Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Editors’ Notes on Translation
- Introduction: Books, Craftsmen, and Engineers: The Emergence of a Formalized Technical Education in a Modern Science-based Education System
- 1 The Translation of Technical Manuals from Western Languages in Nineteenth-century Japan: A Visual Tour
- 2 The Translation of Western Books on Natural Science and Technology in China and Japan: Early Conceptions of Electricity 19
- 3 Creating Intellectual Space for West-East and East-East Knowledge Transfer: Global Mining Literacy and the Evolution of Textbooks on Mining in Late Qing China, 1860–1911
- 4 François Léonce Verny and the Beginning of the ‘Modern’ Technical Education in Japan
- 5 The Role of the Ministry of Public Works in Designing Engineering Education in Meiji Japan: Reconsidering the Foundation of the Imperial College of Engineering(Kōbu-dai-gakkō)
- 6 From Student of Confucianism to Hands-on Engineer: The Case of Ōhara Junnosuke, Mining Engineer 114
- 7 The Fall of the Imperial College of Engineering: From the Imperial College of Engineering (Kōbu-dai-gakkō) to the Faculty of Engineering at Imperial University, 1886 161
- Miscellaneous Frontmatter
- Miscellaneous Frontmatter
- 8 Kikuchi Kyōzō and the Implementation of Cottonspinning Technology: The Career of a Graduate of the Imperial College of Engineering
- 9 The Training School for Railway Engineers: An Early Example of an Intra-firm Vocational School in Japan
- 10 The Training and Education of Female Silk-reeling Instructors in Meiji Japan
- 11 The Establishment and Curriculum of the Tōkyō Shokkō-gakkō (Tōkyō Vocational School) in Meiji Japan
- 12 The Development of Mining Schools in Japan
- 13 Science Education in Japanese Schools in the Late 1880s as Reflected in Students’ Notes
- 14 Education in Mechanical Engineering in Early Universities and the Role of Their Graduates in Japan’s Industrial Revolution: The University of Tōkyō, the Imperial College of Engineering and the Imperial University
- List of Contributors
- Index
6 - From Student of Confucianism to Hands-on Engineer: The Case of Ōhara Junnosuke, Mining Engineer 114
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 May 2022
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Editors’ Notes on Translation
- Introduction: Books, Craftsmen, and Engineers: The Emergence of a Formalized Technical Education in a Modern Science-based Education System
- 1 The Translation of Technical Manuals from Western Languages in Nineteenth-century Japan: A Visual Tour
- 2 The Translation of Western Books on Natural Science and Technology in China and Japan: Early Conceptions of Electricity 19
- 3 Creating Intellectual Space for West-East and East-East Knowledge Transfer: Global Mining Literacy and the Evolution of Textbooks on Mining in Late Qing China, 1860–1911
- 4 François Léonce Verny and the Beginning of the ‘Modern’ Technical Education in Japan
- 5 The Role of the Ministry of Public Works in Designing Engineering Education in Meiji Japan: Reconsidering the Foundation of the Imperial College of Engineering(Kōbu-dai-gakkō)
- 6 From Student of Confucianism to Hands-on Engineer: The Case of Ōhara Junnosuke, Mining Engineer 114
- 7 The Fall of the Imperial College of Engineering: From the Imperial College of Engineering (Kōbu-dai-gakkō) to the Faculty of Engineering at Imperial University, 1886 161
- Miscellaneous Frontmatter
- Miscellaneous Frontmatter
- 8 Kikuchi Kyōzō and the Implementation of Cottonspinning Technology: The Career of a Graduate of the Imperial College of Engineering
- 9 The Training School for Railway Engineers: An Early Example of an Intra-firm Vocational School in Japan
- 10 The Training and Education of Female Silk-reeling Instructors in Meiji Japan
- 11 The Establishment and Curriculum of the Tōkyō Shokkō-gakkō (Tōkyō Vocational School) in Meiji Japan
- 12 The Development of Mining Schools in Japan
- 13 Science Education in Japanese Schools in the Late 1880s as Reflected in Students’ Notes
- 14 Education in Mechanical Engineering in Early Universities and the Role of Their Graduates in Japan’s Industrial Revolution: The University of Tōkyō, the Imperial College of Engineering and the Imperial University
- List of Contributors
- Index
Summary
There seems to be a popular impression that an engineer is necessarily a man connected with a steam engine and that the title ‘engineer’ is derived from ‘engine’. The reverse is however the case and ‘engineer’ is derived from a word which implies the employment of one's ingenuity in the solution of any problem whatsoever so that its application might be made very extensive.
Henry DyerINTRODUCTION
IN THE WORK of the historian, besides systematic research based on sources, chance often plays a role that should not be underestimated. Many years ago, such a coincidence brought a bundle of source materials into my hands, which very quickly proved to be ground-breaking. These are notes and lecture notes, internship reports and diaries of a young Japanese engineer, named Ōhara Junnosuke. Born into a samurai family five years after the opening of the country by Commodore Perry in 1854, Ōhara in many ways represents the group of early engineers whose education was still rooted in the feudal era, who continued their education through different routes, and who belonged to the first generation to end up with a formalized education at a modern, Western educational institution. His personal papers provide invaluable insights into this process, which bridges the seemingly incompatible systems of traditional education in the Edo period and a modern Western-style technical education.
The following reconstruction of his biography during this transitional phase proves his career to be a typical example of the possibilities and problems at the beginning of the introduction of a technical education in Japan.
How his career unfolded, how the gaps and ruptures between the school of a feudal domain and modern technical higher education at the renowned Kōbu-dai-gakkō were filled, and how he achieved the requirements to graduate from the technical college, are quite characteristic of many careers in the technical sciences at that time.
The questions to be considered in a deeper analysis of Ōhara and his work in this transitional period around the Meiji Restoration are: Who was this man? What do we know about him? Was he famous? What did he learn? How did he study? What achievement can be ascribed to him that is significant enough to be the subject of an academic writing?
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- Accessing Technical Education in Modern Japan , pp. 114 - 160Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2022