Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s Online Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms

[Thomas D. Conlan]

Colleagues:

Due to a recent web upgrade, the highly useful Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s Online Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms  http://wwwap.hi.u-tokyo.ac.jp/ships/shipscontroller is currently offline. Until it is restored please refer to the following sites.

 1. A google spreadsheet of ancient and medieval terms

 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1g65pmoi-Ub5hYF-BMGMONq6fGvcYl3vO0ZUkzCkBShc/edit#gid=0

 2. A google spreadsheet of Edo period terms

 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1X8TaYOwxJgDNVp9pD91ikbhspEPeJ1Ve28ALp4KGW10/edit#gid=0

Finally you are welcome to explore the following xisx and csv files. The former is an excel spreadsheet, while the csv file is in a more readable format (it is more compatible with Chrome than Safari).

 https://www.hi.u-tokyo.ac.jp/assets/csv/outougata_20210802.xlsx

 https://www.hi.u-tokyo.ac.jp/assets/csv/outougata_20210802.csv

Best wishes,

Thomas  Conlan

Professor in East Asian Studies and Professor of History

Director Program in East Asian Studies

Princeton University

207 Jones Hall

Princeton, NJ 08544-1008

Tel: (609) 258-4773

Fax: (609) 258-6984

tco...@princeton.edu

[Ross Bender]

Thanks to Dr. Conlan for sharing this glossary. Unfortunately its coverage is extremely spotty and in some cases goes into the Edo period, as in the entry on the Zen monk Hakuin. The definition of Hachiman as "god of war" is out of date and extremely misleading. The entry for Fujiwara no Nakamaro gives no information, although if one searches for Emi no Oshikatsu there is a reference. Many terms are given multiple entries for no reason. The virtue of the site is that if provides kanji and readings if one searches an English term or romanization.

Let me recommend my own extensive Kanji Reference List and Glossary, Appendix 1 (pp. 281-296) in my Nara Japan, 767-770: A Translation from Shoku Nihongi (2016). To compile this I depended almost entirely on the excellent Early Japanese History (c. 40 BC - AD 1167, by Jean and Robert Karl Reischauer, first published in 1937. It was reissued by Peter Smith publishers in 1967.This two volume work depends on the Dai Nihonshi for its timeline, rather than earlier national histories and thus its chronological listings in Volume 1 are flawed. But the Alphabetical Index and Glossary in Volume 2 is still unsurpassed.

Of course my own reference list is limited to early and mid-Nara. I did consult the earlier iteration of the THI's online glossary, but did not find it very helpful. Thus I spent many hours finding terms in the Reischauer's index, and depended on them for most of my translations.

Best Regards,

Ross Bender

https://upenn.academia.edu/RossBender

Nara Japan, 767-770: A Translation from Shoku Nihongi: Bender, Ross: 9781534620292: Amazon.com: Books

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[Paula R. Curtis]

Dear all,

While I agree that coverage can be spotty (as always occurs when such laborious tasks are done on volunteer labor), the database has long been a great asset for reflection on the field over the decades. Translation is a very sticky issue as we all know, and this database has been crucial to considering how and why and when certain terms were interpreted in certain ways throughout the years. (The number of times we have used it at kambun workshops alone, even to disagree with many of its contents, is worth noting!)

In summer and again in winter of 2020 I participated in medieval historical documents translation workshops at Todai for their Historians' Workshop, where reflecting on English translations and how they illuminate or obscure interpretive meanings for international scholars and students required that I sift carefully through Shiryohensanjo's database for translations past. This type of vocabulary compilation is an invaluable part of our institutional memory and I hope to see it continue.

Best,

Paula

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/CAMEQgpFH%2BfWdGopfEQ4k5hkcoUOV3WgXz7GdOuC0ey2Oi_LBtw%40mail.gmail.com.

--

Paula R. Curtis

Postdoctoral Fellow and Lecturer in History

Terasaki Center for Japanese Studies

University of California, Los Angeles

http://prcurtis.com/

[Laffin, Christina]

As someone who uses this glossary regularly for research and teaching, I wanted to thank Tom Conlan for making it available in this form and to register a shared concern that the content of the database is no longer available via the Hensanjo.

