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From the early seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century Japan saw the creation, development, and apparent disappearance of the field of natural history, or "honzogaku." Federico Marcon traces the changing views of the natural environment that accompanied its development by surveying the ideas and practices deployed by "honzogaku" practitioners and by vividly reconstructing the social forces that affected them. These include a burgeoning publishing industry, increased circulation of ideas and books, the spread of literacy, processes of institutionalization in schools and academies, systems of patronage, and networks of cultural circles, all of which helped to shape the study of nature. In this pioneering social history of knowledge in Japan, Marcon shows how scholars developed a sophisticated discipline that was analogous to European natural history but formed independently. He also argues that when contacts with Western scholars, traders, and diplomats intensified in the nineteenth century, the previously dominant paradigm of "honzogaku "slowly succumbed to modern Western natural science not by suppression and substitution, as was previously thought, but by creative adaptation and transformation.
Although Seibutsu no Sekai (The World of Living Things), the seminal 1941 work of Kinji Imanishi, had an enormous impact in Japan, both on scholars and on the general public, very little is known about it in the English-speaking world. This book makes the complete text available in English for the first time and provides an extensive introduction and notes to set the work in context. Imanishi's work, based on a very wide knowledge of science and the natural world, puts forward a distinctive view of nature and how it should be studied. Imanishi's work is particularly important as a background to ecology, primatology and human social evolution theory in Japan. Imanishi's views on these subjects are extremely interesting because he formulated an approach to viewing nature which challenged the usual international ideas of the time, and which foreshadow approaches that have currency today.
This important book, which many will regard as controversial, argues convincingly that the Japanese imperialism of the first half of the Twentieth Century was not a temporary aberration. The author looks at the detail of the great crisis of 1873 and shows that the prospect of economic gain through overseas expansion was the central issue of that year's political struggles. He goes on to show that Japan had a long, earlier history of aiming for economic expansion overseas; and that Japan's Twentieth Century imperialism grew out of this. In addition, he argues convincingly that much of the writing about Japan has played down the true extent and nature of Japanese imperialism.
Documents the great diversity in how people perceive their natural environment and how they come to terms with nature, be it through brute force, rituals or idealization. The main message of the book is that 'nature' and the 'natural' are concepts very much conditioned by their context.
The artistic and philosophical heritage of Japan has a special meaning for the modern world. During the present century, Japanese thought and Japanese art have exerted a strong influence on the western mind. Art, Life, and Nature in Japan takes us to the roots of Japanese culture and the origins of this influence. In this brief but deeply meaningful book Masaharu Anesaki provides a panoramic view of Japanese culture, with particular emphasis on the spirit of Japanese art. The book has, in fact, established itself as a classic, and it ranks with such other valuable works of its time as The Book of Tea, in which Kakuzo Okakura deals with a similar theme. Anesaki expresses himself in crystal-clear English to convey a message that is significant today as it was before World War II, when his book first appeared. He advocates peace and a turning inward to the beauty of art and nature. He is as familiar with the Zen philosophy of the samurai and the tea master as with sentiments of ancient court noblemen and the quiet thought of a humble peasant.
This collection of commentaries and reflections on Japanese culture, first published in 1904, was written shortly after the return of two English aristocrats from five years spent immersed in the ‘Land of the Rising Sun’. Their intention through these anecdotes – some humorous and charming, others tragic and thought-provoking – was to offer glimpses into the "real inner spirit of the native life," and to provide insights into the remarkable idiosyncrasies of Japanese society during a period of unprecedented change. Touching on such diverse topics as sport, religion, music, censorship, drama and bathing, The Heart of Japan will be of particular interest to students of Japanese, as well as to those intrigued by cultural difference and exchange.