During the past three decades of my professorship in the Faculty of Letters of Keio University, Mita (1989-2021), I made every effort to let the students familiarize themselves with cutting-edge American culture and literature; being a Cornell graduate, I wanted to make my students naturalize what’s going on in the United States.  My mission as a professional Americanist was to let the students feel a sense of comfort at American colleges and universities they might get a chance to study at in the near future. Thus, I gave them a reading list of books American students must have taken for granted.

Let me give you an example. My earliest students include Professor Hisayo Ogushi who perused my list and studied hard at the University of Oregon as a junior student and Brown University as a visiting fellow. Even while she was studying abroad, I kept giving her a special education for gifted students through intensive correspondence with her. In consequence, she completed a fabulous BA thesis on Paul Bowles and excellent M.A. and Ph.D. dissertations on Lydia Maria Child without feeling estranged from contemporary North American academia. Having imbibed American literature and culture, she ended up by discovering the impact of American literature on Japanese Shojo manga and publishing her monograph on the very topic（Shohausha, 2021）, which received in 2022 the fifth Nishiwaki Junzaburo Academic Award from Keio University. I suppose most of you vividly remember her giving a lecture on March 23, 2023, linking her interest in Shojo manga and women’s literature in Antebellum America as well as an information session in the capacity of current Dean of International center of Keio University.（https://www.mita-hyoron.keio.ac.jp/literary-review/202111-3.html）

After serving as headmaster of  Keio Academy of New York in the western hemisphere in 2022, antipodal to Keio University, Mita in the Far East, my world was turned upside down. My mission here is to promote the idea of Triculture consisting of American, Japanese and Keio cultures and transfigure the students into representative transpacific citizens, whose bilingual and tricultural competence will undoubtedly open doors to future possibilities either in Japan or in the United States. The primary purpose is to make it easier for them to get adjusted or re-adjusted to the transcultural life of going back and forth between Japan and the States. I consider Keio Academy of New York’s unique cultural festival “Shofusai” to be a powerful instrument for achieving this purpose.

Thus, I contributed this year’s Shofusai message to its program and uploaded the final version on my FACEBOOK page:

 

The Mission of the Cultural Festival

Dr. Takayuki Tatsumi

(Headmaster, Keio Academy of New York)

 

Whenever war breaks out, I cannot help but recall Culture and Anarchy (1869) written by a Victorian intellectual Matthew Arnold (1822-88):

"The whole scope of the essay is to recommend culture as the great help out of our present difficulties; culture being a pursuit of our total perfection by means of getting to know, on all the matters which most concern us, the best which has been thought and said in the world."

Yes, culture means not only intellectual education but also a pursuit of your total perfection through the best of the human heritage that will enable us to get over serious crises. Therefore, I hope this year’s cultural festival “Sofusai” will also provide all the participants and the visitors with the best which has been thought and said at Keio Academy of New York.

 

文化祭の使命

巽　孝之

（慶應義塾ニューヨーク学院第十代学院長）

 

今日の世界は危機に満ちている。

そんな時、19世紀イギリスの批評家マシュー・アーノルド（1822-88）の主著『教養と無秩序』 Culture and Anarchy（1869年）のメッセージを思い出す。

「本論が目論むのはたった一つ、われわれが今日直面している難局を切り抜けるためには教養（Culture）こそ大きな助けになるだろうと推奨することだ。というのも、教養こそは、およそ人間が自らの関心領域においてこれまで思索し表現してきた世界最上のものを知ることにより、人間の全面的完成を追求するからである」。

この文脈において、 “culture”は「教養」と訳すほかない。しかし、よくよく読むと、教養が追求目的を達成するための手段として獲得すべき 「およそ人間が自らの関心領域においてこれまで思索し表現してきた世界最上のもの」というのは「文化」としての “culture”そのものだ。それは「文化祭」の精神にも通じるだろう。

　今年の祥風祭も「およそ慶應義塾ニューヨーク学院生が自らの関心領域においてこれまで思索し表現してきた世界最上のもの」とめぐり逢える現場になってほしいと、切に願ってやまない。

 

The first-ever joint events of Shofusai Culrutal Festival and Cherry Blossom Day on April 13th, 2024 (Saturday) turned out to be a great success, attracting a large number of visitors. I myself greeted a variety of guests not only in Headmaster’s Office but also in Matsushita Hall (Cafeteria) : Prof. Takafumi Akimoto of Konan University who majored in American Literature and received M.A. and Ph.D. from Keio University; Ms. Sayaka Kobayashi a.k.a. Biri-Gal of Columbia University’s graduate school (see my Headmaster’s Voice #32 “Biri-Gal Strikes Back”: https://www.keio.edu/about-us/headmasters-voice), Ms. Junko Kubo (freelance TV presenter and announcer), my niece Prof. Yukiko Tatsumi of Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (Russian History), Mr. Hidetoshi Takeda (editor-in-chief of Daily Japan New York), Prof. Takahiko Koyama of Keio University (Human Biology-Microbiome-Quantum Research Center), and Ms. Fumiko Machinaga (Education Network Association) . Mr.Takeda generously mentioned the event in the latest issue of his newspaper (https://www.dailysunny.com/2024/04/14/en240414/). After enjoying a demonstration of tea-serving, we were all intrigued by Zion’s dance performance at Speakers’ Hall.

Special thanks to Dr. Dusan Nesic, who welcomed these visitors at our renovated library. I believe he and Prof. Yukiko Tatsumi could spend a most agreeable time by discussing the strange vicissitudes of fortune in Eastern Europe and Russia. Without him we could not have fully enjoyed a truly tricultural festival.