Institute of Japanese Studies Andreas Eichleter

Andreas Eichleter has been a research associate at the Institute of Japanese Studies at Heidelberg University since October 2023. Previously, he worked as a lecturer at both the Center for East Asian Studies at Heidelberg University and the Heidelberg Centre for Transcultural Studies. In 2021, he completed his doctoral degree in a joint-degree program at both Heidelberg University, Germany, and Tōhoku University, Japan.

As a historian, his research focuses on the history of East Asia in the 19th and 20th centuries, as well as the relations between the West and the region during this time. His work particularly centers on the Unequal Treaties, which established the framework for interactions between the West and East Asia, and the treaty ports, which were the most significant and diverse contact zones between these world regions.

Research Keywords: 

• Global History and Imperialism
• Regional Studies: East Asia (China, Japan)
• Media History (Newspapers)
• Unequal Treaties and Treaty Ports

• 2025, July 25: Workshop of the HeKKSaGOn-Project Displacement and Detention in History and Historical Memory: Germany and Japan in Comparative and Transcultural Perspective, Heidelberg, Germany. 

• Presentation: Japan, Germany and the United States –Repatriation of Germans and Austrians from Post-World War II Japan

   

• 2025, June 25-27: Britain and the World Conference 2025, Liverpool, UK.

  Presentation: A Tale of Two Sisters – Female British Entrepreneurs in Treaty Port Yokohama

   

• 2025, May 22-24: New Diplomatic History 2025, Aix-en-Provence, France.

  Presentation: Foes and Friends - The British Press of the Treaty Ports and their Consuls

   

• 2025, March 14: AKM - SHoW Junior Researcher Workshop, Online.

  Presentation: Beyond Fighting: The varied roles of the British Military Garrison in Yokohama from 1864 -1874 (Lightning talk)

   

• 2024, November 8-10: 7th EU-Japan Young Scholars Workshop in Alsace “Transnational Japanese Spaces”, European Center for Japanese Studies in Alsace, France. 

  Presentation: Spaces of Connections and Disconnection: Treaty Port Yokohama as a transnational space.

   

• 2024, September 30: Nichi-Doku Joint Lecture, HUOK, Kyoto University, Japan. 

  Presentation: A Foreign Perspective on Education in Japan: William Griffis and Japanese Educational Reforms in the 1870s [日本の教育に関する外国人の視点 - ウィリアム・グリフィスと日本における1870年代の教育改革]. 

   

• 2024, September 7-8: Zeitreise ins Mittelalter Eggenburg, Eggenburg, Austria. 

  Presentation: Leben und Glauben: Johanna, die Jungfrau von Orleans. 

  [title translated: Life and Faith: Jeanne d’Arc of Orleans]

   

• 2024, May 23-24: NAJS 2024, Aarhus, Denmark.

  Presentation/Article: Royalty, Railways and Modernity - The role of Emperor Meiji in the eyes of foreigners

   

• 2023, June 2-3: Fashioning Perceptions – Images of Japan at the Turn of the Twentieth Century, Heidelberg, Germany.

  Presentation: The Deutsche Japan Post und the Russo-Japanese War

   

• 2022, September 28-30: AKM Jahrestagung 2022 - Historische und globale Perspektiven auf den Kriegsschauplatz Asien, Heidelberg, Germany.

  Presentation: Der Krieg und die Presse – Die Deutsche Japan Post und der Russisch-Japanische Krieg [title translated: War and the Press – The Deutsche Japan Post and the Russo-Japanese War]

   

• 2022, July 2-3: ASCJ 2022 - 24^th Asian Studies Conference Japan, Online.

  Panel-Organiser: Foreign Merchant Experiences in the Treaty Ports of the Meiji Period

• Presentation: Arthur Richard Weber: A German Merchant Pioneer in Niigata, 1869-1876

   

• 2022, March 24-27: AAS 2022 - Annual Conference of the Association for Japanese Studies, Online.

  Presentation: Representing a Community? – The foreign-language newspapers of the treaty ports

   

• 2021, August 25-28: EAJS 2021 - 16^th International Conference of the European Association of Japanese Studies, Online.

  Presentation: Niigata – The Forgotten Treaty Port

   

• 2019, September 7-8: Zeitreise ins Mittelalter Eggenburg, Eggenburg, Austria.

  Presentation: Die Geschichte vom Prinzen Genji – Leben und Liebe am Japanischen Kaiserhof

  [title translated: The Tale of Genji – Life and Love at the Imperial Court of Japan]

   

• 2019, May 17: Tübingen-Heidelberg Workshop, Heidelberg, Germany.

  Presentation: The Transformation of Yokohama - From the Opening of the Treaty Port to the End of the Unequal Treaties, 1859-1899

   

• 2018, November 9: Kyōto-Heidelberg Workshop - Entangled Pasts in the Global Present: Gender, Labor & Citizenship, Heidelberg, Germany.

  Presentation: News from Yokohama - The Foreign Press coverage of Meiji Japan

   

• 2018, September 8-9: Zeitreise ins Mittelalter Eggenburg, Eggenburg, Austria. 

  Presentation: Bis zum Ende der Welt - Die Seidenstraße, Marco Polo und Ibn Battuta

  [title translated: To the ends of the world – The Silk Road, Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta]

   

• 2018, September 5-7: BAJS - Crisis? What Crisis? Continuity, and Change in Japan, Sheffield, UK. 

