Idea Transcript
OSLO-TOHOKU INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP
BUDDHISM IN JAPANESE HISTORY: NEW PERSPECTIVES 26 January 2018, 13.00-17.30 P.A. Munchs hus, seminar room 6, University of Oslo
Co-hosted by the Oslo Buddhist Studies Forum and the Tohoku University Global Japanese Studies Initiative
13.00-13.45
SATŌ Hiroo, Tohoku University
A Buddhaless Pure Land: The Secularization of the Afterlife in Japan
13.45-14.30
Mark Teeuwen, University of Oslo
Buddhism and the Administration of Faith in Edo Japan
14.30-15.00
15.00-15.45
Coffee break
Orion Klautau, Tohoku University
Buddhism in Modern Japan: Networks and Scholarship
15.45-16.30
Morgaine Wood, University of Oslo
Buddhism First, Heritage Second: Cultural Heritage On and Off Display at Nishi Honganji
16.30-17.00 General discussion (chair: Aike P. Rots, University of Oslo)
17.00-17.30 Informal reception
ABSTRACTS:
A Buddhaless Pure Land: The Secularization of the Afterlife in Japan SATŌ Hiroo The process of secularization of Japanese society began in the early modern period and continued into modern period. People came to give priority to experiencing a full and happy life in this world rather than to a path leading to salvation in a world after this one. The secularization process did not, however, affect this present world alone: the image of the Buddha also vanishes from scenes depicting the afterlife. The chatting dead (danshō suru shisha) depicted in Mukasariema or Kuyō-egaku (votive memorial paintings dedicated to the dead), are, as we will see in this presentation, a consequence of the secularization of society in the Japanese archipelago.
Buddhism and the Administration of Faith in Edo Japan Mark Teeuwen I was recently given the job of writing a chapter on «Religion in the Edo period» for the new Cambridge History of Japan. In recent yeras, however, books by authors like Jason Josephson and Trent Maxey have made it abundantly clear that in order to understand the world of temples and shrines in pre-Meiji Japan, we must start by «unlearning religion» — that is, make a persistent effort to understand institutions of faith through contemporary concepts, rather than the modern «religion», which served to allign those institutions with a modern, Western-influenced world view. In this talk, I will reflect on the difficulties that I met in making such an effort, and on the (partial) solutions that I found myself adopting while writing my chapter.
Buddhism in Modern Japan: Networks and Scholarship Orion Klautau The process leading to the modernization of Buddhism in the Japanese archipelago is usually said to have begun with the ofttimes violent antiBuddhist campaigns from the early Meiji days. While this is indeed true in many regards, the process of reconfiguring Buddhism into a so-called “religion” did not begin until a few decades later, with the development of modern academia. In this presentation, I will focus on the early stage of Buddhist scholarship in Meiji Japan (1868-1912), considering the types of networks, both international and domestic, that ultimately led to the discursive reinvention of what we now understand as “Japanese Buddhism.”
Buddhism First, Heritage Second: Cultural Heritage On and Off Display at Nishi Honganji Morgaine Wood This talk does not focus on Jodo Shinshu practice itself, but centers around my observations and interviews with certain individuals at Nishi Honganji, the headquarters of the Jodo Shinshu school of Buddhism. Nishi Honganji is a component site of the “Historic Sites of Ancient Kyoto (Kyoto, Uji, and Otsu Cities)” designation that was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1994. Somewhat unusually when compared to other Cultural World Heritage Sites in Japan, however, Nishi Honganji appears to downplay its World Heritage status to public audiences. Individuals working for the information center at the temple are furthermore quick to emphasize that they are a religious institution first and value placed on material heritage comes mostly from outside forces. Why is this?
BIOS: SATŌ Hiroo is professor at the Graduate School of Arts and Letters, Tohoku University. His academic field is the history of Japanese thought. He is the author of How like a God: Deification in Japanese Religion (International House of Japan, 2016), and “Where to next for Shinkoku Thought?” (Contemporary Japan 25, 2013), among others. Mark Teeuwen is Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Oslo. He has published widely on the history of Japanese religion, with a focus on Shinto. Recent publications by his hand include A Social History of the Ise Shrines (2017) and A New History of Shinto (2010), both co-authored with John Breen, and Formations of the Secular in Japan (Japan Review 30, special issue 2017), co-edited with Aike P. Rots. Orion Klautau is associate professor of Japanese Studies at Tohoku University’s Graduate School of International Cultural Studies. His publications include “Against the Ghosts of Recent Past: Meiji Scholarship and the Discourse on Edo-Period Buddhist Decadence” (2008), “(Re)inventing ‘Japanese Buddhism’: Sectarian Reconfiguration and Historical Writing in Meiji Japan” (2011), and “Nationalizing the Dharma: Takakusu Junjirō and the Politics of Buddhist Scholarship in Early Twentieth-Century Japan” (2014), among others. Morgaine Wood is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Oslo. Her doctoral thesis focuses on comparing active religious sites in Japan that have been inscribed, or are currently seeking inscription, on the UNESCO World Heritage List.