 

It could certainly be tweaked and improved in many ways, as Ross has suggested, but having access to a number of different translations of terms across disciplines has better enabled me to think (and write and teach) about the process of translation and the history of reception. Here’s hoping the Hensanjo might reconsider or that an expanded database will be developed elsewhere.

 

Christina

 

Dr. Christina Laffin (she/her)
Associate Professor, Canada Research Chair in Premodern Japanese Literature and Culture
Department of Asian Studies, The University of British Columbia

Vancouver Campus | Musqueam Territory

 

 

From: pm...@googlegroups.com <pm...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Paula R. Curtis
Sent: Tuesday, September 7, 2021 11:13 AM
To: pm...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [PMJS] Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s Online Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms

 

[CAUTION: Non-UBC Email]

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/CAL1MDVQ%3DXG%2BqWmJTx1zHE-8tT5SfDSWnVNdB0NYas9oph6_grQ%40mail.gmail.com.

[Travis Seifman]

My thanks to Tom for sharing these resources, which hopefully help fill the gap while the database is offline. And my apologies on behalf of the Institute that it has been (hopefully just temporarily) taken down, in conjunction with some recent website updates.

I will pass along to our IT/website/database team again that the database's absence is felt, and that there is desire to see it up and running again. I apologize that I do not myself have a clear sense of the reasons it was taken down, or what the difficulties (or reason for delay) may be in getting it back up, but if anyone would like to express directly to the Institute how you've used this database, why you find it useful, and why you would like to see it back, or to inquire about it directly with the database team, I would encourage you to please do so via this 問い合わせ form: 

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSc3hXllljivGM3luna2BNSke0_CPL_sfGtRpaTBTNh2EE69RQ/viewform

(this form can also be found at https://www.hi.u-tokyo.ac.jp/inquiry#web, under the heading ウェブサイトおよびデータベースに関するお問い合わせ。Please do not use the other inquiry forms for this, as the other forms on this page are specifically for questions about the Institute Library, etc.）

If I learn anything more about this (e.g. if there are plans to make it available again by a certain date), I will let you all know.

Thank you for your patience, and thanks again to Tom for providing these alternative resources.

どうぞよろしくおねがいします。

Travis Seifman サイフマン・トラビス

Project Researcher 特任研究員

UTokyo Historiographical Institute 東京大学史料編纂所

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/f0a8691d72bc4aa1887765f8e65f582e%40ubc.ca.

[Travis Seifman]

Apologies for the multiple emails. There are efforts underway to bring back the Online Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms, and on behalf of the Institute, my thanks to everyone for their patience while things get worked out.

In the meantime, for those interested, the Dictionary of Sources of Classical Japan (DSCJ) 欧文日本古代史料解題辞典 database, which was temporarily offline earlier in the summer is now accessible again.

Thanks again,

Much obliged,

Travis

[Haruko Wakabayashi]

Dear All,

As one of the first members of the Online Glossary project at the Historiographical Institute, I wish first to say that I am very pleased to learn that the glossary has served well for many of those on this list. In response to the comment on its "spottiness," I wanted to explain what our visions were when we first created this glossary  more than twenty years ago (!). Our initial assignment as foreign research fellows were to translate the 綱文 of 大日本史料 and create a comprehensive chronology of Japanese history. After a few workshops discussing the 綱文 with the scholars at the Institute (and we could spend hours on a couple of passages), we quickly realized that this would be an endless task, and figured that what might be of better scholarly use would be a glossary of premodern Japanese historical terms that could help with the translation. As Paula noted, however, translation in itself is a complex issue. Hence, instead of creating a glossary with word-for-word translations, we proposed to create a database of translations that have already been provided by scholars in the field, from which the users could choose. The users could, alternatively, come up with their own translations, which could then be submitted to us to be reviewed and added to the glossary. We also envisioned that the glossary could be used for a study on translations of historical terms. 

We began by requesting permissions to use glossaries from works by scholars who were frequent visitors and researchers at the Institute (including scholars from France and Germany, and hence the inclusion of French and German translations for some terms) and selecting works with extensive glossaries/indexes and seeking permissions from the authors and publishers. Since my colleague and I were specialists on medieval Japanese history and history of religion, we began with works in our fields in hopes that we would gradually expand the scope of the glossary. I believe Joan Piggot and her students have been deeply involved in the project, too, and had added translations from their summer Kanbun workshops at USC and workshops at the Institute. As such, the glossary is a cumulative effort of scholars affiliated with the Historiographical Institute in one way or the other, who have contributed or selected glossaries in their own field, and hence the "spottiness."

