Please join us as Yoko Takau Drobin presents her Licentiate degree project on the history of oriental studies in Japan, as seen through the life and work of Shiratori Kurakichi (1865-1942). All interested are welcome!
The project seeks to understand the nature of Shiratori’s research into the protohistoric nation of Yamataikoku, which is thought to be the earliest historically recorded nation in the Japanese archipelago. Attested only in Chinese sources, such as the chronicle Wei-Chi 魏志 (ca. 297 CE), the land of Yamataikoku straddles the border between myth and history, and the exact nature of the kingdom and its role in Japan's history remain controversial to this day.
In the seminar, Takau Drobin will explain how and why the subject of Yamataikoku and its queen, Himiko, who was supposedly a shaman, became an object of intense interest both within and outside the academic world in early 20th-century Japan. Focusing on two articles by Shiratori, one written in 1910, and the other written close to his death in 1942, Takau Drobin will place the Yamataikoku controversy in the broader context of oriental studies in Japan, known as Tôyôshigaku 東洋史学, and thus explain its significance for Japan’s understanding of its own place in Asia.