Th e Faculty of Letters and the Graduate School of Letters occupy a unique position not only in the history of universities, but also in the history of culture. Th e university is a place where most advanced research is conducted and new knowledge is developed—this fairly commonsensical view of the university as a research institution is said to have been born in nineteenth-century Germany, and is today called the “Humboldtian ideal,” aft er one of the original advocators of the concept. Th e fi rst institution based on this ideal, outside Germany, was Johns Hopkins University in America, today boasting one of the world’s best medical schools. Then, what was the first one in the field of humanities and social sciences? Th is is a diffi cult question, but at least in Asia, Kyoto Imperial University (the former avatar of Kyoto University) must be one of the fi rst cases. First, what later became the Faculty of Law, and then, what became the Faculty of Letters were established; they were among the fi rst realizations of the “Humboldtian ideal in humanities.” According to the Humboldtian ideal, students are not passive receivers of professors’ teachings; they are regarded as researchers in embryo who are going to be pioneers in their respective fi elds. For example, formerly, in many Japanese universities students were allowed to read books in libraries, but not to borrow them. Th e Faculty of Letters of Kyoto University, however, permitted them to do so from the date of its foundation. Th e Humboldtian ideal also manifests itself in the form of teaching, namely, in what are called “seminars.” Professors give “general lectures” in which they present a broad survey of the fi eld, and they off er “specialized lectures” in which they discourse on what they themselves are researching at the moment, thereby showing exemplary methods of study, and sharing joys and sorrows of the actual research work. Then in “seminars,” students who have, by imitating professors, acquired various methods and approaches try them out and show the result of their learning. What is called “Zemi” in Japanese universities initially played the role of a cradle for future researchers. Our Faculty of Letters, from its inception onwards, has been assigning special importance to such seminars, and the dissertation developed from presentations in these settings. Th e same can be said of our Graduate School of Letters. Presentations in seminars and theses developed from them have long been regarded as matters of utmost priority in students’ lives. In the Humboldtian university, where from the beginning students are treated as researchers, motivated ones fi nd themselves in rewarding, if “tough,” circumstances. In many, if not all, of the departments belonging to the Faculty and Graduate School myths have been prevalent in which the severity of seminars and oral examinations is overblown. Beijing University in China was one of those institutions in Asia that followed us in having a “Humboldtian faculty.” Th e president Tsài Yuánpéi, who had studied in Germany, made a radical reformation of the university, promoting the “Humboldtization,” to the extent of demolishing the department of Technology as mere “applied studies.” Such “Humboldtizations” bore remarkable fruits. The Faculties of Letters, of Kyoto and of Beijing, produced the Kyoto School and the Contemporary New Confucian respectively, unique Graduate School and Faculty of LettersKyoto UniversityFROM THE DEAN
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