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Dr. David
Gordon holds a Ph.D. in history from the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
Dr. Gordon is currently completing a study of the twentieth-century
Japanese thinker Watsuji Tetsuro and especially his early interest in
the ideas of German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. He also plans to
conduct separate focused research on twentieth-century Japanese
responses to ancient Greek culture.
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"The African
World' and 'The Japanese Spirit': Cultural Dynamics in the Writings of
Wole Soyinka and Watsuji Tetsuro" |
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Twentieth-century thinkers from outside the West have often contended
with Western denigrations of their cultures as rigid and unchanging.
Professor Gordon's lecture will examine two figures who tackled these
aspersions head on: Nigerian playwright Wole Soyinka (1934- ) and
Japanese philosopher Watsuji Tetsuro (1889-1960). Despite wide
differences in heritage, politics, and temperament, Soyinka and
Watsuji arrive at remarkably similar strategies of cultural
self-defense: each presents a model of his traditional culture which
treats that culture as peacefully dynamic, in contrast to a
contentious modern West. The two figures thus attempt to turn the
tables on Eurocentrism while offering alternative visions of cohesive
pluralism. |
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