
Dr Joshua Batts is Research Associate in Japanese Studies at the University of Cambridge.
Dr. Batts’ research explores the dynamics between early modern Japanese and world history. His current research project examines Tokugawa Japan’s attempts to establish direct, trans-Pacific trade with Spanish America in the early seventeenth century. Drawing on archives in Europe and Japan, the project uses this little-known case study to reevaluate the nature of diplomacy and the various frictions inhibiting encounter in the early modern world. Dr. Batts is also developing a project on mining and minting in Tokugawa Japan and its connection to contemporary narratives of industrial, national, and global heritage.