The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan

The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan PDF Author: Federico Marcon
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022625206X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 429

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Book Description
“Opens a fascinating window into the history of Japan’s relationship to its natural environment. . . . A must-read for historians of early modern science.” —New Books in East Asian Studies Between the early seventeenth and the mid-nineteenth century, the field of natural history in Japan separated itself from the discipline of medicine, produced knowledge that questioned the traditional religious and philosophical understandings of the world, developed into a system (called honzogaku) that rivaled Western science in complexity—and then seemingly disappeared. Or did it? In The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan, Federico Marcon recounts how Japanese scholars developed a sophisticated discipline of natural history analogous to Europe’s but created independently, without direct influence, and argues convincingly that Japanese natural history succumbed to Western science not because of suppression and substitution, as scholars traditionally have contended, but by adaptation and transformation. The first book-length English-language study devoted to the important field of honzogaku, The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan will be an essential text for historians of Japanese and East Asian science, and a fascinating read for anyone interested in the development of science in the early modern era. “Marcon introduces to a Western readership for the first time the early history of natural history in Japan . . . Who those naturalists were, how they fitted into society, and what they accomplished, is Marcon’s beautifully told story.” —Archives of Natural History “A bold attempt to provincialize Eurocentric narratives of modernity’s relation to nature.” —Canadian Journal of History “An essential resource.” —Journal of Japanese Studies

The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan

The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan PDF Author: Federico Marcon
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022625206X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 429

Get Book

Book Description
“Opens a fascinating window into the history of Japan’s relationship to its natural environment. . . . A must-read for historians of early modern science.” —New Books in East Asian Studies Between the early seventeenth and the mid-nineteenth century, the field of natural history in Japan separated itself from the discipline of medicine, produced knowledge that questioned the traditional religious and philosophical understandings of the world, developed into a system (called honzogaku) that rivaled Western science in complexity—and then seemingly disappeared. Or did it? In The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan, Federico Marcon recounts how Japanese scholars developed a sophisticated discipline of natural history analogous to Europe’s but created independently, without direct influence, and argues convincingly that Japanese natural history succumbed to Western science not because of suppression and substitution, as scholars traditionally have contended, but by adaptation and transformation. The first book-length English-language study devoted to the important field of honzogaku, The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan will be an essential text for historians of Japanese and East Asian science, and a fascinating read for anyone interested in the development of science in the early modern era. “Marcon introduces to a Western readership for the first time the early history of natural history in Japan . . . Who those naturalists were, how they fitted into society, and what they accomplished, is Marcon’s beautifully told story.” —Archives of Natural History “A bold attempt to provincialize Eurocentric narratives of modernity’s relation to nature.” —Canadian Journal of History “An essential resource.” —Journal of Japanese Studies

The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan

The Knowledge of Nature and the Nature of Knowledge in Early Modern Japan PDF Author: Federico Marcon
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022625190X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 429

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Book Description
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.

Blind in Early Modern Japan

Blind in Early Modern Japan PDF Author: Wei Yu Wayne Tan
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
ISBN: 0472055488
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 267

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Book Description
A history of the blind in Japan that challenges contemporary notions of disability

The Curious Case of the Camel in Modern Japan

The Curious Case of the Camel in Modern Japan PDF Author: Ayelet Zohar
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004518347
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 204

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Book Description
In The Curious Case of the Camel in Modern Japan, Ayelet Zohar addresses issues of Orientalism, colonialism, and exoticism in modern Japan, through images of camels – the epitome of Otherness, and a metonymy for Asia in the Japanese imagination.

The Gods of the Sea

The Gods of the Sea PDF Author: Fynn Holm
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1009305514
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 235

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Book Description
Challenging portrayals of Japan as a whaling nation, Holm shows that anti-whaling protests were widespread in early modern Northeast Japan.

