Newswise — Hirokazu Miyazaki is a professor of Anthropology at Cornell University and studies the social science of hope in Japan. He offers insight on the recent natural disaster in his native country.
Note to editors: Miyazaki is fluent in both English and Japanese.
He says:
“There is a widely shared urge to take action in Japan and elsewhere. This is definitely a sign of hope, an indication of solidarity in which people are willing to share the pain. But my research on hope points to a different kind of hope that I feel that we all need at this moment. That is the hopefulness of a rested mind.
“Anthropological and sociological research on the nature of hope shows again and again that hope cannot be reduced to either action or non-action. It is neither active nor passive. In confronting uncertainty, hope demands that we at least temporarily give up our constant quest for information, knowledge and certainty. It then gives us a moment of rest that our mind desperately needs for further thought and action.”
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