Kanokogi Kazunobu 鹿子木員信 (1884 - 1949) was a Japanese professor, philosopher, mountaineer, author and war criminal. After training as a naval engineer, he saw combat in the

Russo-Japanese War The Russo-Japanese War ( ja, 日露戦争, Nichiro sensō, Japanese-Russian War; russian: Ру́сско-япóнская войнá, Rússko-yapónskaya voyná) was fought between the Empire of Japan and the Russian Empire during 1904 and 1 ...

; after converting to Christianity he resigned his commission and travelled to the United States to study theology at Union Theological Seminary and philosophy at Columbia University. He received his doctorate (supervised by

Rudolf Eucken Rudolf Christoph Eucken (; 5 January 184615 September 1926) was a German philosopher. He received the 1908 Nobel Prize in Literature "in recognition of his earnest search for truth, his penetrating power of thought, his wide range of vision, and ...

) while studying in Germany. After returning to Japan in 1912 he taught at

Keio University , mottoeng = The pen is mightier than the sword , type = Private research coeducational higher education institution , established = 1858 , founder = Yukichi Fukuzawa , endowmen ...

Tokyo Imperial University , abbreviated as or UTokyo, is a public research university located in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Established in 1877, the university was the first Imperial University and is currently a Top Type university of the Top Global University Project by ...

and

Kyushu Imperial University , abbreviated to , is a Japanese national university located in Fukuoka, on the island of Kyushu. It was the 4th Imperial University in Japan, ranked as 4th in 2020 Times Higher Education Japan University Rankings, one of the top 10 Desig ...

. Kanokogi became involved in the

Pan-Asianism file:Asia satellite orthographic.jpg , Satellite photograph of Asia in orthographic projection. Pan-Asianism (''also known as Asianism or Greater Asianism'') is an ideology aimed at creating a political and economic unity among Asian people, Asian ...

movement, which led to him travelling to India. He was arrested by the British in Calcutta, and deported to Singapore, where he was imprisoned briefly. Following this incident, he began advocating for Indian independence. Kanokogi was a

nationalist Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: The ...

who emphasised the importance of the

Imperial family A royal family is the immediate family of kings/queens, emirs/emiras, sultans/ sultanas, or raja/rani and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the family of an emperor or empress, and the term pap ...

in Japanese history. One of his principal works was ''Der Geist Japans'' ("''The Spirit of Japan''"), which was derived from a collection of lectures he gave in Germany arguing against Chinese influences on Japanese history. He was a member of the

Yūzonsha The was a radical Japanese nationalist pan-Asianist organization founded in August 1919.Szpilman 2011, p. 55 The group arose from a pre-existing debate society, the Rōsōkai (Old and Young Society), which was founded in October 1918 by , editor ...

society. After the war, he was held at Sugamo Prison as a Class-A war criminal. He was released in 1946 on medical grounds because he was diagnosed with terminal pulmonary tuberculosis, and died three years later from this condition.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kazunobu, Kanokogi 1884 births 1949 deaths Japanese nationalists Japanese people convicted of war crimes Academic staff of Keio University Academic staff of the University of Tokyo Academic staff of Kyushu University