3rd Brazil-Japan Seminar on Cultural Environments

March 13 – 15, 2018

Co-organization:
Unit of Academic Knowledge Integration Studies of Kyoto University Research, 
Coordination Alliance (UAKIS-KURCA)
Glocal Information Platform of Japan-ASEAN Platform for Transdisciplinary Studies
Research Unit for Development of Global Sustainability (RUDGS-KURCA)
Kyoto University Graduate School of Advanced Integrated Studies in Human Survivability (KU-GSAIS)

Outline

“When do fields replace forests? When do cities and villages are born and die? When are forests restored?” 

This seminar will focus on the topic of continuity and decay in urban, rural and natural systems. The longevity of varied systems has depended upon dynamic interactions occurring at variable levels. Theoreticians trying to understand the dynamic interactions of systems, wrote about the lifetime of human settlements — urban expansion and retraction–, and interpreted the lifetime of human settlements with analogies to ecological cycles and evolutionary models. One of the earliest was the biologist Patrick Geddes, who linked the livability of cities with their surrounding regions. Geddes broke apart with disciplinary boundaries, tried to integrate biological notions to social theories, and became a great advocate of “regional survey”. Following, other figures engaged in interdisciplinary surveys about the death and life of American cities (Jane Jacobs); the natural history of urbanization (Lewis Mumford), and the existence of cities through networks (Christopher Alexander). In Japan, the sociologist Okui Fukutaro, since the Prewar period, began to link together a theory of life to the formation of cities. Nowadays, urban concentration has steadily increased, in parallel to an increment in environmental problems and the depopulation of rural areas. It is urgent to discuss rather urbanization is an inevitable outcome of human evolution as a species. Taking into consideration the trait of human nature to incessantly accumulate knowledge and create technology oriented towards the well-living of humans, urban concentration trend will probably continue. A deep reflection about the consequences and the potential alternatives to this is needed. 

We invite contributions that discuss how urbanization and development interfere in natural settings; the complex interactions between human and non-human living patterns; how societies and environments respond to that; and how associated transitions (spatial-social- cultural-environmental etc) are interpreted, evaluated and dealt with in Brazil, Japan or from a comparative viewpoint.

Presentations 

Brazilian Atlantic Forest: occupation, death and protection of forest remnants and biodiversity
Neli  DE MELLO-THÉRY (USP-EACH/IEA)

Earth’s system under transformation: Humans and geodiversity in an Anthropocene perspective.
Ricardo FRAGA PEREIRA (UFBA-IGEO)

Lifetime of human occupations in Amazonia: rethinking human presence and landscape
transformation.
Anne RAPP/ Claide MORAES (UFOPA-ICS)

Life Cycle Of Brazilian Cities.
Herve THÉRY (USP-EACH/ CNRS-CREDA)

Center, Centrality and Consumption in Middle-Sized Cities.
Eliseu SPOSITO (UNESP-IGCE)

Traditional Farming Systems on the Steep Slopes in Mountainous Areas of Tokushima.
HAGIWARA Hachirō (Shikoku U-FMIS)

Intercomparison survey among cities for the sustainable use of surface water and its impact of untreated wastewater in the river / lake basin system.
YAMASHIKI Yōsuke (KU-GSAIS)

Multiple benefits assessment of the clean energy development in Asian Cities.
Hooman FARZANEH (KU-IAE)

Brazilian Metropolitan Natural Areas: Dissonances and Interactions between Rural and Urban on Macro Metropolitan Context.
Roberta FONTAN (KU-CSEAS)

Program

Poster