I am relieved to learn that the Institute has plans to bring the glossary back online. Meanwhile, I was wondering if there might be ways in which we might be able to help with their effort to maintain or even update the glossary....

Haruko Wakabayashi

Associate Teaching Professor

Department of Asian Languages and Cultures

Rutgers University-New Brunswick

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/CAJAfxnGu3i%2BB8ZG75VqDvy6gu6BZcyhxJUqU6VGkwcwFQ5L8ag%40mail.gmail.com.

[Ross Bender]

Thanks to Haruko Wakabayashi for explaining the genesis of this 'glossary.' I was not aware of this history, which explains its spottiness-- it was assembled by numerous anonymous volunteers plucking random translations of terms from a variety of sources without attribution.

The problem of course is that recommending the 'glossary' to, for example, undergraduates who are unaware of what it actually is and who are impressed by the label of "Tokyo Historiographical Institute," will lead many astray.

While I agree that the document does have some virtues, and that it "could be used for a study on translations of historical terms," I believe potential users should be cautioned.

I have only scrolled through the "Ancient and Medieval" section, and could point out a variety of problems, but I will admit that what bothered me the most was the repeated outmoded definition of Hachiman as "god of war" or "Shinto god of war." 

The resource I recommended, Early Japanese History (c. 40 BC to 1167 AD) by Robert Karl and Jean Reischauer is available online at Amazon and elsewhere for about thirty bucks. Despite its vintage, it has the advantage of providing consistent translations from two identifiable editors.

Ross Bender

https://upenn.academia.edu/RossBender

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/CAOTnB004cCJx63Cg6t9%3DZUCS45nD6%3Dsj0b458i4YD2Em_8v6rg%40mail.gmail.com.

[Christopher Mayo]

Dear All,

I want to begin by thanking Tom Conlan for kindly providing these resources. Many of us have grown to depend on the Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s generosity in maintaining the databases and making so many materials available to everyone over the years. This discussion is a reminder to me of how useful their work has been.

Haruko Wakabayashi’s work on the database was invaluable to me as a graduate student. I remember many hours of discussing terminology at the USC Kanbun workshop I attended. We all benefitted from Joan Piggott’s attention to the importance of terminology, and I was one of the volunteers who helped pass on the work we did to Haruko Wakabayashi. I suppose I’ve spent nearly every day of the last decade translating, and I have deep respect for the many scholars around me who do a far superior job of it, including the work that Ross Bender mentioned, which I also highly recommend. 

However, I think there is rarely a single perfect translation of any word or phrase, and often terms are all connected with one another, so it is a challenge to find the best translation for a particular audience or context. Having a wide range of past translations to choose from is a huge help. Of course, just like most databases, it is a work in progress, and there’s always more that could be done to improve it. Frankly, I’ve been impressed from the beginning with how much has been done with so little. I think the work that Haruko Wakabayashi and others at the Institute have done to get the project off the ground has shown us what is possible. Going forward, I hope we can work to further improve it.

Perhaps, instead of seeing it as having spotty coverage, we can think of it instead as an initial foundation upon which we can build upon—an invitation to explore the possibilities for building an international, collaborative, and deeply sourced database for the benefit of everyone in the field. There are excellent examples out there of other critical databases such as the Digital Dictionary of Buddhism that have been slowly built over the years through considerable contributions of terminology and time. Maybe this reminder of its usefulness could also be an opportunity for us to help rejuvenate the Institute’s project.

Best,

Chris

--------------------

Christopher M. Mayo 

メイヨー・クリストファー
Professor 

教授
Kogakkan University 

皇學館大学
1704 Kōdakushimoto-chō, Ise-shi, Mie-ken 516-8555, Japan
〒516-8555 三重県伊勢市神田久志本町1704番地
【W】 https://www.kogakkan-u.ac.jp
【E】 c-m...@kogakkan-u.ac.jp  |  mayo.christo...@gmail.com

-------------------

2021/09/10 22:29、Ross Bender <rosslyn...@gmail.com>のメール:



To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/CAMEQgpHdq%3Dxvio8cKzhH8NM%2BCSENPq8AN_V9L7qpMuvyKxya8A%40mail.gmail.com.

