James Murdoch

James Murdoch

By Saki Kurihara

Presentation

James Murdoch was born in Scotland, Aberdeen city in 1856. He grew up in a poor general store’s family. He studied a lot and he entered Aberdeen University. After graduation, he went to Oxford University, University of Göttingen, University of Paris and the college of Wooster. When he was 24 years old, he took a post as Greek professor at Aberdeen University at this young age. In 1882 he got offer from Grammar school in Australia and then he seized the chance and went to Australia.

He became aware of the concept of socialism while staying in Australia. Eventually, he quit his job and he threw himself into the world of journalism.

At that time in Australia, left-wing workers insisted to wash out the Chinese immigrants. He tried to find out what is happening to the Chinese immigrants so he got on a ship as a low-grade passenger with the immigrants.

“From Australia and Japan” is his book which was written based on his experience in the ship. In the book, he found out that left-wing Australian workers treated Chinese immigrants badly. He wrote about their evildoing and grief of the Chinese.

After finishing investigative action, he made a brief visit to Japan to meet his friend. However during his trip to Japan he was absolutely charmed by Japanese people, culture and atmosphere so he decided to be an English teacher in Japan.

In 1889 he taught at Tokyo Daiichi Koutou Chugakou (now Tokyo University) and he met Soseki Natsume there. Soseki was struck by James Murdoch and he wrote book about him. In this book, Soseki said he sometimes visited Murdoch’s home so it seems that they were in a good relationship.

One day, Murdoch suddenly handed his resignation because he heard that his friend planned to create new ideal communism country in Paraguay. He got there immediately and helped his friend to realize the new country but it failed. He came back to England with a sore heart.

At that time, Japanese people were engaged in creating modernized country with Westerners’ cynical smile but they endured Westerners and made efforts. Murdoch heard that and he started studying about Japan to find a new way how to make a country.

In 1894 he visited Japan and worked as a teacher again. In 1904 he got married to Japanese woman, Takeko, and moved to Kagoshima prefecture.

He concentrated on studying about Japan and finally, he completed writing three books, “A History of Japan”. These books are on the subject of Japanese history from 1543 (When the Lusitanian came to Japan with guns) to 1868 (End of the Tokugawa Shogunate).

Moreover, he wrote many books about Japan in his life and he introduced Japan abroad. For instance, “47 Ronin” is one of the famous books introducing Japanese Bushi [warriors, or samurai - Ed]. The book’s sources were provided by Shigeno Yasutsugu. He is the first Japanese historian who analyzed the incident. In the book, James Murdoch analyzes the Tokugawa society.

His books are read by many foreign people even now. Probably, there are academic theses analyzing Tokugawa society using his books.

In 1917 he moved to Sydney and promoted exchanges between Japan and Australia. He died in Australia in 1921, planning a trip to Kagoshima..


Discussion

①If you were James Murdoch, how would you promote exchanges between Japan and Australia or other countries?

One student said that they would try to spread European information in Japan or take pictures about Japan. Another student said “When I go back to my country, I would bring something Japanese and introduce Japanese culture or become Japanese teacher”.

②If you were Murdoch, what subject could you teach for foreign students in other country?

Many students said they could teach English.


Reflection

Throughout Caroline’s class, I realized that I don’t know foreign people who contributed to Japan a lot.

In this presentation, I picked James Murdoch and researched about his life and achievement. He devoted most of his life to introducing Japan and promoting exchanges between Japan and overseas. Thanks to him and his books, Japan was known by many foreign people and they thought positively about Japan at that time. Even now, his books are read by many people so I think he is still an influence on many people all over the world.

He played a significant role and I think we should study about foreign people who contributed to Japan a lot like James Murdoch.


References

Blog “Seisouan”
http://sea.ap.teacup.com/seiasouan/31.html

James Murdoch
http://www.dhs.kyutech.ac.jp/~ruxton/James_Murdoch.htm

The 47 Rônin are Introduced to the World
http://www.columbia.edu/~hds2/chushinguranew/retelling/Murdoch.htm

Soseki Natsume “Murdoch’s Japanese History”
http://www.aozora.gr.jp/cards/000148/files/2375_13562.html

James Murdoch

James Murdoch

By Shiori Haba

Do you know that Natsume Soseki, considered Japan's greatest modern writer, studied English? Yes, he learned English at university. Who was the teacher? The answer of this attractive question was in Australia. His name is James Murdoch.

In 1986, James Murdoch was born in Stonehaven in Scotland. He went to Aberdeen University to study. In 1881, he moved to Australia and lived here from this time to 1889. When he lived in Australia, he became a journalist and wrote about the class of Australian laborers. In 1889, he was invited to Japan and began to teach English and European history in high school. He married Okada Takeko when he taught in a commercial high school (now Hitotsubashi University). In 1917, he went back to Australia and he became an adviser of policy to Japan. Then he could visit Japan many times.

Murdoch had several faces. One was as a teacher and another face was as a journalist. He was also an adviser of policy to Japan. When he came to Japan, he taught at high school and one of his students was Natsume Soseki. At same time, he published some books. One of his books was “Ayame-san” which was the romance story. He also published books about history of Europe, Australia and Japan, but his way of writing was sometimes not good for people to read because his style of writing was unpleasant and sometimes there were strange comical parts. In addition, he became an adviser of policy to Japan, so he could come to Japan every year to get the information about Japanese people and how foreign policy was changed. Therefore, he was a mediator between Australia and Japan.


We had the discussion and I could get some interesting opinions. We talked about two topics. First one was “If you would work for foreign policy, how would you like to help Japan become close friends with the foreign countries?” There were two main opinions. First of all, student A and student B wanted to try to understand foreign culture and introduce Japanese culture for foreign people. In addition, they wanted to learn not only foreign culture but also Japanese culture to introduce about it. Secondly, student C wanted to try to have Japanese people and foreign people get to know each other. For example, they wanted to organize some events and give the chance to exchange their cultures and get to know each other more than before. I think all ideas are fantastic for making friends with foreign countries. The most interesting point is that they want to learn Japanese culture. I agree with this because in order to understand culture of foreign countries, we have to know our culture more.

The second topic was that “If you could show off Japanese strong points for foreign countries, which point would you like to introduce?” There were three opinions. The first one was that they want to introduce about Japanese traditional and modern culture such as temples in Kyoto and high technology in Tokyo. Secondly, student B wanted to show Japanese characteristics such as being kind to other people. The last one was about four seasons. Japan has spring, summer, autumn and winter, so it is tasteful. I like these opinions because they look at the good points and they are pride of Japanese culture and characteristic. I think it is important to know and find good points our country to know other countries. Therefore, we need to know ourselves more than before if we would like to understand foreign countries.


Through this project, I could learn the connection between Japan and foreign countries especially Australia by researching about James Murdoch. We learned about some travelers to Japan in Meiji and Taisho period, but I could learn and understand Japan though these foreign people. I think that researching foreign people who are related to Japan and looking at Japan through their eyes is a better way to know more about Japan. We thought about this in the discussion and I got various opinions. I would like to consider these opinions when I research the history of Japan and foreign countries. I’m interested in the history of the connection between Japan and foreign countries, so I would like to continue to learn it.


References

James Murdoch (2014) Wikipedia Retrieved July 3, 2014 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Murdoch_(Scottish_journalist)

Australian Dictionary of Biography Murdoch, James (1986) D.C.S Sissons Retrieved July 3, 2014 from http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/murdoch-james-7690

我輩は日豪パイオニアある (2010) 考えRoo Retrieved July 4, 2014 from
http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/murdoch-james-7690