Japanese Journal of Cultural Anthropology
Online ISSN : 2424-0516
Print ISSN : 1349-0648
ISSN-L : 1349-0648
Volume 78, Issue 4
Displaying 1-28 of 28 articles from this issue
  • Article type: Cover
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages Cover1-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Cover
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages Cover2-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages App1-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Sho Morishita
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 449-469
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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    Since scientific activities are understood historically and practically, our conception of science has been radically changing. While Ian Hacking has emphasized the importance of the practice of intervening in materiality as well as representation, Andrew Pickering, a sociologist of science, has suggested a new pragmatic approach for understanding scientific practices to replace the traditional representation theory. This paper focuses on arguments of scientific realism, acknowledging that recent studies of scientific practice emphasize the historicity and locality of science. It criticizes the way that they reduce the process of making reality to the scheme of stabilization between representations and materiality. It emphasizes the heterogeneity of the components in scientific practice through a description of the practices of observation and modeling in earth physics, and shows that the components call up various modalities of making reality. This paper examines the practice of geodesy, a sub-discipline of earth planetary physics based on the paradigm of plate tectonics theory. Geodesists use various methodologies of observation to explore the state of the earth. Each of those methodologies has a unique data format, as well as unique methods of data processing and data analysis, forming expertise. The paper comprises three chapters, the first on observation, the second on modeling, and third containing a discussion. The first chapter explains two representative observation methodologies: gravimetry and GPS observation. The second chapter presents examples of analyzing each observation datum to explain various techniques of realizing entities in geodesy. Gravimetry, a traditional method for exploring the condition of the earth, utilizes Newton's theory of gravitation. Gravity data are expected to contain information about all kinds of mass distribution, and are used for such purposes as underground resource exploration, the detection of ice-sheet mass variation caused by global warming, and the detection of crustal deformation. As gravity data reflect all those kinds of phenomena, geodesists need to separate each signal of the phenomena from the surrounding noise in a process called "correction." GPS observation, a rather new geodetic method, is a widespread technology to determine the position of observation points; it is used for detecting crustal deformation in solid-earth physics. In the late 1990s, GEONET, a 1,200-point GPS observation system, was constructed by the Geospatial Information Authority of Japan, and is now the standard observation tool for detecting crustal deformation in this country. In the context of geodesy, people cannot perceive the "world" without those observations. Observations provide an image of the world through figures, which geodesists always work with. Those figures represent the geodetic "visibility" within the territory of "installability," that is, the area where geodesists can put their observation tools, and define the territory of "fact" in geodesy. Based on those figures, geodesists often infer the condition of the earth's interior, which is regarded as a territory both invisible and hypothetical. That activity is called "modeling." The second chapter presents several examples of modeling based on data collected through the aforementioned observational methods. The first case involves modeling of plate motion in southwest Japan, based on GEONET crustal deformation data. In that case, a geodesist first shows the GEONET data as arrows on a map, then constructs a model of plate motion in that region of Japan, finally deducing the calculated value from the observational data on the map. As a result, the observation arrows are almost entirely eliminated. That case demonstrates how geodesists use observational data, figures, and models to show that the hypothetical model

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  • Ryoko Sachi
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 470-491
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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    Le silence est generalement defini par l'absence ou la solitude, par opposition a la parole, qui est une pratique de communication et de communaute. Mais est-il vrai que la communaute ne se trouve pas au sein du silence? Pour illustrer ce propos, nous avons examine le <<silence de respect>> chez les Manouches francais qui font partie des <<Tsiganes>> (Gypsies en anglais). Les Manouches ne parlent pas de leurs morts. Le defunt est ramene de l'hopital et place dans sa caravane durant les trois jours de veillee funebre qui precedent son enterrement. Tous les membres du groupe, y compris la famille eloignee, se reunissent autour de sa caravane pour lui faire leurs derniers adieux, et expriment leur chagrin par des gemissements, des lamentations ou des caresses. Pourtant, une fois l'enterrement termine, le <<silence>> s'instaure autour du defunt. La caravane et les objets lui ayant appartenu sont brules, detruits ou vendus. La famille et l'entourage cessent de prononcer son nom, n'evoquent pas son souvenir. Toutes ces attitudes sont toujours expliquees par rapport au <<respect>> : <<Il ne faut pas le dire, il faut du respect>>. P. Williams, a demontre a ce sujet que le <<silence de respect>> envers les morts n'est rien d'autre que la preservation de l'integrite du groupe. En identifiant le silence a <<l'oubli>>, il explique que le mort <<perd peu a peu ses caracteres singuliers. Il reste une fidelite a une entite - le groupe, les Manus, "nous" - dont les morts maintenant garantissent collectivement, anonymement, la perennite>> (Williams 1993 : 16) . On peut voir, dans cette formulation, l'idee de <<l'integration de l'individu a une totalite sociale>> : par la mort, l'individu singulier accede au statut d'ancetre, fondu dans un collectif anonyme, sans distinction d'individus. C'est ce que montre la plupart des recherches ethnographiques effectuees sur le deuil : en tant que phase liminaire du <<rite de passage>>, la periode de deuil permet de separer le defunt du monde des vivants pour l'accompagner dans celui des ancetres. Cependant, si l'on examine plus attentivement le processus de deuil chez les Manouches, on remarque que ce modele fonctionnaliste (le rite comme integration) n'est pas applicable a leur cas. En effet, le deuil des Manouches se prolonge par le silence qui l'entoure, de facon informelle et individualisee, et par consequent empeche l'accomplissement du rite de passage. Les differents rites de