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

230 PRIVATE ACADEMIES OF CHINESE LEARNING IN MEIJI JAPANand occasional overnight outings, and often members stayed intouch long after leaving. In some cases the professor even actedas their official go-between when they married. Thenumerous university clubs, with their hiearchies, strong groupties and often strict regimes, may also fulfil some of the functionsof the communal life in the former juku. The proliferation ofkenkyūkai, informal study groups devoted to research in aspecified area, may do the same. Besides, given the indifferentreputation of teaching at some universities, it may well be thatreal intellectual stimulation occurs there rather than in the formalteaching sessions. Could this be another example of thepreference for informal study over official schooling?During my work in Japan in 1999 I was fortunate to beintroduced to the Kyōikushi kenkyūkai, a study group for thehistory of education, which met once a month in the Kendōbunko, the private library of the late Ishikawa Ken and his sonMatsutarō, 57 both eminent scholars in the history of education.The library is open to the public on certain days of the week, andseveral study groups meet there regularly. A member gives apresentation of their work in progress, which is then discussedover tea. This is the pattern of study groups elsewhere, too, butthis one takes place in the extension of a private home andProfessor Ishikawa presides over it. On occasions when thegroup consists mainly of younger members who receive advicefrom him, it is easy to imagine, that the juku may have beensomething like this for older students.The examples just mentioned do not represent a consciousattempt to revive the juku. Other initiatives explicitely linkthemselves to the idea of the juku, for example at the privateuniversities mentioned earlier in this chapter. Reitaku University(its name comes from a passage in the Yi Jing or I Ging), thesuccessor of Hiroike Chikurō’s juku, is now part of aneducational complex including a high school, a middle school, abranch school in Gumma prefecture, the Institute of Moralogy, akindergarten, a business section with a publishing department,accommodation and catering services, a shop, a mail ordercompany, a golf club and an overseas developmentorganization. 58 The chancellor of the university is HiroikeMototada, presumably Chikurō’s descendant. In 1991 a newSenkōjuku was founded. Its education is based on developing theindividual, combining knowledge with morality, studying in aself-governing community and practicing mutual service and