2020 Fiscal Year Research-status Report
From Transculturation to Culture-Specific Ethics: The Implementation of Confucian Ritual Forms in 19th Century Japan
| Project/Area Number |
19K00937
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| Research Institution | The Toyo Bunko |
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Principal Investigator |
Chard Robert 公益財団法人東洋文庫, 研究部, 研究員 (30571492)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2019-04-01 – 2023-03-31
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| Keywords | Confucianism / Ritual |
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| Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
In the second year of this research project on the deployment of Confucian symbols in Japan during the 19th century, the emphasis remains on locating primary source documents in libraries and archives in Japan, as much as was possible amid the ongoing pandemic restrictions. These sources reveal clues to the survival of Confucian ritual forms and their purpose in domain schools. Japanese native learning, and foreign learning, had by then assumed a major role in the curricula of such schools, yet we find that Confucian ritual forms continued to be displayed in many of them. This was in part a legacy of the Kansei restrictions imposed by Matsudaira Sadanobu late in the 18th century, with the associated major restoration of the Yushima Seido temple in Edo. As part of this legacy, Confucius temples were maintained in some domain schools but not others, in a cultural climate where their religious nature was no longer deemed necessary to express their bona fides as educational institutions. The concept of transculturation is useful to explaining the disparity of approaches in different places: the schools’ intended function was very much planned and directed by domain authorities according to local needs. The economic and social crises of the 18th century had eased in many domains, but moral transformation to maintain social order remained an important aim of domain schools, even with the diminished status of Confucian learning. Rather than passive reception of external culture, the domains were pursuing agendas they had devised themselves.
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| Current Status of Research Progress |
Current Status of Research Progress
3: Progress in research has been slightly delayed.
Reason
Restrictions on travel and the closure of libraries and archives as a result of the coronavirus outbreak meant postponement in the planned investigations in regions around Japan. Some background work has been possible from online sources, but the main search for textual evidence on Confucian ritual forms in many domain schools has been substantially delayed.
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| Strategy for Future Research Activity |
The project will continue along the lines planned, as the easing of pandemic restrictions permits. This will consist of continued investigation of archival documents from domain school sites around Japan, which are expected to reveal more about the maintenance of Confucian ritual in different domains during the 19th century, and the place this ritual had in relation to the school curricula. The decline in the importance of Confucian visual forms from the 17th century through the 18th century becomes even more marked in the 19th century, and yet these forms were maintained in some schools, and the current research will seek out evidence for the aims of the domain authorities to maintain good governance through the officials trained in their schools.
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| Causes of Carryover |
The funds allocated for the year remained unspent as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which made travel and library and archive research possible. The postponed research trips will be completed in the next year as much as conditions permit, in order to achieve the aims of the project as originally conceived, and the results disseminated to the public.
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Research Products
(1 results)
