Essentialist paradigm and deterministic exceptionalism in/of Japanese Studies (some hypotheses)

Abstract

This text offers a deconstructive analysis of the relationship between literature, archives, and modernity in Japan, focusing on the symbolic rupture associated with General Nogi’s suicide and its repercussions on fictional and intellectual production, particularly that of Mori Ōgai. It argues, as a theoretical prologue, that the Meiji Era cannot be understood as a linear process of modernization, but rather as a field of disputes between political, aesthetic, and ideological projects in constant tension. In this context, Mori Ōgai’s literature and debates emerge as privileged spaces for exposing these contradictions, highlighting the lack of consensus among intellectuals and power groups. The text also problematizes the use of archival materials, suggesting that both the excavation of new materials and the reinterpretation of already known sources reveal the impossibility of having already determined all possible historical interpretations of the events following 1868. Finally, the text engages with debates on community, self-Orientalism, and Japanese exceptionalism, challenging stage-based and teleological approaches, and seeking to propose a more critical reading of the role of the intelligentsia in the production and maintenance of ideas that become naturalized over time.