Global COE Program - Kyoto University - In Search of Sustainable Humanosphere in Asia and Africa

 First, we will hold seminars and conferences to discuss and elaborate the sustainable humanosphere paradigm. Each project will hold main workshops in three stages, first in Asian and African countries we study, then in Japan, and finally in major centers of area studies in the West, so that we could get feedbacks from different disciplinary areas and perspectives. The results of our research will be published in the form of working papers, proceedings, and eventually refereed journal articles and edited volumes. It is envisaged that each project will produce two volumes, and with an introductory volume, nine volumes will be published in English as the main research outcome of this project. Corresponding Japanese publications will also be attempted.

 Second, we will improve on the existing “infrastructure” for research and training of this subject in several fronts. Since this is an interdisciplinary project, the basic infrastructure ranges from conventional written sources and historical materials to a diverse set of data base, field stations in Asia and Africa, large equatorial radars in Southeast Asia, and the website for researchers interested in our research.

 Third, if we obtain the results of material and energy flows in certain areas we already have good knowledge of and establish the utility of such a research, we envisage that, after the five-year project is completed, we may plan the establishment of a major international site (or sites) for laboratory research to make possible the more systematic investigation into material and energy flows in the tropics as a whole, in collaboration with the government of a host country.

  Finally, special emphasis will be placed on the training of young scholars. While we will invite a few outstanding scholars in the field to Kyoto to work with us for the duration of six months to a year, we will spend the majority of our resources to recruit young scholars from worldwide, train them both at Kyoto and on site, and work with them in seminars and workshops before they publish research results in internationally reputable places. 　We currently publish an on-line journal the Kyoto Review of Southeast Asia in English, Thai, Indonesian, Tagalog and Japanese, an academic journal Tonan Ajia Kenkyu (Southeast Asian Studies) in Japanese and English, and an academic journal African Study Monographs in English (also on-line). Those young scholars from abroad will also be encouraged to publish their research results in these journals.