The legacy of imperialism is one that lingers uncomfortably in both Japan and Britain. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe insists on making visits to Yasukuni Shrine, which enshrines Japan's war dead along with Class-A war criminals. In Britain's case, many Oxbridge colleges have become a focal point for unprecedented tensions over the legacy of Britain's imperialist past, be it with the recent repatriation of a bronze cockerel from Jesus College to Nigeria, or the campaign to take down the statue of arch-imperialist Cecil Rhodes at Oriel College.
Edward Said, author of “Orientalism,” comes up in every discussion of cultural imperialism or "appropriation." As his nearly religious adherents are keen to tell us, any "Western" comment on or borrowing from "Eastern" culture is at best totally inappropriate, at worst an attempt to exert cultural control.
This time a Cambridge college, Trinity Hall, has been forced by these adherents to change the theme of its summer party from a "Tokyo to Kyoto" celebration of Japanese culture to the foolproof, if bland, "Metropolis."