500彩票网

Contemporary folklore is seeking to transform itself into a new discipline through the addition of new knowledge and perspectives to “20th-century folkloristics.” Here, “20th-century folkloristics” refers to the movement started in the 20th century by Kunio Yanagita to understand and revitalize indigenous cultures in Japan as well as the movement to establish the study of indigenous culture as a scholarly discipline. It was a “product of the times” created by the demands of the age that started as “grassroots scholarship“ and has been systematized, organized, and institutionalized over nearly a century. One of the folklorists who played an important role in the final stages of the establishment of “20th-century folkloristics” and the folklorist who is the subject of this book is Ajio Fukuta.
 
Fukuta inherited but was critical of the Yanagita’s folkloristics. It would not be an overstatement to say that Fukuta was a child of “20th-century folkloristics.” To bring folkloristics into the 21st century, we need to take a leap forward from “20th-century folkloristics,” which means that we must surpass the discipline of Fukuta and folklorists of the same age. But have we shown the drive needed to deliberately surpass the work of these folklorists? Are we not simply succumbing to the inertia of 20th-century folkloristics? Driven by such doubts and sense of crisis, we planned a seminar to directly meet and discuss these issue