Project overview

The aim of this project is to construct an archive of photographs stored at the National Museum of Ethnology (Minpaku) which were taken in Thailand for the First Synthetic Research of the Culture of Rice-cultivating Peoples in Southeast Asian Countries (1957-58).

By undertaking a follow-up field study, we aim to gather and add new information to the basic information for the photographs taken in 1957-58 during the original study. Through this, we will also seek to build collaborative relationships with the source community pictured in the photographs, as well as local researchers.

Research results and papers from the original study will be linked to the archives, along with information about the artifacts stored at Minpaku. In addition, the Kanagawa University Institute for the Study of Japanese Folk Culture houses administrative documents from the Nihon Minzokugaku Kyokai (later Shibusawa Foundation for Ethnological Studies), which organized and dispatched the research team for the study, so these will also be linked to the archives as related materials.

Based on photographs taken by the research team in the latter half of the 1950s, by creating a new academic hub which comprehensively links interviews from the follow-up field study, research papers, artifacts and administrative documents, we will explore potential ways in which researchers, local communities and society in general can collaborate and share with each other.