Craft Culture in Early Modern Japan

Craft Culture in Early Modern Japan PDF Author: Christine Guth
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520379810
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
"Crafts were central to daily life in early modern Japan. They were powerful carriers of knowledge, sociality, and identity, and how and from what materials they were made were matters of serious concern among all classes of society. In Craft Culture in Early Modern Japan, Christine M. E. Guth examines the network of forces--both material and immaterial--that supported Japan's rich, diverse, and aesthetically sophisticated artifactual culture between the late sixteenth and mid-nineteenth centuries. Exploring the institutions, modes of thought, and reciprocal relationships among people, materials, and tools, she draws particular attention to the role of women in crafts, embodied knowledge, and the special place of lacquer as a medium. By examining the ways and values of making that transcend specific media and practices, Guth illuminates the 'craft culture' of early modern Japan"--

The "Global" and the "Local" in Early Modern and Modern East Asia

The Author: Benjamin A. Elman
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004338128
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Book Description
The “Global” and the “Local” in Early Modern and Modern East Asia offers inquiries by scholars in three different institutions (Princeton, Fudan, and Tokyo Universities) into the philosophies and methodologies of global history and how it relates to local stories.

Routledge Handbook of Premodern Japanese History

Routledge Handbook of Premodern Japanese History PDF Author: Karl F. Friday
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 135169202X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 433

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Book Description
Scholarship on premodern Japan has grown spectacularly over the past four decades, in terms of both sophistication and volume. A new approach has developed, marked by a higher reliance on primary documents, a shift away from the history of elites to broader explorations of social structures, and a re-examination of many key assumptions. As a result, the picture of the early Japanese past now taught by specialists differs radically from the one that was current in the mid-twentieth century. This handbook offers a comprehensive historiographical review of Japanese history up until the 1500s. Featuring chapters by leading historians and covering the early Jōmon, Yayoi, Kofun, Nara, and Heian eras, as well as the later medieval periods, each section provides a foundational grasp of the major themes in premodern Japan. The sections will include: Geography and the environment Political events and institutions Society and culture Economy and technology The Routledge Handbook of Premodern Japanese History is an essential reference work for students and scholars of Japanese, Asian, and World History.

Natural Things in Early Modern Worlds

Natural Things in Early Modern Worlds PDF Author: Mackenzie Cooley
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000873021
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 557

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Book Description
The essays and original visualizations collected in Natural Things in Early Modern Worlds explore the relationships among natural things - ranging from pollen in a gust of wind to a carnivorous pitcher plant to a shell-like skinned armadillo - and the humans enthralled with them. Episodes from 1500 to the early 1900s reveal connected histories across early modern worlds as natural things traveled across the Indian Ocean, the Ottoman Empire, Pacific islands, Southeast Asia, the Spanish Empire, and Western Europe. In distant worlds that were constantly changing with expanding networks of trade, colonial aspirations, and the rise of empiricism, natural things obtained new meanings and became alienated from their origins. Tracing the processes of their displacement, each chapter starts with a piece of original artwork that relies on digital collage to pull image sources out of place and to represent meanings that natural things lost and remade. Accessible and elegant, Natural Things is the first study of its kind to combine original visualizations with the history of science. Museum-goers, scholars, scientists, and students will find new histories of nature and collecting within. Its playful visuality will capture the imagination of non-academic and academic readers alike while reminding us of the alienating capacity of the modern life sciences.

Drugs and the Politics of Consumption in Japan

Drugs and the Politics of Consumption in Japan PDF Author: Judith Vitale
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004548769
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 364

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Book Description
In early modern Japan, upper status groups coveted pills and powders made of exotic foreign ingredients such as mummy and rhinoceros horn. By the early twentieth century, over-the-counter-patent medicines, and, more alarmingly, morphine, had become mass commodities, fueling debates over opiates in Japan’s expanding imperial territories. The fall of the empire and the occupation of Japan by the United States created conditions favorable for heroin use, followed, in time, by glue sniffing and psychedelic mushroom ingestion. By illuminating the neglected history of drugs, this volume highlights both the transnational embeddedness and national peculiarities of the “politics of consumption” in Japan. Contributors are: Anna Andreeva, Oleg Benesch, William G. Clarence-Smith, Hung Bin Hsu, John Jennings, Miriam Kingsberg Kadia, William Marotti, Kōji Ozaki, Jonas Rüegg, Jesús Solís, Christopher W.A. Szpilman, Judith Vitale, and Timothy Yang.