JCAS SYMPOSIUM SERIES 1

1997

Area Studies Must Be the Foundation of New Scholarly
Knowledge
lTAGAKI Yuzo

Tokyo Keizai University

1. WORLD VISION IN JAPAN, AND MIDDLE EASTERN AND ISLAMIC STUDIESThe traditional image of the world that Japanese people had in the pre-19thcentury era comprised Kara (China), Tenjiku (India), Namban (homelands ofSpaniards and Portuguese), and Kama (homelands of the Dutch and the British).
Studies on Kara and Tenjiku were started during the 7th century, when Japanese
Buddhist priests went to China to study Buddhism. During the 16th century,Christianity was introduced to Japan at the same time as guns. Japanese at thetime identified Westerners as either Namban or Komo, but they did not know thatthe literature from Andalusia originally belonged to the Arabs. Since the latter
half of the 19th century, Japanese people have strived to assimilate Western scienceand world vision. As a result, the Japanese became familiar with such dichotomies
as East and West, and the Eastern and Western Blocs, the latter involved in a Cold
War. Until the first oil crisis, the majority of Japanese paid little attention to theMiddle East, since, in the Japanese interpretation of the dichotomized world, theMiddle East was mistakenly thought to be negligible. The first oil crisis, the Iranian Revolution, and the Gulf War had significant effects in changing Japanese attitudes towards the Middle East, as well as on Japan's own role in the world. Today,the "threat" of "Islamic resurgence" and worldwide ethnic conflict are stimulating
the Japanese public's interest in the Middle East and Islamic world. However,despite such changes in their attitudes the Japanese still preserve a conventional,
dichotomized world image in their minds: a stereotyped world vision, instead ofcreating a new world vision.
Japanese researchers of the Middle East are aware that their tasks include
developing a new world vision. I would now like to explain this issue from thefollowing four angles.
First, in Japan, researchers of the Middle East have been particularly enthusiastic in establishing liaison and cooperation with academic circles of various
other areas in the world. This is because Middle East studies also involve studies ofvarious other parts of the world. Most problems in the Middle East have theirorigin in other parts of the world; at the same time, many global issues have their
origin in the Middle East. For instance, the Jerusalem Question cannot be addressed within the domain of the Middle East alone. Middle East history cannot be15

16ITAGAKI Yuzo

explained without reference to the Crusades and the Mongolian invasion. ThePalestinian Question cannot be discussed without reference to Jewish communities
in Eastern Europe, Russia, and America. Also, Muslim influence originating in theMiddle East spreads to China, Southeast Asia, India, Central Asia, Africa, andEurope. The riot in which the holy mosque (Haram) in Mecca was occupied had adirect impact not just in Saudi Arabia but all over the world. Accordingly,
researchers of various areas other than the Middle East may find it necessary to
study the Middle East. At the same time, researchers of the Middle East always
feel the necessity to study the whole world. This is why they are eager to establish
global studies and to create a new world vision.
Second, the current world confusion indicates that the modern world order iscollapsing. I call this confusion the "global expansion of the third world." Thecurrent confusion features an increase in dissensions; the crisis of nation-statesystems; the explosion of ethnic conflicts; and the intermingling phase of penetration, successional transfiguration and fuzzy aggregate. In recent Middle East studies in Japan, discussion focuses on Islamic impact on the post-modern world aswell as on the decadence of 'modernity' in Islam. Many Japanese researchers havegiven particular attention to the complex identity of Middle Eastern societies, whichbuilt and developed cities prior to any other society in the world. As I have alreadystated, many researchers are aware of their own complex identity as scholars. Theyknow that Middle East studies mean not just studying the Middle East but also
other parts of the world. They also know that to study the subject thoroughly,interdisciplinary approaches are important.
Third, middle East studies in Japan during the past decade highlights the fusion of Islamic and urban studies. As well, multifaceted, comparative studies havebeen promoted concerning urbanism in Islam. In a joint study project onurbanism in Islam, for instance, the fusion of cultural, social, and natural sciences
and technology were necessary (and realized) in such studies on urban planning;
ecological settings for intramural and external networks; plague; garbage and sewage treatment; water resources; earthquake damage; the "Informal Sector";
religious movements; cosmology; Waqf (trust) system; the application of communication science; and informational processing of historical documents. By
demonstrating the cooperation among various academic fields, the researchers participated in this study project implied their academic message that Islamic civilization, featuring urbanism, must co-exist with the natural environment rather thanbeing involved in ruinous competition.
Fourth, the Japan Association for Middle East Studies has been endeavoring
to promote academic cooperation with academic societies in the Middle East. In
recent years, the Japan Association also reinforced cooperation with the China Association for Middle East Studies (CHAMES); Korea Association for Middle EastStudies (KAMES); and researchers in Southeast and Central Asian countries. I
hope that the relation will be reinforced between the Asian network on Middle East
studies and related academic societies in the U.S. and Europe, so that Middle East

Area Studies Must Be the Foundation of New Scholarly Knowledge17studies will become innovative and not bias toward Orientalism.