[William Farris]

Hello:

       I'm sure that I will catch hell for what I am about to write.

       I think that scholars spend WAY TOO MUCH TIME on translations, as opposed to scholarly monographs and articles.

       I'm sure that translations serve some deep inner need for those who worship at the altar of primary sources, but I have rarely found translations (especially of documents) of any value at all in my research or in the classroom.

      Perhaps one reason that translations are so popular is that they obviate the need for conceptualizing large issues.

      I'm also sure that translations do little to lessen the view that premodern Japanese history and studies is a "niche field."

     There are plenty of sources (even those that are not written) and the field desperately needs much more large-scale and much less literalist thinking.

Wayne Farris

    

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/D779FF08-E1A8-4509-A96F-D9505C8E7BB2%40gmail.com.

[Michael Pye]

Dear Ross,
about "... what bothered me the most was the repeated outmoded

definition of Hachiman as "god of war" or "Shinto god of war."

I agree such expressions seem simplistic. And do names need
"definitions" at all? But what sort of a kami was/is Hachiman?
Nothing to do with fighting then? Most kami have some raison d`être,
don't they.
best wishes,
Michael Pye

Zitat von Ross Bender <rosslyn...@gmail.com>:

> Thanks to Haruko Wakabayashi for explaining the genesis of this 'glossary.'
> I was not aware of this history, which explains its spottiness-- it was
> assembled by numerous anonymous volunteers plucking random translations of
> terms from a variety of sources without attribution.
>
> The problem of course is that recommending the 'glossary' to, for example,
> undergraduates who are unaware of what it actually is and who are impressed
> by the label of "Tokyo Historiographical Institute," will lead many astray.
>
> While I agree that the document does have some virtues, and that it "could
> be used for a study on translations of historical terms," I believe
> potential users should be cautioned.
>
> I have only scrolled through the "Ancient and Medieval" section, and could
> point out a variety of problems, but I will admit that what bothered me the
> most was the repeated outmoded definition of Hachiman as "god of war" or
> "Shinto god of war."
>

> The resource I recommended, *Early Japanese History (c. 40 BC to 1167 AD) *

>>>>> *Dr. Christina Laffin* (she/her)

>>>>> Associate Professor, Canada Research Chair in Premodern Japanese
>>>>> Literature and Culture
>>>>> Department of Asian Studies, The University of British Columbia
>>>>>
>>>>> Vancouver Campus | Musqueam Territory
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>

>>>>> *From:* pm...@googlegroups.com <pm...@googlegroups.com> *On Behalf
>>>>> Of *Paula
>>>>> R. Curtis
>>>>> *Sent:* Tuesday, September 7, 2021 11:13 AM
>>>>> *To:* pm...@googlegroups.com
>>>>> *Subject:* Re: [PMJS] Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s Online

>>>>> Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>

>>>>> [*CAUTION:* Non-UBC Email]

>>>>>
>>>>> Dear all,
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> While I agree that coverage can be spotty (as always occurs when such
>>>>> laborious tasks are done on volunteer labor), the database has
>>>>> long been a
>>>>> great asset for reflection on the field over the decades.
>>>>> Translation is a
>>>>> very sticky issue as we all know, and this database has been crucial to
>>>>> considering how and why and when certain terms were interpreted
>>>>> in certain
>>>>> ways throughout the years. (The number of times we have used it at kambun
>>>>> workshops alone, even to disagree with many of its contents, is worth
>>>>> noting!)
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> In summer and again in winter of 2020 I participated in medieval
>>>>> historical documents translation workshops at Todai for their

>>>>> *Historians'
>>>>> Workshop*, where reflecting on English translations and how they

>>>>> illuminate or obscure interpretive meanings for international
>>>>> scholars and
>>>>> students required that I sift carefully through Shiryohensanjo's database
>>>>> for translations past. This type of vocabulary compilation is an
>>>>> invaluable
>>>>> part of our institutional memory and I hope to see it continue.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Best,
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Paula
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Tue, Sep 7, 2021 at 11:07 AM Ross Bender <rosslyn...@gmail.com>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks to Dr. Conlan for sharing this glossary. Unfortunately its
>>>>> coverage is extremely spotty and in some cases goes into the Edo
>>>>> period, as
>>>>> in the entry on the Zen monk Hakuin. The definition of Hachiman
>>>>> as "god of
>>>>> war" is out of date and extremely misleading. The entry for Fujiwara no
>>>>> Nakamaro gives no information, although if one searches for Emi no
>>>>> Oshikatsu there is a reference. Many terms are given multiple entries for
>>>>> no reason. The virtue of the site is that if provides kanji and
>>>>> readings if
>>>>> one searches an English term or romanization.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Let me recommend my own extensive Kanji Reference List and Glossary,

