"Harimao" is the Japanese proper noun derived from the Malay word "Harimau malaya", meaning "Malayan Tiger (or Tiger of Malay)" and refers to the two specific Japanese. One is the Japanese Muslim who grew up in Terengguanu. His name is Tani Yutaka (1911-1942) who led a band of robbers of thousand of Malay youths throughout the 1930s and on the even of the Second World War in Asia. He also started to be engaged in anti-British activities as an agent of the Japanese military on the eve of the outbreak of the war but died of malaria shortly after the fall of Singapore. The other was the protagonist of a Japanese live-action superhero television series in the very early 1960, modeled on the Tani. The Harimao suggest two implications. First, there was the Japanese public sentiment accumulated prior to the outbreak of the war, perhaps as far back as the 1920s, as the background urging the military t use the young overseas Japanese as a propaganda tool to justify the war. Second, the other Harimao on TV indicated that the wartime Japanese view of the war was inherited or shared as part of the postwar Japanese memories or perceptions of the wartime experience, which has certain implications for understanding the "history dispute" still casting a shadow over Japan's relations with its neighbors.

Authors:
Norihito Mizuno, Akita International University, Japan

About the Presenter(s)
Dr. Mizuno Norihito is a professor in the GS program at Akita International University in Akita, Japan. His area of expertise is the history of relations between Japan and other East Asian countries and regions in the early modern and modern periods.

See this presentation on the full schedule – Monday Schedule

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