2. KNOWLEDGE SYSTEM RECONSTRUCTION AND A NEW UNIVERSALISM

I would now like to progress to the main theme of my presentation. What I
have said previously can be applied to area studies of other areas. In order topromote the integration of the different fields of area studies, I would like to propose the following four goals.

2.1. Integration and fusion of disciplines
It is evident that the existing disciplines have only a limited capacity.
Although a particular discipline can explain a certain phenomena and resolve acertain problem, there are many more problems that cannot be addressed within thedomain of a single discipline. In an increasingly multifaceted world, individual
disciplines cannot handle the varying phenomena collectively amassed under a"general theory." The system of modern scholarship is a product of area studies
conducted by Europeans on Europe and other regions that Europeans have explored since the 16th century. Although modern scholarship has successfully concealed its Eurocentric character, disguised by an objective, general theory ofuniversal validity, it can no longer do so.
I would now like to review how these disciplines were established. The
knowledge system created in the time of classical Greece was inherited by the Arabs,
who developed it, through exchange and fusion of knowledge with other areas ofthe world, into scholarship that incorporated systematic academic classification.
Throughout the Islamic world, the Arabs established university-level education andresearch facilities called "madrasa." In Europe, it was not until the 12th or 13th
century that universities were founded by those who had learned the academic system of the Islamic world. According to a monologue in Faust, "Philosophy, Law,
Medical Science, and even Theology" were transplanted from the Islamic world andassimilated by Europeans.
Modern scholarship, however, has its origins in the intellectual activities
developed in Europe since the 16th century. Modern scholarship was originated in
Natural History, a sort of area studies, in which various phenomena in a certain
region were studied comprehensively, and details were described, concerning suchnatural environment as fauna, flora, and silva; ecology; topology; geology; ethnicgroups; languages; cultures; and social systems. For instance, when Napoleon
Bonaparte advanced into Egypt, about 200 French scholars accompanied him to
conduct area studies, the result of which is shown in Description d'Egypte, a great
work of Egyptian area studies. Accompanying the expansion of their activities
throughout the world, Europeans obtained and accumulated knowledge and expertise that they then described and analyzed, and then generalized through the development of theories. Through such a process, various disciplines were created,
including cultural, social, and natural sciences, and technologies. However, it was18lTAGAKI Yuzo

soon forgotten that each discipline stemmed from Natural History; the close relative to area studies. Instead, each discipline, armed with a "general theory," began
insisting on its universal validity. With a multifaceted world, however, it is increasingly difficult to insist on the "objective and universal validity" of each discipline, since present disciplines are affected by extreme departmentalization,
reduction, and unconscious orientalism.
Regarding laws and their practical application, how can we study the reorganization trends of Islamic law and Hindu law? How can we study the Chinese
legal mind, and the changing consciousness of Chinese law? Regarding economics,
what can we do if we cannot apply the theoretical values and models, which weredeveloped to explain and analyze Western societies, to other areas of the world?
To address such problems, we are now obliged to start over again through holistic
studies of each area. This also applies to the study of politics, which covers conflictstudies; religious studies, which surveys religious movements; various disciplines in
the natural sciences, which address the issues of global environment; medicalscience, which tries to reveal the mechanisms of cancers and AIDS; and engineering, which seeks for the most effective adaptation of technology. In this current
age, where knowledge integration is essential, researchers of area studies must notremain as mere specialists within their own discipline, but must extend their strategies. To fulfill this task, researchers must take trans-disciplinary action that cuts
across conventional disciplines in order to deconstruct them, rather than take amere interdisciplinary approach, extending only to the border of each discipline. Itis worth noting that Japanese chiiki kenkyu (area studies) has traditionally regarded
natural scientific approaches (studies on ecology, environment, and naturalresources) as an essential element in integrating and fusing various disciplines.
2.2. Global studies through the dynamic reshaping of areas
According to Arthur Koestler, areas consist of "holarchic structures ofspaces," whose cross sections, no matter where they are cut, have both "entire" and"partial" characters. Also, an area is so flexible that it can shrink to an individual's
standpoint, and yet can also expand to the entire universe. Areas can be likened tohyperspace that absorbs detached territories and even domains of different dimensions. It is possible that the diagnosis of synchronicity can establish a new area.
As a part of cultural research, area studies must withstand such drastic and dynamicreshaping. For area studies researchers, an area should not be a fixed territory, likean octopus pot. Researchers must include the search for ways to develop global
studies, which is the integration of area studies, through the comparison of variousareas.
2.3. Networking of area studies
In order to realize the aforementioned, cooperation must be promoted according to the following four levels: a) multidisciplinary collaboration; b) collaboration of inter-area studies, which will permit significant comparison of different

