Edward Warren Clark and Early Meiji Japan: A Case Study of Cultural Contact

Abstract

Protestantism in the early Meiji era has long interested Western students as an aspect of the encounter between Japan and expanding European culture in the nineteenth century. Edward Warren Clark (1849–1907) and other American laymen, who went to Japan as teachers and not society missionaries, played a significant role in the process during the 1870s. Edward Warren Clark is known to Western scholars of the Meiji period for his contribution to the development of English-language education and as the author of books based upon his experiences in Japan. In his letters to William Elliot Griffis (1843–1928), Clark reveals opinions concerning Japan and Japanese acquaintances, and the hopes and tribulations of teaching Western studies. These are interesting in themselves as one American's views, and they also shed more valuable light upon Japanese attitudes toward the West between 1871 and 1875. In this study of cultural contact, particular attention will be paid to Clark's evangelistic work in Shizuoka and later in Tokyo, and the influence of his Christian ideas and misconceptions upon certain Japanese, especially Nakamura Masanao (Keiu, 1832–91).