Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: This article is based on the previously unused manuscripts from two Dutch university libraries to reconstruct the unmentioned contributions of Johannes Josef Hoffmann (1805–1878), the first professor of Chinese and Japanese Studies in the Netherlands, during the first Japanese diplomatic mission to Europe in 1862. The paper finds that Hoffmann’s interactions with the Japanese delegation were fundamental for the Dutch state to maximize the benefits of this event, especially in securing the Dutch higher education institutions as the first portals of Western natural and social sciences for the modernizing state of Japan.
Source: Dutch Crossing
Author: Minghao Zhang
Institution: University College London
Language: English
Topic: Japanese History and Culture
Subfield: Cultural Studies
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W4411031367