Project Leader
Mark Chen (PhD candidate) Harvard University
Project
Wasan, or traditional Japanese mathematics, was a unique field that dominated the numerical world of early modern Japan. Apart from its academic achievements, such as an alternative system of calculus and a comprehensive structure of geometric knowledge, it was instrumental to building the outstanding financial literacy and numeracy amongst Edo-period commoners, bureaucrats, and businesspeople. This project maps out the genealogy of different schools of mathematicians that span more than two centuries, their academic contributions, and scholastic rivalries with one another.
Research Objectives
This project uses tools available in JBDB to organize the structure of wasan mathematics as an early modern knowledge network. Through tracking the biographical information of scholars from different schools, along with their interactions with others in the field, it aims to construct an image of the social, epistemological, and academic structures of early modern Japan. While much of this information is available through more than a century of historiography, it wishes to present it in an easily retrievable format.