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Papers by chris goto-jones
Kyoto Journal, 2023
a meditation on Kamo no Chōmei's 'escape' from the city to his 'ten-foot square' hut
Journal of Chan Buddhism, 2023
Making use of a case study in the contemporary deployment of Zen Buddhism as a framework for envi... more Making use of a case study in the contemporary deployment of Zen Buddhism as a framework for environmental activism and chaplaincy, this article considers the cultural politics and philosophical importance of 'how Chan became Zen,' revealing some tendencies towards the hegemony of Japanese cultural preferences in the representation and practice of Zen today. Concretely, it explores the significance of cherry trees as emblems of this tendency. Rather than simply reflecting a cultural or aesthetic preference for cherry blossom in Japanese culture, this article goes further to suggest that exhibiting a preference for any particular species of tree at all might be a distinctive feature of the development of Chan into Zen in the Japanese context, and that this actually represents a philosophical and doctrinal shift in the content of the paired traditions. If true, this observation suggests that the contemporary move to return Chan (rather than Zen) to the center of scholarly and practical attention is more than a correction of names in the international marketplace, but it also has some concrete implications for Buddhist practice today, including in the practice of eco-chaplaincy. Does the (re)turn to Chan mean that we have to give up the privileging of cherry trees? Even more provocatively, if it is necessary to surrender this privilege, might it also be necessary to re-cast Dōgen, the founder of Sōtō Zen in Japan, as Chan descendant rather than primarily a Zen ancestor? Sitting with the Death of a (Cherry) Tree
Kyoto Journal, 2023
a playful exploration of myōe's letter to an island
Cambridge University Press eBooks, Jul 5, 2016
Political Philosophy in Japan
Nishida, the Kyoto School and Co-Prosperity, 2005
Page 1. Christopher Goto-Jones Beyond Utopia: New Politics, the Politics of Knowledge, and the Sc... more Page 1. Christopher Goto-Jones Beyond Utopia: New Politics, the Politics of Knowledge, and the Science Fictional Field of Japan1 Abstract: Recognizing that, since the end of the Cold War, political theorists around the world ...
The Philosophy of Mixed Martial Arts, 2021
Early Popular Visual Culture
Re-Politicising the Kyoto School as Philosophy, 2007
Preface, James W. Heisig The Kyoto School and the History of Political Philosophy: Reconsidering ... more Preface, James W. Heisig The Kyoto School and the History of Political Philosophy: Reconsidering the Methodological Dominance of the Cambridge School, Chris Goto-Jones Turns to and from Political Philosophy: The Case of Nishitani Keiji, Bret W. Davis The Individual and Individualism in Nishida and Tanabe, Matteo Cestari Constituting Aesthetic/Moral National Space - The Kyoto School and the Place of Nation, Yumiko Iida Time, Everydayness and the Specter of Fascism: Tosaka Jun and Philosophy's New Vocation, Harry D. Harootunian What was the 'Japanese Philosophy of History'? An Inquiry into the Dynamics of the 'World-Historical Standpoint' of the Kyoto School, Christian Uhl Romanticism, Conservatism and the Kyoto School of Philosophy, Kevin M. Doak The Definite Internationalism of the Kyoto School: Changing Attitudes in the Contemporary Academy, Graham Parkes Resistance to Conclusion: Kyoto School Philosophy under the Pax Americana, Naoki Sakai
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, 2002
... The orientation of the debate is neatly summarized by Huntington's response to it: If No... more ... The orientation of the debate is neatly summarized by Huntington's response to it: If NotCivilizations What? ... on both side of this debate seem to be willing to do so, then an equally pressing question must be: if not a clash, then what? This paper will be in four broad sections. ...
The Oxford Handbook of Japanese Philosophy, 2019
This chapter explores the philosophical and ideological landscape of the so-called bushidō (way o... more This chapter explores the philosophical and ideological landscape of the so-called bushidō (way of the warrior) tradition in Japan. It contends that bushidō has often been misunderstood or misrepresented as only a simple code of conduct tied to the historical samurai. Instead, this chapter seeks to reveal the richness of bushidō as a sophisticated and complex field of philosophical inquiry into questions of ethics, justice, being, violence, conflict, and death. Drawing on intellectual and cultural traditions as diverse as Buddhism, Shintō, Confucianism, the Kyoto School, and currents of Western philosophy, bushidō’s full philosophical importance emerges only in the twentieth century. While the political and ideological dangers of aspects of bushidō were clearly manifest in this period, its philosophical potential was only just beginning to be understood.
