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Traditional philology in Japan (kokubungaku) is often described, both at home and abroad, as having a phobia of theory. The literary scholar often speaks the same language as the poet, and in many cases, as in the second edition of Iwanami Literary Studies (Iwanami Kōza Bungaku, 1975–1976), they are one and the same person. However, a closer look at Japanese literary studies since the translation of Eagleton´s Literary Theory in 1985 reveals that this paradigm has already started to shift. The publication of the third edition of Iwanami Literary Studies, and in particular the supplement Literary Theory (Bungaku Riron, 2004) distinctly reflects this shift, at least among the younger generation of literary scholars. In my paper I will show not only the shift to theory in recent Japanese literary studies, but also that theory itself (as it is used in Japan) has experienced that worldwide movement described as the “cultural turn.” In order to prove this observation I will take a closer look at the contemporary English, German and Japanese discourse on literary theory and, in particular concepts such as contingency, (new) contextuality, and culturalism.
In trying to study the idea of landscape (fukei) in Japanese waka-poetry, one may find oneself confronted with a great variety of concepts. All of these share commonalities in that they are not at all defined, that their meaning depends on personal usage (at the level of the producer, as well as of the researcher who often speaks the same language), and that they can be understood on a wide spectrum between the two extreme positions marked by fiction and reality (without, of course, any scientific concept about what fiction and reality might be). Although European traditions are coping with the concept of landscape in an aesthetical and philosophical way, there is no such comparable tradition in traditional Japanese literary history (kokubungaku). Because of this, there is no satisfactory way to conceptually understand waka-landscape, since the very basic key-term itself is not mutually accessible. European and Japanese concepts of landscape may not, therefore, be able to be brought together. To have an international scientific discussion on landscape (found in every culture historically and up to the present), it is necessary to develop a concept of landscape which is not only an issue of arts, aesthetics or philosophy, but also the subject of anthropological approaches and cultural studies. In this paper, I attempt to develop a concept of landscape, which is based on constructivism and the psychology of perception and memory. I will also show how constructivist thought has gained great popularity in German social and cultural studies.
Kinofilme dienen mitunter der Widerspiegelung gesellschaftlicher Realität. Der vom Japanologen Robert Wittkamp verfasste Essay stellt anhand von „Terminator“ und „The Matrix“ die filmische Erzeugung von Wirklichkeit sowie die Verflechtung von gesellschaftlichem Denken und Wissenschaft dar. Dabei erläutert er die in „The Matrix“ angedeutete Simulationstheorie. Abschliessend analysiert Wittkamp das zentrale Filmelement Kontingenz von Tom Tykwers „Lola rennt“ in Bezug auf Wissenschaft und Kultur.