Oleg Benesch is Professor and Head of the Department of History at the University of York, specializing in the history of East Asia in a global context. He received his Ph.D. from the Department of Asian Studies at the University of British Columbia and conducted postdoctoral research at the Institute for Historical Research at the University of London. He is the author of Inventing the Way of the Samurai: Nationalism, Internationalism, and Bushido in Modern Japan (Oxford University Press, 2014) and, together with Ran Zwigenberg, Japan’s Castles: Citadels of Modernity in War and Peace (Cambridge University Press, 2019). Oleg is a co-author of the book Civilizing Emotions: Concepts in Nineteenth Century Asia and Europe (Oxford University Press, 2016). More recently, together with Judith Vitale and Miriam Kingsberg Kadia, Oleg co-edited the volume Drugs and the Politics of Consumption in Japan (Brill, 2023). For more information on his research, please see www.olegbenesch.com

This recording took place in April 2025 as part of our short course on Britain and the Second World War – a global conflict. We have made it available this summer to commemorate VJ Day 80 years on.

If you're unable to see the film below, please use the link for your Membership type:
Historian members | Primary members | Secondary members | Student members