>>>>> Appendix 1 (pp. 281-296) in my *Nara Japan, 767-770: A Translation
>>>>> from Shoku Nihongi *(2016). To compile this I depended almost entirely
>>>>> on the excellent *Early Japanese History (c. 40 BC - AD 1167*, by Jean

>>>>> and Robert Karl Reischauer, first published in 1937. It was reissued by

>>>>> Peter Smith publishers in 1967.This two volume work depends on the *Dai
>>>>> Nihonshi* for its timeline, rather than earlier national histories and

>>>>> thus its chronological listings in Volume 1 are flawed. But the
>>>>> Alphabetical Index and Glossary in Volume 2 is still unsurpassed.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Of course my own reference list is limited to early and mid-Nara. I did
>>>>> consult the earlier iteration of the THI's online glossary, but did not
>>>>> find it very helpful. Thus I spent many hours finding terms in the
>>>>> Reischauer's index, and depended on them for most of my translations.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Best Regards,
>>>>>
>>>>> Ross Bender
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> https://upenn.academia.edu/RossBender
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Nara Japan, 767-770: A Translation from Shoku Nihongi: Bender, Ross:
>>>>> 9781534620292: Amazon.com: Books

>>>>> <https://www.amazon.com/Nara-Japan-767-770-Translation-Nihongi/dp/153462029X/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=nara+japan&qid=1631033879&s=books&sr=1-4>

>>>>> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/B3DA2BD4-C814-4EE9-A287-1316F48D632E%40princeton.edu?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>
>>>>> .

>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> PMJS is a forum dedicated to the study of premodern Japan.
>>>>> To post to the list, email pm...@googlegroups.com
>>>>> For the PMJS Terms of Use and more resources, please visit www.pmjs.org
>>>>> .
>>>>> Contact the moderation team at mod...@pmjs.org
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>>>>> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/CAMEQgpFH%2BfWdGopfEQ4k5hkcoUOV3WgXz7GdOuC0ey2Oi_LBtw%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>
>>>>> .

>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>>
>>>>> Paula R. Curtis
>>>>>
>>>>> Postdoctoral Fellow and Lecturer in History
>>>>>
>>>>> Terasaki Center for Japanese Studies
>>>>>
>>>>> University of California, Los Angeles
>>>>>
>>>>> http://prcurtis.com/
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> PMJS is a forum dedicated to the study of premodern Japan.
>>>>> To post to the list, email pm...@googlegroups.com
>>>>> For the PMJS Terms of Use and more resources, please visit www.pmjs.org
>>>>> .

>>>>> Contact the moderation team at mod...@pmjs.org
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>>>>> .

>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> PMJS is a forum dedicated to the study of premodern Japan.
>>>>> To post to the list, email pm...@googlegroups.com
>>>>> For the PMJS Terms of Use and more resources, please visit www.pmjs.org
>>>>> .
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>>>>> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/pmjs/f0a8691d72bc4aa1887765f8e65f582e%40ubc.ca
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>>>>> .

>>>>>
>>>> --
>>> PMJS is a forum dedicated to the study of premodern Japan.
>>> To post to the list, email pm...@googlegroups.com
>>> For the PMJS Terms of Use and more resources, please visit www.pmjs.org.
>>> Contact the moderation team at mod...@pmjs.org
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>>> "PMJS: Listserv" group.
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>>> .

>>>
>> --
>> PMJS is a forum dedicated to the study of premodern Japan.
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>> .

>>
>
> --
> PMJS is a forum dedicated to the study of premodern Japan.
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.................................................................................................................
Professor of the Study of Religions (em.), University of Marburg, Germany

[jan]

I have found the Shiryō hensanjo's glossary very useful. Not all the definitions are to my liking, but it really helps to know how other scholars have translated a particular term. A literary scholar might have a different take than a historian, and of course translations vary as the Japanese terms themselves changed in meaning over time. If we view the glossary as evidence for the ways in which terms have been translated, rather than as any attempt to standardize definitions, I think we can find it helpful. I hope the Shiryō hensanjo will reinstate it.

