Beyond the Legacy of the Kyoto School―Crossing the Borders towards an International Network of the Knowledge

Project Gist

Rethinking the Knowledge of the Kyoto School in Asian Context and Attempting New Interpretations of It for the World

Keywords

Japanese philosophy, The Kyoto School, Confucianism, East Asian philosophy, Philosophy of women in Asia

Background and Purpose

The goal of this project is to help set up, at Kyoto University, the original birthplace of the Kyoto School, an international research network that would help to foster the study of Japanese philosophy around the world. It is necessary that we establish a management structure oriented towards fostering a more organized collaborative research of Japanese philosophy than has existed in the past. By reaching out beyond a delimited “Japanese philosophy” and conducting dialogue with other traditions or fields, we may help bring Japanese philosophy into an age of new possibilities and new understandings. This is our substantial task for the future. To this end, we shall here conduct a comparison between Confucianism and Japanese philosophy, attempting to establish a dialogue between these two fields of thoughts. In other words, we will attempt to think through “Japanese philosophy” from the perspective of Asia.

Project Achievements

The conference which forms the core focus of this research project is the World Consortium For Research In Confucian Cultures:“Confucian Modernity as Japanese Experience in East Asian Context”which was held on the 3rd and 4th of November 2017, in the main hall at the Society-Academia Collaboration for Innovation, Kyoto University. Twenty-four papers were given at this international conference. Participants from a range of areas (Japan, USA, German, Taiwan, Korea and China) were able to deepen ties of research and friendship. Leading figures as well as young researchers were both in attendance to represent the two fields of Confucian thought and Japanese philosophy, and topics concerning their intersection were revisited from not only a historical perspective, but also from new angles of approach.

Future Prospects

Along with the holding of the Conference for the Asian Association of Women Philosophers in 2019 at Kyoto University, in the same year the representative of the research project plans to hold an international interdisciplinary conference at the Maison de la Culture du Japon à Paris, on the theme of “human beings” and “nature.”

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Principal Investigator