Thammasat University students are cordially invited to participate in a free Zoom seminar about Children as Charismatic Conservationists in 1960s Japan.

The event will be held on Wednesday, 26 January starting at 6pm Bangkok time.

It is organized by the Committee on Gender Equality and Diversity, Faculty of Arts, The University of Hong Kong (HKU).

The Thammasat University Library collection includes many books about different aspects of conservation.

Students may register to receive a Zoom link here.

For further information or with any questions, please contact Georgina Challen by email at

gchallen@hku.hk

The speaker will be Assistant Professor Janet Borland of the Department of Japanese Studies, School of Modern Languages and Cultures, HKU.

The respondent will be Affiliated Associate Professor Staci Ford, Department of History and School of Modern Languages and Cultures, HKU.

The moderator will be Assistant Professor Alastair McClure, Department of History, School of Humanities, HKU

The event webpage offers further details:

Children as Charismatic Conservationists in 1960s Japan

Children can play an important role as agents of conservation with compelling messages to be heard, yet their voices and writings seldom appear in environmental histories. Why? When historians do find children’s voices and writings in the archives, how do we use them? What can they tell us about children’s thoughts, beliefs, hopes, and feelings about animals, nature, and their relationship with the non-human world?

In this talk, I will examine the pivotal role of schoolchildren in saving Japan’s Red-crowned Crane from the brink of extinction. Using children’s writings and first-hand observations, I will demonstrate how children captivated the nation with their evocative narratives about nature and wildlife. I argue that children succeeded in mobilizing public support because they elicited empathy, motivated people to care, and galvanized them to act. In turn, national recognition in the form of prestigious awards, media coverage, donations, and visits from overseas experts empowered children and helped reinforce the belief that they possessed the power to affect change and make a difference. Children’s role as charismatic conservationists endures in Hokkaido and may well serve as a model for other conservation efforts today.

Janet Borland is an award-winning historian of modern Japan whose research focuses on fundamental relationships between people and the natural and built environment. Her first book, “Earthquake Children: Building Resilience from the Ruins of Tokyo” (Harvard University Asia Center, 2020), won the 2020 Hong Kong Academy of the Humanities First Book Prize, the 2020 Grace Abbott Book Prize, and was shortlisted for the 2021 New South Wales Premier’s History Awards, General History Prize. Janet’s second book, “Endangered Icon: Japan’s Quest to Save the Red-crowned Crane,” is a social, cultural and environmental history covering the twentieth century.

There has been extensive research in Japan about children as the future of enviromental conservation movements. In 2017, Childhood experience of nature influences the willingness to coexist with biodiversity in citie by Tetsuro Hosaka, Koun Sugimoto & Shinya Numata, an Open Access article, was published in Palgrave Communications volume 3.

Its abstract follows:

Although efforts to promote biodiversity in cities around the world have increased, many wild animals (including vertebrates and invertebrates) comprising “urban biodiversity” are unpopular or often regarded as a nuisance by the general public, particularly by those city residents who have had little experience with nature. We conducted a questionnaire survey with 1030 urban residents in Japan to assess their likeability (like and dislike) towards 29 wild animals, and their willingness to have these animals in their neighbourhoods, and examined the effects of childhood experience of nature and socio-demographic factors on these attitudes. In general, people liked smaller birds and mammals, and some insects, but were only willing to have birds and insects near their homes. Females liked birds and mammals but disliked insects and unfavourable animals more than males. Older people expressed willingness to coexist with insects and birds more than younger people. However, childhood experience with nature, particularly collecting insects and plants, was a more important factor than socio-demographics for positive attitudes towards wild animals. Therefore, even though urban residents were unwilling to coexist with many animals, their attitudes can become more positive through increased interaction with wild animals and plants. Biodiversity conservation initiatives in cities should place greater emphasis on providing children with more interaction with biodiversity.

The article’s conclusion:

Urban residents showed a range of attitudes towards wild animals, and were unwilling to coexist with most animals, except favourable birds and insects. Their attitudes, however, were strongly affected by their childhood experience with nature. Therefore, their attitudes may become more positive through increasing interaction with wild animals. Hence, not only creation of protected areas for rare native species, but also creation of green spaces for children to directly interact with animals and plants (irrespective of native or nonnative species), should be prioritized in cities. Effective orientation to encourage children to use such green spaces is equally important. At the same time, education about ecosystem functions and actual risk of unfavourable animals are important to obtain wider support for urban biodiversity conservation.

Also in2017, another article by the same authors, Effects of childhood experience with nature on tolerance of urban residents toward hornets and wild boars in Japan, was published with the following abstract:

Urban biodiversity conservation often aims to promote the quality of life for urban residents by providing ecosystem services as well as habitats for diverse wildlife. However, biodiversity inevitably brings some disadvantages, including problems and nuisances caused by wildlife. Although some studies have reported that enhancement of nature interaction among urban children promotes their affective attitude toward of favorable animals, its effect on tolerance toward problem-causing wildlife is unknown. In this study, we assessed the tolerance of 1,030 urban residents in Japan toward hornets and wild boar, and analyzed the effects of childhood experience with nature on tolerance using a structural equation model. The model used sociodemographic factors and childhood nature experience as explanatory variables, affective attitude toward these animals as a mediator, and tolerance as a response variable. The public tolerance toward hornets and boars was low; over 60% of the respondents would request the removal of hornets and wild boar from nearby green spaces by government services, even when the animals had not caused any damage. Tolerance was lower in females and elderly respondents. Childhood experience with nature had a greater influence on tolerance than did sociodemographic factors in the scenario where animals have not caused any problems; however, its effect was only indirect via promoting positive affective attitude toward wildlife when the animals have caused problems. Our results suggest that increasing people’s direct experience with nature is important to raise public tolerance, but its effect is limited to cases where wildlife does not cause any problems. To obtain wider support for conservation in urban areas, conservationists, working together with municipal officials, educators and the media, should provide relevant information on the ecological functions performed by problem-causing wildlife and strategies for avoiding the problems that wildlife can cause.

Its conclusion:

Biodiversity conservation in urban areas is increasingly highlighted to promote habitat quality for both humans and wildlife as urbanization accelerates around the world. However, increasing biodiversity in urban areas will inevitably bring various disadvantages, including nuisances and problems caused by wildlife. Our study showed that urban residents generally had low tolerance toward problem-causing wildlife and high dependency on governments to solve the problems. This should be kept in mind when governments launch local or regional strategies for biodiversity conservation, as those strategies often only consider the positive side of biodiversity and overlook negative public attitudes toward urban wildlife. The growing lack of childhood experience with nature may further reduce the tolerance in the future, which may present an obstacle to urban biodiversity conservation. To obtain wider support for conservation in urban areas, biologists working closely with municipal officials, educators and media, should provide relevant information on the ecological functions of problem-causing wildlife and strategies to avoid these problems.

Still other articles by different researchers, such as An analysis of 15 years of trends in children’s connection with nature and its relationship with residential environment address related themes.

(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)