PSU in 1999. In 2004 he was a Fulbright Scholar to Kyoto University, where he conducted research for a new book about Japan in 1940.

Contact Information for Journalists:
Japan-based journalists who would like to make arrangements to interview Prof. Ruoff, whether by phone or in person during his stay in Tokyo from January 23 to 29, 2005, should contact him directly at ruoffk@pdx.edu or at his office phone, 503-725-3991.

Reporters with questions regarding the prize, the selection process and other issues may also contact Mr. Yuki Ishida of the Asahi Newspaper and chair of the selection committee, who asks that questions be submitted in writing to his e-mail address: ishida-y4@asahi.com.

For a photograph of Prof. Ruoff, please contact David Santen in Portland State University’s Office of Marketing and Communications at 503-725-8789 or santend@pdx.edu.

Source:
Ken Ruoff (503-725-3991)
PSU Center for Japanese Studies

For Immediate Release (PR-04-164)