separation exposes par Hertz, Van Gennep et par d'autres ethnologues montrent comment le daunt est depersonnalise pour devenir un ancetre impersonnel, garant de l'ordre social. Cependant chez les Manouches, au contraire le daunt continue de garder sa propre personnalite, grace au silence des vivants qui l'entoure. Decrire les attitudes des vivants a l'egard du nom et des souvenirs se rapportant a un mort nous amene a remarquer que ce silence du respect apparait comme la garantie de la presence irremplacable du mort en tant qu'individu singulier. Ne pas appeler le mort par son nom, car le romano lap, nom utilise au sein de la communaute manouche, est unique pour chaque membre et ne peut etre reutilise ou transmis a un autre individu. Ne pas evoquer les souvenirs du mort, car les evenements qui marquent la vie de chacun sont intangibles et incommunicables. Les Manouches tiennent a la personnalite singuliere du mort et craignent de la detruire par la parole ou l'acte de representation. Sur ce point, la remarque de Williams est exacte : <<La possibilite de faire une erreur tourmente le vivant>> (Williams 1993 : 14) . Toutefois, il faut signaler que les Manouches gardent le silence, non pas pour oublier

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  • Ryosuke Kuramoto
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 492-514
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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    World religions with established canons, such as Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism, have doctrines about what salvation is and how it can be achieved. We can define religious practices of world religion as activities that aim at achieving such doctrinal ideals. They include not only particular kinds of activity, such as rituals or ascetic training, but also everyday life. What, then, does it mean to live as a believer of a world religion? What types of problems do those believers have, and how do they respond to them? This paper discusses those issues by investigating the example of a Theravada Buddhist monk in contemporary Myanmar. It will be helpful to reveal the complicated and dynamic relationship between doctrines and practices in world religions. To 'renounce' society means to refuse every social role and leave the social order. At the same time, no one can live without relating to society. Such is the case with Theravada monks, who are known as complete renouncers of society, as they are prohibited from doing any economic or productive activity by the Vinaya [monks' rules]. The most important principle for them is to live as beggars, and to depend on Dana [religious gifts] given by lay people. In Theravada Buddhism, such a monk's life is thought to be the optimum approach-though not the only one-to achieve Nibbana [the doctrinal ideal of Theravada Buddhism]. In that way, a monk's life in Theravada Buddhism is ambivalent in nature. On one hand, it is assumed to be separate from society, while on the other hand, it is not economically viable without support from society. According to M. Mauss' The gift, such a life is impossible for monks, as they, having received Dana, inevitably owe a debt to society. If they repay their debt to society through a variety of social or religious services, that strengthens the connection between monks and society. But if they fail to repay their debt, they are subordinate to society. In any case, monks are involved in society, and cannot avoid departing from their ideal of becoming a renouncer of society. In fact, ethnographies about Theravada Buddhist society have developed the image of monks who develop gift-exchange relationships with society. Is it impossible to transcend the secular world established by the gift-exchange relationship? To answer that question, one must reconsider the relationship between monks and society from the monks' point of view. In this paper, I analyze the efforts of monks aspiring toward the ideal of renouncers of society and the consequences of those efforts, using T monastery in Myanmar as an example. First, I point out the unique missionary viewpoint of T monastery, namely, the belief that attaining the ideal of a renouncer of society does good not only to the monks themselves but also to lay people, as it enhances the faith of the lay people and leads them to profitable Dana. Second, I indicate that the efforts to renounce society by the monks in T monastery appear to society as a socially evasive attitude; that includes their decision to settle in a forest and their refusal to give and receive gifts, as well as any service that I regard as an attempt to avoid the gift-exchange relationship. Finally, I analyze how T monastery is accepted by society, and reveal that by gaining support from urban residents who wake up to the importance of Buddhism in a new way, it has overcome the two major risks that inevitably go with efforts at renunciation: the economic risk, and the risk of being worshipped.
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  • [in Japanese], [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 515-518
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 519-521
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 521-525
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 525-528
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 528-531
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 532-535
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • [in Japanese]
    Article type: Article
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 535-538
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 539-540
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 542-552
    Published: March 31, 2014
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 553-554
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 555-557
    Published: March 31, 2014
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 557-
    Published: March 31, 2014
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 558-
    Published: March 31, 2014
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages 559-560
    Published: March 31, 2014
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages i-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Index
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages ii-iii
    Published: March 31, 2014
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  • Article type: Index
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages iv-v
    Published: March 31, 2014
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages App2-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages App3-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Appendix
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages App4-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Cover
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages Cover3-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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  • Article type: Cover
    2014 Volume 78 Issue 4 Pages Cover4-
    Published: March 31, 2014
    Released on J-STAGE: April 03, 2017
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