Wolfgang Michel (Japanologist)

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Wolfgang Michel (also Wolfgang Michel-Zaitsu ; * 1946 in Frankfurt am Main) is a former professor for comparative linguistics and cultural studies at the University of Kyūshū in Fukuoka in Japan .

Michel studied East Asian linguistics and cultural studies in Frankfurt am Main . He received his PhD in Cultural Sciences from Okayama University in Japan and was the first foreigner to receive a tenure at a state university after the opening of Japanese universities in 1984. In the course of his work he also took on a number of administrative functions up to dean and vice-president until he retired in 2010.

Research areas

In the context of the history of European-Japanese cultural contacts, Michel's works particularly address questions of medicine and related sciences:

  • Development of “Western Studies ” ( Yōgaku ) and “Dutch Studies ” ( Rangaku ) in Japan. In numerous studies, Michel was able to show that and how Western medicine gained a foothold in Japan as early as the 17th century in an interplay of structural, social, scientific and coincidental moments , achieved and achieved a wealth of effects on related disciplines such as pharmaceuticals , botany , etc. a fundamental revision of the previous conception of Dutch studies and its history is inevitable.
  • Transfer of traditional Chinese and Japanese medicine to Europe. According to Michel's studies, much of the early information about Chinese medicine came to the west not from China but from Japan. These include many concepts and therapies that were developed in early modern Japan and were unknown in China. The traditional medicine of Japan (TJM) ( acupuncture , moxibustion , Kampo , Anma, Shiatsu , judo therapy), which was considerably further developed in the 20th century , therefore deserves an independent place alongside traditional medicine in China (TCM) , Korea and Vietnam.
  • In this context, the role of indigenous knowledge and Japanese reactions to Western and Chinese stimuli in the 17th and 18th centuries are pursued (anatomy, corpse sections, materia medica, herbalism / botany, therapy concepts, medical instruments, etc.).
  • "Dutch studies" and traditional medicine in the Nakatsu fief (Northeast Kyushu). The example of the Nakatsu domain demonstrates the density and high level of information that diffused into the regions during the Edo period and laid the foundations for the rapid modernization after the opening of Japan in the 19th century.
  • Travelers to the East Indies of the early modern period ( Caspar Schamberger , Zacharias Wagener , Andreas Cleyer , Georg Meister , Johann Konrad Rätzel Johann Jacob Merklein , Albrecht Herport , Herman Niklas Grim , Willem ten Rhijne , Matthäus Gottfried Purmann , Clas Fredrik Hornstedt , Johan Arnold Stützer etc. ). The beginning of the reception of western medicine in early modern Japan became particularly visible through the studies of the previously shrouded in mystery Caspar Schamberger, the "father" of the first western school of surgery in Japan.
  • A number of Japanese doctors of the Edo period ( Kawaguchi Ryōan , Yoshio Genkitsu , Murakami Gensui , Oe Shuntō, Kamiya Gennai, Negoro Tōshuku, etc.) show, on the one hand, that the previous division between adherents of the western and those of the traditional directions of the eclectic Situation in theory and therapy does not do justice. On the other hand, it is proven that the indigenous Japanese medicine already contained important elements of modernization which, as catalysts, accelerated the reception of Western medicine in the 18th century.
  • Edition of the Japan-related manuscripts by Engelbert Kaempfer ( Iudicium Verlag ). In particular, with the richly commented critical edition of the previously unpublished manuscript Today's Japan , research on Kaempfer, the “Humboldt of Asia”, was placed on a new basis.

Memberships and honors

  • Itan Award (Research on Medical History, 2018)
  • Nakatsu City Award (2018)
  • Yakazu Medical History Award (2018)
  • Scientific Advancement Award (Fujikawa Yu Award) of the Japanese Society for Medical History (1996)
  • Federal Cross of Merit on Ribbon (2004)
  • Japanese Society for the History of Medicine ( Nihon Ishi Gakkai ): Advisory Board from 1996 to 1999, Board of Directors from 2000 to 2007, permanent board member since 2008
  • Society for the History of Western Learning in Japan ( Yōgakushi Gakkai ): Board member from 2000 to 2002, Advisory Board from 2003 to 2006, President from 2003 to 2005

Fonts (selection)

