Private Academies of Chinese Learning in Meiji Japan: The Decline ...

THE DECLINE OF THE JUKU 175around the same time. Many teachers at the domain schools hadtheir own juku, and from 1828 the domain gave financial supportto juku. 2 Nihon kyōikushishiryō lists 66 juku for Akita (Akita kenshilists another 19), 3 more than, for example, Kyoto (34), Hyōgo(52), Chiba (52), Aichi (43), Fukuoka (50) and Kumamoto (45) andabout as many as Hiroshima (65). Nearly all of them werekangaku juku. None specialized in Western learning. 4 In 1869 thedomain schools, which had been closed during the Restorationwars, reopened and the other schools too continued to operate.This changed with the Education Law of 1872. The execution ofthe policies was the responsibility of the prefectures, and theauthorities in Akita prefecture were particularly strict in theirinterpretation of the central government order. All schools wereordered closed and few received permission to reopen.Prospective teachers had to acquire a licence by passing a publicexamination, which included a range of subjects. A teachertraining school was established, which produced its firstgraduates in 1874. 5 In practice it was almost impossible fortraditional kangaku scholars to pass the examination.The reason for the prefecture’s radical approach was given inan order to juku teachers on 30 April 1874 to report the closure oftheir juku by 31 May. The order alleged that the juku did not teachthe basic skills of reading, writing and numeracy and hinderedprogress by encouraging empty discussions of hollow principlesand that teachers confused the people by criticizing the newelementary schools. Teachers at juku had already been told tostop criticizing the new schools by a previous order on 25February. 6The regulations were apparently ignored. A prefectural orderon 30 August 1875 warned that teachers found teaching secretlywould be identified and charged a fine, although parents wereallowed to teach their own children at home. A similar order wasissued on 9 October 1876. 7 In 1875, an official of the Ministry ofEducation visited the school district of Tsuchisaki and reportedthat there were very few pupils at the public school there,because many children were attending illicit kajuku. 8 A report byinspectors from the Ministry of Education in 1875 deplored thealleged stupidity and backwardness of the people of Akita andstated that the prefecture’s effort to create schools met either withopen defiance or secret attendance of juku. 9 Another report twoyears later again criticized the backwardness of the people anddescribed the government’s efforts, but conceded that the