Tradition within and beyond the Framework of Invention: Case Studies from the Mascarenes and Japan Susanne Klien and Patrick Neveling (eds.)

Hobsbawm and Ranger's "invention of tradition" is among the most popular concepts in the social sciences. The paradigm is appealing for its potential to analyse political, cultural and economic conflicts. Regardless of whether property rights, religious practices or political programs are affected, traditions are often used to shore up the rights of the parties whose interests are at stake. This, however, means that research on the "invention of tradition" is not always appreciated by those whose actions and political agendas are analysed and deconstructed. Individuals or groups disputing any of the above named issues often seek to boost their positions with reference to "their" traditional rights. If social scientists then deconstruct such claims, they will often experience anything but positive reactions from their "research subjects". This kind of research, however, is important because the deconstruction of traditions helps to question strategies of reactionary and anti-emancipatory movements. Instead, following the "invention of traditions" paradigm may show ways to open and emancipatory negotiations of social conflicts. But this also means that the paradigm of invention itself has become part of social practice and political debates.

This volume, which originated from an interdisciplinary workshop that was organized at the Graduate School "Society and Culture in Motion" at the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg in January 2007, follows up on this trajectory of one classical social sciences paradigm. The authors of the seven papers collected in this volume are social anthropologists and Japanese studies scholars. The focus on case studies of Japan and the Mascarene Islands (especially Mauritius and Réunion) furthermore sheds light on the persistent permanence of colonial imagination in social science research. For on the one hand, Japan has been ascribed millennia of ancient traditions as done conventionally in European images of high cultures in the Far East. On the other hand, Mauritius and Réunion have for a long time been presented as uncharted territory on the world map of local traditions in accordance with European fantasies about unexplored colonial paradises.

On more than 200 pages the reader is taken on a comprehensive foray through historical eras and various political, economic and cultural contexts. Insightful examples from the Japanese tourism industry, urban festivals in Kyoto, bestsellers on the Japanese book market, world music in Réunion and the deportation of the residents from an island archipelago in the Indian Ocean to give way to the biggest U.S. base in the region help to illustrate the entanglement of theoretical debates in the social sciences and mundane discussions about the politics of tradition.
The volume contains papers by Steffen F. Johannessen, Carsten Wergin, Cornelia Reiher, Susanne Klien and Christoph Brumann,with two introductory texts by Patrick Neveling and Susanne Klien.

Susanne Klien and Patrick Neveling (eds.): Tradition within and beyond the Framework of Invention: Case Studies from the Mascarenes and Japan. Orientwissenschaftliche Hefte 28/2010, Centre for Interdisciplinary Area Studies – Middle East, Africa, Asia (ZIRS), Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg. ISSN 1617-2469, 204 pages, 13,50 €. Please see http://www.zirs.uni-halle.de/publikationen-owh-28.php for the table of contents and details on how to order the volume.