Area Studies Must Be the Foundation of New Scholarly Knowledge

19areas; c) global study networks that have domestic and international organizations
at various levels; and d) theories of the multifaceted transactions and exchanges
between "observers and the observed."
2.4. Area studies as a foundation of scholarshipArea studies can be a foundation of scholarship, if the process always starts
with the systematic integration and classification of concrete knowledge of theworld, and proceeds to the establishment of general theories, comprehensive systems, and accurate structures. Some insist that in area studies, general theories
generated in disciplines must be applied to local, and specific phenomena. This
notion cannot be recognized due to its reversal of the relationship between basic
approach and application. Other examples of this reversal include such notions
that area studies are immature since they have no systematic methodology; that
researchers of area studies must receive disciplinary training; and that area studies
must prove its usefulness by applying the knowledge of an area in policy science.
The integration of area studies is expected not just as an inevitable and effective
breakthrough in actual recognition of the world, but also as a foundation ofscholarship for the coming new century. Just as philosophy once played a role of
midwife to the total system of knowledge and scholarship, area studies must at thistime be a springboard for the emerging knowledge system of the coming century. I
believe that "Doctor of Area Studies" will have a new significance, just as a Ph.D.
has.

JCAS SYMPOSIUM SERIES No. 1

Japan-USA Area Studies Conference

Edited by

MATSUBARA Masatake
John CAMPBELLThe Japan Center for Area Studies
National Museum of Ethnology,Osaka1997

CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTMATSUBARA Masatake
INTRODUCTION: Views on Behalf of the Each Delegation .......................... 1John CAMPBELL
MATSUBARA Masatake
REMARKSJohn CAMPBELL ............................................................................... 9
MATSUBARA Masatake ...................................................................... 11
KEYNOTE SPEECHITAGAKI Yuzo
David WYATT

Area Studies Must Be the Foundation of New Scholarly
Knowledge ...................................................... 15
Whatever Happened to the Third World?: Area Studiesand New World Disorders .................................. 21

COMMENT ON THE KEYNOTE SPEECH
0GURA Mitsuo
Area Studies and Contemporary Japan ................. 25
American Studies as Area Studies: The Need for ColMichael CowAN
laboration ...................................................... 29
THE INTELLECTUAL SIDE OF AREA STUDIES
MATSUI Toru
Area Studies and This Changing World ................. 33
Edward KEENANOur Once and Future Life in Area Studies ............. 39
YASUBA Yasukichi
Discipline, Interdisciplinary Approach and International Orientation in Area Studies ..................... 43
Reid READING
A Better Rationale than the Cold War for American
Area Studies ................................................... 47
APPROACH AND ACTIVATION OF AREA STUDIESFUJITA Fumiko
American Studies in Japanese Universities:
Past, Present and Future .................................... 53
Goran HYDEN
The Challenges of Area Studies in the 1990s ........... 61
YOSHIDA Masao
Area Studies as a Method of Perceiving Others andOurselves: A Condideration of the Problems of theUniversity Education ........................................ 65
Ann LESCH
Area Studies in Universities: Organization and Funding........................................................ 69

PROMOTION OF MULTI-LATERAL COOPERATION AMONG VARIOUS
ASSOCIATIONS OF AREA STUDIES AND BETWEEN AMERICANS AND
JAPANESE, INCLUDING RESEARCHERS OF AREAS STUDIED
FuJIMOTO W akio
The Promotion of Multi-lateral Cooperation in theField of Area Studies: American and Japanese Slavic
Area Studies Associations and Researchers Native tothe Area of Study ............................................. 75
Marysa NAvARRO
Multi-lateral Cooperation among Association of AreaStudies and between Americans and Japanese, Including Researchers of Areas Studies .......................... 77
YAMADA MutsuoMultifaceted International Cooperation to Promoto
Area Studies ................................................... 79
Ann BETTERIDGEInternational Cooperation: Scholars and Associations .............................................................. 85
APPENDIX ....................................................................................... 91
A: Program
B: List of Participants
C: Participating Associations
D: Taskforce Members