Randolph-Macon College Professors Todd Munson (Asian studies) and David Clark (mathematics) recently received grants from the AAS Northeast Asia Council and the Japan Foundation, New York. The grants, totaling nearly $10,000, will be used to host the Conference on Sangaku and Wasan at Randolph-Macon (SWARM), which will highlight traditional Japanese mathematics. The conference will be held April 28-29, 2017 on campus and is free and open to the public. Students and teachers are especially encouraged to attend. 

The Conference on SWARM, which will take place in Birdsong Hall, will be held in honor of Hidetoshi Fukagawa, co-author of Sacred Mathematics: Japanese Temple Geometry and foremost expert on sangaku tablets—wooden tablets inscribed with Japanese geometrical problems or theorems.

The Culture of Mathematics 
“The conference on SWARM will provide an opportunity for scholars, educators and students to share and learn about the fascinating culture of mathematics in Tokugawa Japan (1603-1868), also known as wasan,” explains Clark, who met Fukagawa when he and his students traveled to Japan in 2015 during January Term. “Of particular interest will be the phenomenon of sangaku, colorful wooden tablets inscribed with geometrical problems that were hung in shrines and temples throughout the country. We are hoping to foster a community with broad interests in wasan and a diverse collection of viewpoints to contribute to its study and dissemination, and to encourage collaborative relationships across the disciplinary boundaries. Art, religion, history, and mathematics all play important roles in understanding this topic.”

Invited Speakers
The conference will feature speakers from all over the world: Hidetoshi Fukagawa (Daidou and Kogakkan Universities, Japan); Rosalie Hosking (University of Canterbury, New Zealand), author of Sangaku: A Mathematical, Artistic, Religious, and Diagrammatic Examination; Mark Ravina (Emory University), author of the forthcoming book Japan’s Nineteenth Century Revolution: A Transnational History of the Meiji Restoration; Tony Rothman (New York University), co-author of Sacred Geometry: Japanese Temple Mathematics; and J. Marshall Unger (Ohio State University), author of Sangaku Proofs: A Japanese Mathematician at Work.