Janet Goodwin

[jan]

Dear Wayne,

Surely you would not deprive those who are not experts in classical Japanese of the fun of reading The Tale of Genji!

But I think you are talking about translations of documents rather than of literature, and I'm afraid I need to disagree with you. It's all well and good to recommend large-scale conceptualization, but that necessarily has to depend on knowing what was actually going on. If we want to know how the estate system worked, for example, we need to review and analyze pertinent documents. Statistical analysis, too, depends on documentary evidence. Theoretical physicists cannot "conceptualize" without knowledge obtained through experiments; neither can we conceptualize without the evidence that comes, in part, from documents. Combined with archaeological and literary sources, documents can provide the groundwork for large-scale analysis. We have to start somewhere.

I hope you don't think that I am giving you hell!

Janet Goodwin

[Mary Louise P. Nagata]

Hi,

To the contrary, I have gotten some of my best stories from translating documents, especially since the authors tend to lay out the entire history of the matter, from his or her point of view, in the deposition, apology, request, or even contract. And these translated documents seem to resonate more broadly than a niche for the exotic. So I think it depends on what documents scholars choose to translate and how they use or interpret them. Good stories that can resonate with students are quite useful in the classroom.

Anyway, my two cents.

Best,

Mary Louise Nagata

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From: pm...@googlegroups.com <pm...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of William Farris <wfa...@hawaii.edu>
Sent: Friday, September 10, 2021 2:49:43 PM
To: pm...@googlegroups.com <pm...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: [PMJS] Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s Online Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms

 

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Hello:

       I'm sure that I will catch hell for what I am about to write.

       I think that scholars spend WAY TOO MUCH TIME on translations, as opposed to scholarly monographs and articles.

       I'm sure that translations serve some deep inner need for those who worship at the altar of primary sources, but I have rarely found translations (especially of documents) of any value at all in my research or in the classroom.

      Perhaps one reason that translations are so popular is that they obviate the need for conceptualizing large issues.

      I'm also sure that translations do little to lessen the view that premodern Japanese history and studies is a "niche field."

     There are plenty of sources (even those that are not written) and the field desperately needs much more large-scale and much less literalist thinking.

Wayne Farris

    

On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 11:01 AM Christopher Mayo < mayo.christo...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Chris Kern]

I am also confused by the notion that translations are not useful in the classroom -- I don't have the opportunity to teaching graduate students who can read classical Japanese, so if something isn't translated, it doesn't exist as far as my teaching is concerned. (Except to the extent that I can tell my students about it).

Sincerely,

Chris Kern, Auburn University

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[Jos Vos]

As someone trying to make a living from translating premodern Japanese literature I can only applaud Janet Goodwin and Chris Kern's comments.

Translations of literary works do not 'obviate the need for conceptializing large issues' (whatever that may mean). On the contrary, they stimulate debate on all levels.

Regards,

Jos Vos

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Subject: Re: [PMJS] Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s Online Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms

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[William Farris]

Dear all:

         I think that there are several issues here, some of which I was trying to raise and others not.

         Certainly I find translated Japanese literature (or French or Russian, etc.) interesting and fun.  That's not in dispute.  I recall with great happiness reading modern Japanese literature in translation when I was an exchange student in Tokyo 50 years ago.  Showing my age!  I always used Japanese literature for discussions in the classroom.

         And I was not saying that there should be NO translation of historical materials.  It's a question of balance.

         What I deplore are tomes of undigested primary documents that try to pass as history.  Jeffrey Mass'  THE KAMAKURA BAKUFU:  A STUDY IN DOCUMENTS or Asakawa's THE DOCUMENTS OF IRIKI come to mind.

        Good historical work (they're called monographs) consist of three parts:  evidence (of which primary written documents are but one kind, often biased and unreliable), an argument or arguments (logic or reason tying evidence together) and ideas (or interpretations).

        Dollops of undigested primary documents have no argument or ideas--to me what I remember most about any book or article.  Ideas are a product of the human imagination, an essential but unrecognized human faculty.  Without imagination, there would be no art or literature or technology.