Graphic Revolution and Politics in the twentyfirst Century Techno cultural products have formed a... more Graphic Revolution and Politics in the twentyfirst Century Techno cultural products have formed an increasingly visible and important part of the Japanese public sphere in the 1990s. Goto-Jones places the contemporary media forms anime and manga in a social and political context and argues that graphic media can be used as an important source of theoretical insight into processes at change in the twenty-first century.
Kyoto Journal, 2023
a meditation on Kamo no Chōmei's 'escape' from the city to his 'ten-foot square' hut
Journal of Chan Buddhism, 2023
Making use of a case study in the contemporary deployment of Zen Buddhism as a framework for envi... more Making use of a case study in the contemporary deployment of Zen Buddhism as a framework for environmental activism and chaplaincy, this article considers the cultural politics and philosophical importance of 'how Chan became Zen,' revealing some tendencies towards the hegemony of Japanese cultural preferences in the representation and practice of Zen today. Concretely, it explores the significance of cherry trees as emblems of this tendency. Rather than simply reflecting a cultural or aesthetic preference for cherry blossom in Japanese culture, this article goes further to suggest that exhibiting a preference for any particular species of tree at all might be a distinctive feature of the development of Chan into Zen in the Japanese context, and that this actually represents a philosophical and doctrinal shift in the content of the paired traditions. If true, this observation suggests that the contemporary move to return Chan (rather than Zen) to the center of scholarly and practical attention is more than a correction of names in the international marketplace, but it also has some concrete implications for Buddhist practice today, including in the practice of eco-chaplaincy. Does the (re)turn to Chan mean that we have to give up the privileging of cherry trees? Even more provocatively, if it is necessary to surrender this privilege, might it also be necessary to re-cast Dōgen, the founder of Sōtō Zen in Japan, as Chan descendant rather than primarily a Zen ancestor? Sitting with the Death of a (Cherry) Tree
Kyoto Journal, 2023
a playful exploration of myōe's letter to an island
Cambridge University Press eBooks, Jul 5, 2016
Political Philosophy in Japan
Nishida, the Kyoto School and Co-Prosperity, 2005
Page 1. Christopher Goto-Jones Beyond Utopia: New Politics, the Politics of Knowledge, and the Sc... more Page 1. Christopher Goto-Jones Beyond Utopia: New Politics, the Politics of Knowledge, and the Science Fictional Field of Japan1 Abstract: Recognizing that, since the end of the Cold War, political theorists around the world ...
The Philosophy of Mixed Martial Arts, 2021
Early Popular Visual Culture
Re-Politicising the Kyoto School as Philosophy, 2007
Preface, James W. Heisig The Kyoto School and the History of Political Philosophy: Reconsidering ... more Preface, James W. Heisig The Kyoto School and the History of Political Philosophy: Reconsidering the Methodological Dominance of the Cambridge School, Chris Goto-Jones Turns to and from Political Philosophy: The Case of Nishitani Keiji, Bret W. Davis The Individual and Individualism in Nishida and Tanabe, Matteo Cestari Constituting Aesthetic/Moral National Space - The Kyoto School and the Place of Nation, Yumiko Iida Time, Everydayness and the Specter of Fascism: Tosaka Jun and Philosophy's New Vocation, Harry D. Harootunian What was the 'Japanese Philosophy of History'? An Inquiry into the Dynamics of the 'World-Historical Standpoint' of the Kyoto School, Christian Uhl Romanticism, Conservatism and the Kyoto School of Philosophy, Kevin M. Doak The Definite Internationalism of the Kyoto School: Changing Attitudes in the Contemporary Academy, Graham Parkes Resistance to Conclusion: Kyoto School Philosophy under the Pax Americana, Naoki Sakai
International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, 2002
... The orientation of the debate is neatly summarized by Huntington's response to it: If No... more ... The orientation of the debate is neatly summarized by Huntington's response to it: If NotCivilizations What? ... on both side of this debate seem to be willing to do so, then an equally pressing question must be: if not a clash, then what? This paper will be in four broad sections. ...
The Oxford Handbook of Japanese Philosophy, 2019
This chapter explores the philosophical and ideological landscape of the so-called bushidō (way o... more This chapter explores the philosophical and ideological landscape of the so-called bushidō (way of the warrior) tradition in Japan. It contends that bushidō has often been misunderstood or misrepresented as only a simple code of conduct tied to the historical samurai. Instead, this chapter seeks to reveal the richness of bushidō as a sophisticated and complex field of philosophical inquiry into questions of ethics, justice, being, violence, conflict, and death. Drawing on intellectual and cultural traditions as diverse as Buddhism, Shintō, Confucianism, the Kyoto School, and currents of Western philosophy, bushidō’s full philosophical importance emerges only in the twentieth century. While the political and ideological dangers of aspects of bushidō were clearly manifest in this period, its philosophical potential was only just beginning to be understood.
