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Who won the gold for the javelin in the 1940 Tokyo Olympics? In her dissertation Collins explains the real reasons behind the non-existent Games, a primary one being that the Japanese government forfeited its opportunity to do so in favor of continuing colonization of other Asian regions and states. Of course this explanation is far too simple, and as she explains the role of the Olympics in imperial commemoration and diplomacy, the increasingly complex confrontations between East and West in the diplomatic dance, how the event mattered in Japanese political and social thought, the promises of spectacle and its links to the empire, the rise of militarism and the decline of enthusiasm over holding an Olympics that reflected the Olympic ideal. Particularly interesting are her reflections on the Berlin Olympics of 1938 and those in Beijing in 2008, and the specter of the 1940 Tokyo in later Asian Olympics. -- Book News Inc., August 2008 The book is recommended reading to anyone interested in modern Japanese history or the history of the Olympic Games Ben-Ami Shillony This is an absorbing book. Collins develops the decade's story as a chronological narrative, drawing impressively on a wide range of contemporary publications and documents. Ironically, it is one of the most complete studies we have of the full course of a Games cycle...This is not narrow sports history but rather a fine example of a fully situated historical account of a complex sports process. -- Journal of Japanese Studies, 2010

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Sandra Collins received her Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Her current academic interests are gender, sport and national identity in Japan and the United States. She is now working on a study of the myths of national sport and the failure of professional soccer in the United States. She is an authority on Japanese culture and society.

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