        Why premodern Japanese historians have such an aversion to ideas and a preference for translations of primary (and for that matter secondary) sources I do not know.

        Something to think about, if thinking isn't totally out of vogue.

Wayne

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[William Farris]

Hello:

       As I wrote earlier, I'm all in favor of translating literature, just as it is.  But good history demands an argument and ideas, not simply undigested documents of practice.

Wayne

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[raji.s...@aoi.uzh.ch]

Dear colleagues,

as a trained and practicing philosopher, I am all for tackling broad conceptual issues.

My experience from engaging with such questions by way of dealing with sources from Japanese intellectual history tells me that translations are indespensable means to this end.

One reason is that we need sources in translation if we want to discuss the conceptual issues and ideas we are interested in with others who have no training in Japanology.

A second reason is that even Japanologists usually start from reading translations (admit it, colleagues!). So authors / schools / texts that have already been translated get more attention than those that haven't. There is a certain danger of a self-reinforcing dynamic, leading to distorted perceptions of the intellectual landscape.

I'll be glad to be corrected, but my impression is that we still do not have translations of 20% of the texts collected, for example, in Nihon shisō taikei. And whose collected works have been translated into any Western language?

So I'd say, with all due respect to Wayne Farris, that tackling conceptual issues and translating will have to go hand in hand for quite a while, at least in my field.

Kind regards,

Raji Steineck

Prof. Dr. Raji C. Steineck
Professor für Japanologie
Principal Investigator
ERC Advanced Grant Project "Time in Medieval Japan" (TIMEJ)

Asien-Orient-Institut
Universität Zürich
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Neue Publikationen/new publications

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Datum: 11.09.2021 19:15
Betreff: Re: [PMJS] Tokyo Historiographical Institute’s Online Glossary of Japanese Historical Terms

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[Pinnington, Noel J - (noelp)]

I am surprised that Professor Farris sees translation to be “so popular,” as we all know in the US that it doesn’t count towards promotion and tenure. Society at large is probably more enriched by translations than any amount of jargon exchange. I think translation is actually under-valued. 

Still, there is certainly a certain amount of re-translation that I personally find less necessary: the idea that every generation needs a new version seems doubtful to me. 

I actually feel that there has been far to much attempted large scale conceptualization at the Ph D and indeed tenure level in the past. My policy would be: Earn your stripes in thorough and detailed research, then attempt larger thoughts further down the road.

Noel Pinnington

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[Sharon Domier]

Wayne,
I feel like the more you have clarified your viewpoint, the more I have questions about your understanding of how historians work and train new historians. Most history texts are secondary sources, in which the authors have interpreted primary sources to make their point. And two scholars can look at the same documents and interpret their meaning and significance differently. So we always want students to go back and look at the primary sources, just as we always want scholars to cite the documents they use so we can retrace their steps. There are plenty of excellent new historical works being published. Have no fear about the balance.

I don’t believe anyone would recommend that a student pick up collections of translated primary sources and try to digest it without context and background. But giving students access to good translations of really difficult to read primary texts is a great service to the field. Almost all history departments in North America, as far as I know, expect their history majors to work with primary sources as part of their training. And given how difficult premodern Japanese is, or even Meiji period Japanese, collections of translations are super useful.

Sharon Domier
East Asian Studies Librarian
UMass Amherst

[William Farris]

Hello:

        I feel like this discussion of translation versus monographs has the potential to become divisive, and we shouldn't go there.

       As for translations of philosophy, I agree that they can be valuable.  I remember reading Plato and Aristotle long ago as an undergraduate, and the assignment was often 5-10 pp.  Philosophy requires the kind of deep reading that is not very popular now, especially among undergraduates.  Aren't there good monographs in philosophy, too?  I know that, for example, without Hermann Ooms' work I could never have understood Tokugawa ideology.  Isn't the same also true of literature?  What about Miyoshi's ACCOMPLICES OF SILENCE, etc.?

       As for subjecting undergraduates to primary sources, maybe a little, but not much.  To me, the object of a liberal arts education is to prod undergraduates to think.  I never considered undergraduate history majors to be potential historians, but rather wanted to introduce them to a particular type of thinking--historical, clearly visible through popular secondary works.

      I think that otherwise my position on the translation of primary documents is clear and I will write no more.

Wayne

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