Graphic Revolution and Politics in the twentyfirst Century Techno cultural products have formed a... more Graphic Revolution and Politics in the twentyfirst Century Techno cultural products have formed an increasingly visible and important part of the Japanese public sphere in the 1990s. Goto-Jones places the contemporary media forms anime and manga in a social and political context and argues that graphic media can be used as an important source of theoretical insight into processes at change in the twenty-first century.
Can playing videogames lead to ethical transformation or even enlightenment. In this first versi... more Can playing videogames lead to ethical transformation or even enlightenment. In this first version of the Virtual Ninja Manifesto, we asked gamers around the world for their views ... Illustrated by Siku (Marvel, 2000AD), this is the pdf version of the limited edition print run that accompanied the original public exhibition in 2014.
Navigating between society’s moral panics about the influence of violent videogames and philosoph... more Navigating between society’s moral panics about the influence of violent videogames and philosophical texts about self-cultivation in the martial arts, The Virtual Ninja Manifesto asks whether the figure of the ‘virtual ninja’ can emerge as an aspirational figure in the twenty-first century.
Engaging with the literature around embodied cognition, Zen philosophy and techno-Orientalism it argues that virtual martial arts can be reconstructed as vehicles for moral cultivation and self-transformation. It argues that the kind of training required to master videogames approximates the kind of training described in Zen literature on the martial arts. Arguing that shift from the actual dōjō to a digital dōjō represents only a change in the technological means of practice, it offers a new manifesto for gamers to signify their gaming practice. Moving beyond perennial debates about the role of violence in videogames and the manipulation of moral choices in gamic environments it explores the possibility that games promote and assess spiritual development.
The promise of magic has always commanded the human imagination, but the story of industrial mode... more The promise of magic has always commanded the human imagination, but the story of industrial modernity is usually seen as a process of disenchantment. Drawing on the writings and performances of the so-called 'Golden Age Magicians' from the turn of the twentieth century, Chris Goto-Jones unveils the ways in which European and North American encounters with (and representations of) Asia - the fabled Mystic East - worked to re-enchant experiences of the modern world. Beginning with a reconceptualization of the meaning of 'modern magic' itself - moving beyond conventional categories of 'real' and 'fake' magic - Goto-Jones' acclaimed book guides us on a magical mystery tour around India, China and Japan, showing us levitations and decapitations, magic duels and bullet catches, goldfish bowls and paper butterflies. In the end, this mesmerizing book reveals Orientalism as a kind of magic in itself, casting a spell over Western culture that leaves it transformed even today.
This is a Leiden University MOOC hosted through Coursera: Interest in meditation, mindfulness, a... more This is a Leiden University MOOC hosted through Coursera:
Interest in meditation, mindfulness, and contemplation has grown exponentially in recent years. Rather than being seen as mystical practices from ancient Buddhism or esoteric philosophy, they are increasingly seen as technologies rooted in evidence from psychology and neuroscience. Mindfulness has become the basis for numerous therapeutic interventions, both as a treatment in healthcare and as a means of enhancing well-being and happiness. For millions around the world, mindfulness has become a life-style choice, enhancing and enriching everyday experience. Mindfulness is big business.
But, what actually is mindfulness? Is it really good for you? Can anyone learn it? How can you recognize charlatans? Would you want to live in a mindful society, and would it smell like sandalwood? What does it feel like to be mindful? Are you mindful already, and how would you know?
Evolving from the popular Honours Academy course at Leiden University, this innovative course combines conventional scholarly inquiry from multiple disciplines (ranging from psychology, through philosophy, to politics) with experiential learning (including specially designed ‘meditation labs,’ in which you’ll get chance to practice and analyze mindfulness on yourself). In the end, the course aims to provide a responsible, comprehensive, and inclusive education about (and in) mindfulness as a contemporary phenomenon.
During the production of this course, we have been supported by Willem Kuyken, Director of the University of Oxford Mindfulness Centre, and Stephen Batchelor, co-founder of Bodhi College. And we gratefully acknowledge the contributions made by Mark Williams, co-developer of Mindfulness-based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), and Rebecca Crane, Director of the Centre for Mindfulness Research and Practice at the University of Bangor.