［Event Report］The first workshop and symposium held by the Research Center for Textual Scholarship
The first workshop and symposium held by the Research Center for Textual Scholarship
On June 18, 2022 (Saturday), the first workshop and symposium were held at the Global Lounge, Building No. 9, hosted by the Research Center for Textual Scholarship. A total of 50 people participated in this event, the first since the center’s establishment. The participants included students and faculty members of Seijo University and graduate students and researchers from various institutes in diverse fields.
At the workshop “Learning German Textual Scholarship Part 1”, Professor Takashi Yahaba (Dokkyo University) was invited to comment on the report on the basic concepts of German “Editionsphilologie” by two young researchers. Shunsuke Moribayashi (Doctoral student at the University of Tsukuba) raised the issue of the “historical-critical edition”, a German model of scholarly editing that is based upon the theoretical structure proposed by Siegfried Scheibe. Following his presentation, Yu Tomizuka (Doctoral student at the Seijo University) further discussed the characteristics of the “scholarly edition” and the problem of its conceptual definition, using Friedrich Hölderlin’s works as an example. This workshop introduced practical examples and theoretical discussions on textual editing by modern and contemporary German-speaking writers. It was followed by the Q&A session, climaxing with a heated debate on universal issues beyond the German-speaking world, such as the ideal form of scholarly editing and the challenges of editing in the digitalization age.
At the symposium “The World of Italian Textual Scholarship Part 1”, we invited Professor Hiroaki Ito (Senshu University) to join the discussion and give a talk on “the discovery and publication of The World’s First Business Book - Merchant of the Renaissance, Humanist Benedetto Cotrulli”. Referring to The World’s First Business Book 15th Century Italian Merchant Benedetto Cotrulli’s 15 Golden Rules (translated to Japanese by Hiroaki Ito, Subarusha, 2021) by Cotrulli, the merchant who was active in Renaissance Italy, Professor Ito talked about the manuscripts and published books, as well as the problems of editing the revised edition in recent years.
Dr Motoaki Hara (Tokai University), our guest commentator, offered us a detailed picture of the political environment of Italy at the time when Cotrulli was most active. Meanwhile, guest commentator Professor Noburu Notomi (University of Tokyo) raised critical issues such as whether editing based on manuscripts should aim only at restoring the original text, or whether there are other possibilities. How are texts written in one era passed on to later generations through manuscripts? What interpretive and editorial differences will arise when editing and publishing them in later times? How should we perceive these now? Using the 15th-century Italian texts as an example, throughout the session, our participants exchanged opinions on editing and issues concerning a broader humanities context.
The Research Center for Textual Scholarship will regularly hold workshops and symposiums on “Editionsphilologie”. In that case, we will post information on our website. Please join us if you are interested.
