Newsletter No. 326
Information-Announcement
July 12, 2006

 

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Shingetsu Electronic Journal of Japanese-Islamic Relations

Overview

The Shingetsu Institute announces the launch of a new academic journal -- the Shingetsu Electronic Journal of Japanese-Islamic Relations (SEJJIR) -- which will focus on Japanese-Muslim relations and related topics. Japan's relations with the Islamic world are an exciting field of study that will help enrich understanding of Japan's historical, political, economic, and cultural role in the world. The topic also merits special attention in view of the increasing Japanese involvement in regions of the world with predominantly Muslim populations. The field remains understudied. The subject of Japanese-Muslim relations also encompasses transnational and international history. It enables us to understand aspects of Japanese society, politics, and culture from a different angle.

SEJJIR welcomes papers on past and present relations between Japan and the Muslim world. Suggested main themes are:

1. Papers on contemporary issues in politics, economics, investment, trade, finance, social and cultural affairs; including Japanese interest and involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan as two crisis areas. We also include sociological studies of present-day Japanese and Muslim images of each other, and identity formation.

2. Papers on historical subjects, especially the modern period, although earlier periods are not excluded. At present, even the formal diplomatic relations of Muslim countries with Japan have not been studied in great depth compared to Japan's relations with the Western countries. Intellectual, cultural, economic relations also promise to yield an uncharted view of Japanese modern history, and that of modern Muslim societies as well.

Content

Scholarly papers on any of these suggested topics and beyond are quite welcome. Manuscripts should be sent to the Editor-in-Chief, Selcuk Esenbel (esenbel@boun.edu.tr), after which they will be reviewed for quality and suitability. Papers of any length are welcome so long as they meet scholarly standards of quality.

The language of SEJJIR is English, but we encourage non-native speakers of English to make proposals even if their English abilities are not complete. One of the purposes of this journal is to make available in smooth and readable English scholarship that currently exists only in other languages. In some cases, it is possible to submit articles to SEJJIR which are written in Japanese, and we ourselves will take responsibility for the English translation work, with the authors' approval.

We are currently planning to post the journal biannually (March and September) at the Shingetsu Institute website. All papers will be available on PDF files to ensure proper formatting. The first volume is scheduled for release in March 2007.

Deadlines for Volume One

September 30, 2006 -- Deadline for one-page proposals
December 31, 2006 -- Deadline for completed manuscripts

Editorial Board

Editor-in-Chief:

Selcuk Esenbel, Bogazici University

Editors:

Christopher Len, Uppsala University
Michael Penn, Shingetsu Institute
John Edward Philips, Hirosaki University
Keiko Sakai, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
Keiko T. Tamura, The University of Kitakyushu
Shintaro Yoshimura, Hiroshima University