承前*1
2007 Inter-Asia Cultural Studies Shanghai Conference終わる。
私の役割は、”The Media in East Asia and Our Internal West”というセッションでのディスカッサント。セッションでの報告は以下の通り；
以下に私のコメントの草稿を貼り付けておく。但し、この通り読んだのではない。
Akiko Okada（岡田章子,Sei Gakuin University ）
Christianity and Westernizing project for Women in Jogaku-Zasshi, the first influential women’s magazine in Japan, published between 1885 and 1904
Hiroshi Murai（村井寛志,coordinator，Kanagawa University ）
Inter-Chinese Capital and Market in Shanghai Cultural Industry Inter-War Period: Toward Intertwining Cultural History of Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Oversea Chinese
Lin Hung-Yi（林鴻亦,Shih Hsin University）
Broadcast Industry Development of Asia and Foreign Aid of the United States Since the end of World War II: From an Example of Major Regional Conflicts
http://inter-asia.net/conferences/2007-inter-asia-cultural-studies-society-shanghai-conference/panels/
会議については日を改めて書くかも知れない。
Commentary: Centering on MimicryMikio SUMITA
Presentations of 3 panelists deal with the “Westness” in minds of Asian people, eg. the Japanese, the Chinese and etc., in concrete historical, political or technological contexts, I think. Murai discusses construction of Shanghai’s modernity in relation to Shanghai/Hong Kong interactions and overseas Chinese networks. Okada discusses construction of Japanese modernity via adoption of Christianity. Lin traces American information/media strategies from Chinese War against Japan through Cold War Taiwan and Vietnam to recent war in Afghanistan. Each of 3 presentations deals with different historical periods and geographical locations. And each focuses on different instances, economic, cultural and political/military.
In spite of such diversity, we can see one general theoretical implication in these presentations: one’s own traditions(cultures) which we understand as so are only constructed through external interventions or interactions with external forces(especially persons bearing them). Our own traditions or cultures are always/already contaminated by foreign ones, in this case the Western cultures and traditions.
Okada refers to Homi Bhabha’s concept of mimicry. Bhabha says mimicry necessarily produces hybridity. It is contamination from viewpoint of purists or “fundamentalists” of each party. But must we suspect that such purist or fundamentalist views of one’s own cultures and traditions themselves are constructs of interactions with foreign cultures? For example, now FUJIWARA Masahiko, mathematician and conservative essayist, praises Bushido in his discourses. But did modern understanding of Bushido begin at an English book of NITOBE Inazo*2, a Christian educator. The core of Japaneseness, that many understand, was constructed via Christianity or the West. Or reformation movements of various Japanese Buddhist denominations and religious attitudes of ordinary people were modeled after Christianity, especially Protestantism, or at least, done in mirror of it.
In Homi Bhabha’s theory, the colonizers command the colonized to mimic them. But in case of IWAMOTO Yoshiharu who Okada refers to, he was not commanded to mimic the West but just mimicked and, as an Enlightening educator, commanded his readers to mimic. I suspect that such cases can be found in Liangyou that Murai refers to and Taiwan and Vietnam that Lin refers to. And transforming or enlarging Bhabha’s thesis, can we say that mimicry can be double or multiple? Previously I said so-called Japanese traditions were reconstructed via interactions with external ones. And Murai also tells us that some aspects of Chineseness were constructed via modern media. So once were traditions, (mis)recognized as one’s own, reconstructed or invented(in Hobsbawm’s term), must we mimic these traditions? Or is the relationship between ourselves and our so-called traditions a kind of mimicry? Or are the traditions themselves products of mimicking?
So we mimic both our own and external traditions(cultures). From that, we can say that we construct neighboring traditions(eg. Chinese or Korean, for Japan) through adopting or internalizing the external(Western) constructs, or in constructing neighbors, we mimic the West. It is already famous that FUKUZAWA Yukichi, a prominent Enlightenment thinker of Japan, and others constructed the images of retarded and pathological Asia(East), adopting the Western Orientalist constructions. And now living in Shanghai, China, I see many books on Japan in bookstores in Shanghai. The most interesting thing is not their contents, eg. anti-Japan or pro-Japan but basic images of Japan that authors, publishers or book designers have. Even serious social-scientific books are filled with photos of Mt. Fuji, Geisha girls or Sumo wrestlers. How western these images are! Contrarily Chinese people might feel how western, browsing Japanese books on China. So I want to ask Murai how Liangyou constructed Japanese images.
Lastly I refer to Lin’s presentation. Lin leaves the aspects of contents in the American media aids open to further discussions. American conducts overseas have been not only political or military in a narrower sense but also cultural ones. American aids/interventions innovated many media-related cultural forms directly or indirectly.
