Symposium on September 12–13, 2008
Historical Dialogue and Reconciliation in East Asia: Recent Practice and Future Prospects

The Harvard Yenching Institute will be hosting a symposium on “Historical Dialogue and Reconciliation in East Asia: Recent Practice and Future Prospects” on September 12-13 2008. The symposium will be organized by Professors Andrew Gordon and Hiroshi Mitani. Professor Mitani, of Tokyo University, is a historian of Japan in residence at Harvard this year at the Harvard-Yenching Institute. Professor Gordon is a historian of Japan on the Harvard faculty.

The symposium has several objectives. It will present the results of a very productive multi-year collaborative effort of Japanese and Chinese historians to examine Sino-Japanese relations over the course of the 20th century. It will also ask participants to step back and assess more generally the results of the many such international projects involving scholars from East Asia and elsewhere which have been convened in the past two decades. What sorts of efforts have been particularly successful? What are the most critical issues that should be addressed in ongoing efforts of this sort? In particular, how can scholars address gap—perhaps growing—between academic historical understanding and more nationalistic popular views? What is the potential for ongoing efforts at historical dialogue in East Asia which transcend particular national histories?

The symposium grows out of a long-term project undertaken by Japanese and overseas Chinese historians, supported by the Sasakawa Peace Foundation, which produced a book of essays whose title can be translated as Contentious Issues in Modern Sino-Japanese Relations: toward a history beyond borders. This book was initially published in both Chinese [PRC] and Japanese editions, in 2006. An English translation is now underway, and the Asia Center at Harvard has indicated its interest in publishing that translation. We will have drafts of most if not all of the chapters available for participants to read and comment on.

The symposium will broaden the community of scholars engaged in this particular inquiry to include those from the PRC and from Korea. It will discuss future scholarly projects involving the original participants and others.

This conference is made possible by the generous support of the Sasakawa Peace Foundation. It is co-sponsored locally by the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies, the Fairbank Center for East Asian Research, and the Harvard Asia Center. We are excited about the possibilities to broaden the community of scholars engaged in efforts to expand common ground in interpretations of modern history in East Asia. Affiliates of the Harvard Yenching Institute, as well as the general public, are welcome to register and attend the symposium. To register your attendance, please send email to Lindsay Strogatz at strogatz@fas.harvard.edu.

Tentative schedule (exact paper titles are subject to revision):
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updated August 26, 2008