Minna de Honkoku (https://honkoku.org/) is a crowdsourcing platform for the transcription of historical Japanese documents, such as manuscripts and printed books produced before the Meiji era. This presentation introduces the platform along with associated tools, research applications, and educational practices.
Research into the application of generative AI is underway in the humanities as well. The International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Nichibunken) has been converting the 67,000 pages of the Kojiruien, an encyclopedia of Japanese culture compiled at the beginning of the 20th century, into text data, which it has been releasing sequentially since 2008. As of May 2025, 22,477 pages are available as searchable text data.
Prominent businessman and social entrepreneur Shibusawa Eiichi (1840-1931) was active across a wide range of fields from the late Edo period through the early Showa era. Throughout his life, he adhered to Rongo (the Analects of Confucius) as a personal and ethical guide. His philosophy of integrating morality with economic activity is clearly articulated in his 1916 collection of lectures, Rongo to Soroban (The Analects and the Abacus, Tōadō-shobō), a work that remains widely read today through various translations.
The Slovene Ethnographic Museum holds a total of 105 pieces of Japanese art brought back by Dr. Franc Kos, the ambassador of the then Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to Japan from 1959 to 1962. Though there is a record of exhibitions of the Kos collection in the 1960s, other than a short introduction to the history of Japanese art by the curator at the time, there is no record of analysis or explanation of individual items in the collection. Currently, only 26 items from this collection, including paintings, calligraphy, and picture scrolls, are introduced on the Museum's Internet site, but there are other items that have not yet been analyzed or described.
Kyo-u Library, Takeda Science Foundation, located in Doshomachi, Osaka, a town that has developed as a pharmaceutical town since the 1720s, is Japan's largest repository of old medical books and documents. The collection, which began as a private collection started by Mr. Takeda after the Great Kanto Earthquake (1923), has a history of about one hundred years and includes three national treasures and fourteen important cultural properties. The collection contains mainly Japanese and Chinese books on medicine and herbalism including Western studies documents and Dunhuang document and continues to expand to this day.
This presentation introduces an archival project that focuses on the dispersed and largely underexplored materials of Frederick W. Gookin (1853–1936), a pioneering American scholar, curator, and promoter of Japanese art in the early 20th century.
This year, we will once again host a panel discussion featuring participants from both Japan and Europe. In previous panels, we have explored various topics related to Japanese sources and digital data. Building upon these discussions, the central theme for this year will be: "What constitutes data in Japanese Studies?"
In 2023, the C. V. Starr East Asian Library at UC Berkeley received a notable donation: an archival collection of approximately 26 cartons originally compiled by David. W. Conde (1906-1981). Conde was involved in Allied propaganda efforts during World War II, working in the U. S. Office of War Information’s Psychological Warfare Branch. From October 1945 to July 1946, he also served as Director of the Motion Picture Department within the Civil Information and Education (CIE) Section during the U. S.-led Allied occupation of Japan. This collection includes a wide range of materials: Conde’s manuscripts on Korea from the 1950s, film synopses and scripts, photographs of actors, posters and films submitted by Japanese film companies to the CIE for censorship, as well as propaganda leaflets, internal GHQ reports, and books and periodicals
The Library of Japanese Studies of the College de France has recently digitized its collection of Comte Hippolyte de Castillon de Saint-Victor (1830-1898), a French land owner who lived in the south-west of the country. I talk about this collector and his collection, composed of books (90 titles, 256 vol., many of which are old botanical or horticultural Japanese books) and of other documents (80 letters, 4 of which are from Japanese, and handwriting notes).
This presentation focuses on labor union publications by Japan National Railways (JNR) branches, which—though locally issued—often took on the format of general-interest magazines. I aim to analyze the characteristics and expressive potential of these journals, with a particular emphasis on literary content. Special attention will be given to leftist discourse and its relationship with Cold War dynamics, including the role of censorship.