Study on the Concepts of the Value of Athletics in the Meiji Era[II] : The Controversy on the "School Spirit" and A Pattern of the Assimilation of "Athletics" with Japanese

Abstract

In this article, the concepts on the values of Athletics, which the students of Dai-ichi Koto Gakko had in the second stage (189697) of the controversy on the "School Spirit", are considered. The feature of this controversy can be found out in the following two points; first, the values of "speech and literary work" which had not been fully recognized among the students was asserted, and secondly it was reflected in the emphasis of "Bushido" that the victorious result of the Chino-Japanese War urged them to be aware of Japanese's own. The analysis of the concepts shows that Athlelics was commonly recognized to serve as "means" of rousing Genki (a spirit) and that Athletics as Western culture was considered as Bujutsu which had origininally meaned the traditional military arts in Japan . The results of analysing these concepts in the two stages lead us to conclude as follows ; (1) A form of the assimilation of Athletics as Western Cultuern with Japanese was to have accepted it exclusively as "arts" and not including the spritual side. Therefore, the students had recognized the ethical values of Athletics, especially the content of which were practically the morals connected with those of Bushi. (2) There was a spiritual condition of the sujects which formed such a recognition. It was "Ethos" descended from Bushi, which had functined to orient them to rouse Genki and indulged themselves in "Athleticism". (3) But, these controversies themselves clariffed that the orthodoxy on the values of Athletics had begun to be doubted.