  • Engelbert Kaempfer: The 5th fascicle of the “Amoenitates Exoticae” - Japanese botanical science . Edited and commented by Brigitte Hoppe and Wolfgang Michel-Zaitsu. Hildesheim / Zurich / New York: Olms-Weidmann, 2019. ISBN 978-3-615-00436-6
  • Aoki Toshiyuki, Oshima Akihide, Michel Wolfgang: Tennentō to no tatakai - Kyushu no shutō (Fighting small-pox - Vaccination in Kyushu). Tokyo: Iwata Shoin, 2018. ISBN 978-4-86602-036-5 C3021 ( 青木 歳 幸 ・ 大 島 明 秀 ・ Ｗ. ミ ヒ ェ ル 編 『天然 痘 痘 と の 闘 い 九州 の 種痘』 岩田 書院 )
  • Bastaardt Woordenboek (Dutch edition 1688 / Japanese version 1822) . Nakatsu Municipal Museum for History and Folklore, Medical Archive Series No. 17, Nakatsu, 2018 ( PDF file from Researchgate )
  • Wolfgang Michel-Zaitsu: Traditional Medicine in Japan - From the early days to the present . Munich: Kiener, 2017. ISBN 978-3-943324-75-4 (Yakazu Medical History Award 2018)
  • "Brief explanation of the most distinguished rarities of the East Indian and neighboring kingdoms" - New finds on the life and work of the Leipzig surgeon and trader Caspar Schamberger (1623–1706) . Fukuoka: Hana-Shoin, 2010. ISBN 978-4-903554-71-6 ( PDF file at Researchgate )
  • Wolfgang Michel / Torii Yumiko / Kawashima Mahito (ed.): Kyūshū no rangaku - ekkyō to kōryū ("Hollandkunde" in Kyushu - border crossing and exchange). Kyōto: Shibunkaku Shuppan, 2009. ISBN 978-4-7842-1410-5 ( ヴ ォ ル フ ガ ン グ ・ ミ ヒ ェ ル, 鳥 井 裕美子, 川 嶌 真人 共 編 『九州 の 蘭 学 ー 越境 と 交流』 思 文 閣 出版 )
  • On Caspar Schamberger's Activities in Japan (1650/51) and Early Caspar-Style Surgery . Languages ​​and Cultures Series, No 18. Kyushu University, 2008, 256 pp. ( 「慶安三,四年の日本における出島商館医シャムベルゲルの活動及び初期カスパル流外科について」九州大学大学院言語文化研究院,言語文化叢書 ) PDF file in the Kyushu University Institutional Repository (QIR)
  • Engelbert Kaempfer: Works. Critical edition in individual volumes . Edited by Detlef Haberland , Wolfgang Michel, Elisabeth Gössmann : Volume I / 1 u. Volume I / 2, Engelbert Kaempfer : Today's Japan . Edited by Wolfgang Michel and Barend J. Terwiel. Munich: Iudicium, 2001. ISBN 3-89129-931-1
  • From Leipzig to Japan - the surgeon and trader Caspar Schamberger (1623–1706) . Munich: Iudicium, 1999. ISBN 3-89129-442-5
  • First treatise on moxibustion in Europe: the carefully examined and invented Podagra, mediates itself safely-own convalescence and relieving Hülff means / Hermann Buschoff . Heidelberg: Haug, 1993. ISBN 3-7760-1327-3

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Michels website, accessed on July 9, 2019 . First Tenure for Foreigner in Kyushu University - Associate Professor Michel. Important step towards internationalization. Mainichi News , March 16, 1984, p. 18 (Japanese).
  2. ↑ Michel-Zaitsu (2017)
  3. ↑ Josef Kreiner, Book Review I, OAG Notes , No.11, 1999, pp.25-30
  4. ^ Uta Lindgren: Engelbert Kaempfer, works. Yearbook for European Overseas History, no.3, 2003, pp.195–196 .; no.5, 2005, pp.245-248. Elise Guignard: Engelbert Kaempfer, works. Critical edition in individual volumes. Asian Studies - Etudes Asiatiques , no.57, 2003, pp.406-412.
  5. ↑ Yomiuri Shimbun, March 19, 2004; Nishinihon Shinbun , March 19, 2004; Kyudai Kōhō , July 2004, p.30 (in Japanese)
personal data
SURNAME Michel, Wolfgang
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Michel-Zaitsu, Wolfgang; ヴ ォ ル フ ガ ン グ ・ ミ ヒ ェ ル (transliterated name in Japanese publications); ミ ヒ ェ ル ・ ヴ ォ ル フ ガ ン グ (transliterated name in Japanese publications); W ・ ミ ヒ ェ ル (transliterated name variant in Japanese publications)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German linguist and cultural scientist, medical historian
DATE OF BIRTH 1946
PLACE OF BIRTH Frankfurt am Main