# Nishi Amane and the Japanese vocabulary of philosophy

95.6 s · Narrator: Frederick Surrey; Japanese reader: Hijiri

Japanese and Chinese both write “philosophy” 哲學. Nishi Amane took 希 from Zhou Dunyi’s line that the scholar aspires to be worthy and named the study kitetsugaku in 1861, dropped the 希 by 1870, chose tetsugaku over rigaku to keep it apart from Confucian learning, and printed it in 1874 in a sentence that runs over a page turn. His lectures also gave Japanese its words for induction, deduction, definition and proposition; Chinese books took up the word from 1889, Wang Guowei argued in 1905 for keeping the Japanese terms, and two of those words replaced the ones Ricci and Xu had made for Euclid.

| Time | Voice | Line | On screen |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 0:00.66 | Narrator | Japanese and Chinese write philosophy with these two characters. | The last page of text of Nishi Amane’s Hyakuichi shinron (1874), close on its first column, printed through the 3 px screen. On “these” 哲學 lights. |
| 0:03.86 | Narrator | A translator named Nishi Amane made the word. | The camera eases back until the column and its neighbours read; 哲學 stays lit. |
| 0:06.92 | Narrator | Nishi trained as a Confucian scholar before he learned Dutch and English. | The frontispiece of Mori Ōgai’s 西周傳 (1898), Nishi late in life, and the globe: a pin on Tsuwano, an arc east to Edo, 1853. |
| 0:11.26 | Narrator | The eleventh-century Chinese philosopher Zhou Dunyi had written that the scholar aspires to be worthy. | Zhou Dunyi’s Tongshu in a Japanese printing of 1666: the chapter title 志學第十 lights, then 士希賢, then 希 alone. |
| 0:18.58 | Narrator | In 1861 Nishi used that line to name philosophy kitetsugaku, the study that aspires to wisdom. | The Tongshu page holds with the type 希 in its box; on “used” the page leaves as 希 moves, and 哲 and 學 print in beside it, with “aspire”, “wise” and “study” under them. Heading: The study that aspires to wisdom. |
| 0:26.78 | Narrator | By 1870 he had dropped the first character, and the word was tetsugaku. | 希 lifts out of the frame and 哲學 closes up. |
| 0:31.98 | Narrator | The direct translation would have been rigaku. | 理學 sets beside 哲學 and drops back to grey. |
| 0:35.80 | Narrator | Nishi wrote that he chose tetsugaku to set philosophy apart from Confucian learning. | Nishi’s note of 1873 set as type; 今哲學ト譯シ東洲ノ儒學ニ分ツ lights, and the clause before it drops to grey. |
| 0:42.16 | Narrator | The word reached print in a book of 1874. | Leaf 35 recto of Hyakuichi shinron, vol. 2, its last column ending ヒロソヒー譯シテ. |
| 0:45.38 | Narrator | The sentence that names it runs over a page turn. | Heading: The sentence that names it. |
| 0:48.24 | Reader | ヒロソヒー、譯シテ哲學ト名ケ <br>*Subtitle:* “philosophy, which I translate and name tetsugaku” | Each printed character of ヒロソヒー譯シテ lights as the reader says it; the leaf turns, and 哲學ト名ケ lights on leaf 35 verso. The reader is given 訳 in kana (やくして). |
| 0:53.78 | Narrator | His lectures of 1870 and 1871 had also given Japanese words to induction, deduction, definition and proposition. | 百學連環, “the linked circle of the hundred studies”, and the four words 歸納 kinō, 演繹 en’eki, 定義 teigi and 命題 meidai, in grey from the cut; they brighten on “had also given” and light on their English words. Heading: Induction, deduction, definition and proposition. |
| 1:03.54 | Narrator | In 1889 a Chinese book about Japan explained the word as the Western study of human nature. | Fu Yunlong’s 游歷日本圖經 (1889): a light runs down 有所謂哲學者西學中之性學也. |
| 1:10.26 | Narrator | In 1905 the scholar Wang Guowei wrote that Japanese scholars had fixed such terms first, so Chinese could use them. | Wang Guowei’s sentence of 1905 set as type, lit in two phrases. Heading: Japanese scholars had fixed such terms first. |
| 1:19.26 | Narrator | Two words first recorded in Nishi’s lectures replaced the words Matteo Ricci and Xu Guangqi chose for Euclid in 1607. | The Jihe yuanben: 界說 lights on “Matteo”, 題 on “Xu Guangqi”, and a slip printed 定義 slides down over 界說. The take’s pause after “Two words,” is closed to 0.25 s. |
| 1:28.32 | Narrator | Chinese now uses them for definition and proposition. | A slip printed 命題 slides in over 題, and the caption adds 題 → 命題. Heading: Definition and proposition. |
| 1:31.63 | No voice |  | The globe, the pin on Tsuwano, Nishi Amane’s former residence, and the General Translation lockup. |

Times are where each line starts in the final, read from the film's own audio.