ARCHAEOLOGIA JAPONICA

Overview
Tanaka Yoshiyuki1a year has passed since the Great East Japan Earthquake. The Japanese archaeologicalassociation has carried on activities in 2012 while reconstruction projects are notrunning smoothly yet.
The Special Committee for Measures for the Great East Japan Earthquake continued
this ﬁscal year, and a “resolution regarding protection of cultural properties located inareas affected by the nuclear power plant accident in Fukushima Prefecture” was adopted
at the 78th General Meeting, and subsequently was sent to related organizations. There
were some media reports that excavation research is an obstruction to reconstruction
projects such as housing construction, but not many people are aware that municipal
employees are exerting much effort to plan reconstruction in order to avoid archaeologicalsites as much as possible. They are achieving this goal to a certain degree. We are keenly
aware of the need for steady and continuous activities in the future.
There are six regular committees at the Association, and also there are two specialcommittees. One is the Special Committee for the Measures for the Great East Japan
Earthquake mentioned above, and the other is the Special Committee for the Problem ofDonated Books. after the suggested plan to donate books stored at the association wasdenied at an emergency general meeting, we continued with thorough discussion on thematter, including non-member consultants. The committee holds members with various
standpoints and every possibility is being discussed.
Fiscal 2012 saw installment of two examination groups within the board of trustees.
One is the “Committee for Reexamination of the Association Articles and Rules.” It istrying to reorganize the articles and due to revision of “laws regarding general aggregatecorporations and general foundations,” as well as due to the need for organization ofrules that has been added continuously. The results of examination will be discussed at
the ﬁscal 2014 General Meeting.
another is a discussion group for the publication of an English journal on the internet.
It was concluded the Japanese Journal of the Japanese Archaeological Association is
an important medium for the Association, so its publication will be continued, and1 Graduate

School of Social and Cultural Studies, Kyushu University, 744 Motooka, Nishi Ward,Fukuoka, 819–3095, Japan(tanak@scs.kyushu-u.ac.jp)
JAPANESE JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY 2 (2014): 66–67© Japanese Archaeological Association66

TRENDS IN ARCHAEOLOGYTitle
IN JAPAN

an English journal will be newly published on the internet. The board of trustees has
approved the plan, and the journal is titled Japanese Journal of Archaeology. It is aninternet journal published by the Japanese archaeological association in English which
is open to be accessed by anybody related to archaeology from all over the world. Suchmovement for international accessibility is seen not only in Japan but also in asiancountries; especially China and South korea and they rather seem to be ahead of us. Thewave of internationalization keeps coming quite forcefully whether we like it or not, andwe have to deal with it even though internationalization does not always bring beneﬁts.
Since the Trans-Paciﬁc Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement (TPP) may possibly
relate to excavation research of buried cultural properties, the Association is beginning todiscuss this problem at the Committee for Discussion of Research Environment.
The Second Japanese Archaeological Association Award’s Grand Prize was awarded
to FUNAHASHI Kyoko [Basshi Fushu to Shakai Shudan (Tooth Extraction Customsand Social Groups), Suirensha], and the Encouragement Award was awarded to HIGAMI
Noboru [Mokuseihin kara Kangaeru Chiiki Shakai: Yayoi kara Kofun he (LocalCommunities Seen from Wooden Objects: from Yayoi to Kofun), Yuzankaku]. Thesebooks are well worthy of Japanese archaeological association awards. The author would
like to congratulate these members, and hopes many members of the Association willenter for the award.
Thus, based on the enormous number and accumulation of excavation research andreports/preceding studies, it could be considered that the enormity and variability ofJapanese archaeology is one of the best in the world. and there are many studies thatﬁt with today’s keywords in Japanese study such as international, interdisciplinary, andintegration. In the future it is necessary to send information to the world and receive
appropriate evaluation rather than holding it within the country. In this sense, publicationof an English internet journal, Japanese Journal of Archaeology, is a big step forward.
When all research results are published as theses in the journal rather than a mere
introduction or outline, and with accumulation of such publication, research methods
like entire-site excavation, style of excavation reports, and various study methods will berecognized in the world and “Japanese archaeology” will be established as a ﬁeld within
the world archaeology.

© Japanese Archaeological Association67