  Presentation: The Outside Perspective – Treaty Port Newspapers and the Meiji Restoration

   

• 2018, May 1-2: Mutual Images 6^th International Workshop - Mediatised images of Japan in Europe: Through the media kaleidoscope, Cardiff, Wales. 

  Presentation: The Treaty Port Press – Japan’s image in the eyes of the foreign language press in East Asia in the 1870s

   

• 2017, September 8-9: Zeitreise ins Mittelalter Eggenburg, Eggenburg, Austria.

  Presentation: Das Japanische Mittelalter – Vom Zen Buddhismus der Samurai zum Christentum der Jesuiten

  [title translated: The Japanese Middle Ages – From the Zen Buddhisum of the Samurai to the Christiantiy of the Jesuits] 

   

• 2017, April 14: Kyōto-Heidelberg Workshop - Entangled Pasts in the Global Present: Gender, Labor & Citizenship - Labor and Citizenship in the 20th Century, Kyōto Workshop, Kyōto, Japan. 

  Presentation: Foreign Labor in Japan Then and Now -From Foreign Teachers to Teaching Foreigners

   

• 2016, September 23: Cultural Typhoon in Europe, Vienna, Austria. 

  Presentation: Perception of Modernity - The creation of an image in East Asia in the 19th century

   

• 2016, June 17: Treaty Ports in East Asia, 1850-1910, Heidelberg, Germany. 

  Presentation: Backward China – Progressive Japan - a Comparative Study of the Japan Weekly Mail and The North China Herald

   

• 2015, April 15: Young Researchers Workshop, 4^th HeKKSaGon Conference, Sendai, Japan. Presentation: The Treaty Ports in China and Japan - A Comparison

ARTICLES and CHAPTERS 

(Upcoming) Eichleter, Andreas, „The Dream of Niigata – A New Treaty Port from Expectation to Disappointment, 1869 to 1879“, In: Cristina, Giovanni and Favero, Giovanni (Ed.): Imagining the Future of Ports in the Long Nineteenth Century.

(Upcoming) Eichleter, Andreas, „Der Krieg und die Presse – Die Deutsche Japan Post
und der Russisch-Japanische Krieg“, In: Melber, Takuma und von Lingen, Kerstin (Ed.): Historische und globale Perspektiven auf den Kriegsschauplatz Asien.

Eichleter, Andreas (2025), „Der Lehrling des Westens – Im Imperialismus Japans spiegelt sich die Erfahrung des Landes als Opfer“, In: Zeit Geschichte - Imperialismus, 4/25.

Eichleter, Andreas (2019), “The Outside Perspective – The Treaty Port Press, the Meiji Restoration and the Image of a Modern Japan”, In: Mutual Images Journal, Volume 6 (Spring 2019), Mediatised Images of Japan in Europe: Through the Media Kaleidoscope, S. 93-114.

MONOGRAPHIEN

Eichleter, Andreas (2022), The Treaty Port Press and the Transformation of Yokohama - From the Opening of the Treaty Port to the Beginning of Treaty Revision, 1859-1884 (Dissertation, Online-Publikation, Tohoku University Repository).

REVIEWS

Eichleter, Andreas (2022), Rezension zu: Schmidt, Jan: Nach dem Krieg ist vor dem Krieg. Medialisierte Erfahrungen des Ersten Weltkriegs und Nachkriegsdiskurse in Japan (1914–1919). Frankfurt am Main 2021, In: H-Soz-Kult, 11.08.2022, <www.hsozkult.de/publicationreview/id/reb-26827&gt;.

Proseminar Geschichte Japans I [History of Japan I] and Übung Einführung in das wissenschaftliche Arbeiten [Introduction to Academic Work]

The proseminar on the History of Japan I provides an overview of the relevant historical developments of the country in the context of East Asia, from prehistoric beginnings through early Japanese history and the medieval period to modern times and the postwar era at the end of the 20th century. The focus of this course is the analysis of the political, social, economic, cultural, and intellectual history foundations of the various historical epochs within the study period. 

As part of the Proseminar History of Japan I, there is also a mandatory exercise for the proseminar, which serves as an introduction to scholarly work with a focus on historical Japan research.

VO Ostasien in der Weltgeschichte II [East Asia in World History II]

The course follows East Asia in World History I from the winter semester and concentrates on the 19th and 20th centuries. The focus is on the question of modernization in terms of state, economy, technology, language, religions, and social models, as well as the different forms of the visual realm that depict these aspects.

Past Courses: 

• Seminar Sources in Transcultural History
• Seminar The Century of Inequality – East Asia under the Unequal Treaties, 1842-1943
• Seminar Just Visiting? – Globetrotters in East Asia in the 19th and early 20th century
• Seminar Gender and Class in Foreign Settler Communities in East Asia
• Seminar The Treaty Port Networks in East Asia - Spaces of Connection and Separation

• Course Basic Research Skills for the MA Transcultural Studies
• Tutorials for the lectures Kulturelle Grundlagen Ostasiens, Ostasien in der Weltgeschichte II und Mittelalter 1 (ca. 400 bis ca. 1200)