Japanese Language Education in Thailand before the End of World War II: Introduction of New Documents

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to expand the knowledge of Japanese language education in Thailand before the end of World War II. Up to the present, there are few works on this topic, and existing ones mainly focused on the Japanese language education in Bangkok Japanese Language School, which was opened on the 21st December 1938 by the subsidies of Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. There are still many documents related to Japanese language education in Thailand, however, most of them are not investigated yet.

Relying on such new documents, the following subjects are treated in this paper, (1) the establishment of Japanese Language course in Bophitphimuk Middle School in B.E. 2477 (1934/5) and its first Japanese teacher (Uematsu Hideo), (2) Japanese language textbooks and dictionaries written and published by Thai authors and Miki Sakae (Wathana Triphrukphan) from 1937 to 1943 in Bangkok, (3) Japanese language teaching project (1934–1938) conducted by Japanese teachers (Goto Zengo and others) of Japanese Primary School managed by the Association for Japanese Community in Siam.