The Suntory Foundation (Chairman: Nobutada Saji) has selected six grant recipients for support in overseas publication in fiscal 2008 as follows. The grants total 5 million yen.

This assistance program was established to promote a better understanding of Japan overseas by supporting translation and publishing of significant works on Japan in other languages, as well as publishing of original works on Japan in other languages.

Eligible works are focused on Japan in the fields of social science or humanities, as a rule, or are outstanding works written by Japanese authors. From a commercial standpoint, these academic and literary works are usually more difficult to translate and publish.

To date, the foundation has contributed to publication efforts for 220 works in 20 languages, which has helped introduce Japanese culture and Japanese academic achievements to a broader audience.

The authors and/or works to receive this year's grants are as follows:

• 1. Textbook of Japanese Kanji Characters for Everyday Use, Vol. 3 (Polish)
• 2. The Tale of the Bamboo-Cutter (Bengali)
• 3. Tadao Umesao, A Record of Explorations Among the Moghol (Mongolian)
• 4. Yoshio Ozasa, A History of Modern Japanese Performing Arts: The Meiji to Taisho Eras and A History of Modern Japanese Performing Arts: The Taisho to Showa Eras(Korean)
• 5. Yoshitaka Horie, Fighting Spirit: Iwo Jima Reminiscences of an Ogasawara Corps Staff Officer (English)
• 6. Makoto Ooka, The Structure and Surface of Japanese Poetry (Chinese)
• 7. Akinobu Tansou and Hiroshi Iyori, General Remarks on Economic Law (Chinese)
• 8. Shen Guo-Wei, Study of Recent Lexical Exchange Between Japan and China (Chinese)
• 9. Lee Ryong, ed., Japan's Intellectual Property Law Framework (Chinese)

The following works were completed during the 2008 fiscal year:

• Akira Suehiro, Catch-up Industrialization: The Trajectory and Prospects of East Asian Economies(English, National University of Singapore)
• Akifumi Nagata, Japan's Rule of Korea and Its International Relations (Korean, Ilchogak)
Yoshishige Yoshida, Ozu's Anti-cinema (Italian, Franco Cesati Editore)
• Tale of Genji IV (Czech, Paseka Publishing House)
Vlasta Winkelhöferová, ed., Dictionary of Japanese Literature (Czech, Libri Ltd.)
• Masakazu Yamazaki, Homo Sociabilis (Chinese, Shanghai Translation Publishing House)
Masanobu Kato, Japanese Contract Consciousness (Korean, Hoyusha)
• Ogura Hyakunin Isshu (English, Columbia University Press)
• Yukichi Fukuzawa, Complete Works of Fukuzawa Yukichi: Preface (French, CNRS Editions)