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> Richard B. Bernstein wrote: > The controversy over ARMING AMERICA is but the latest example of a > growing tendency to attack controversial books via the news media >rather than in appropriate scholarly venues, allowing for measured framing of >the controversy, mutually respectful discussion of the merits of the case, >and,most important of all, an opportunity for the scholar being pilloried >to make a full response and, if need be, a full defense.>> Well, we have an interesting case here in Japan that has some tangential relevance to the media and history (well, archaeology at least). Archaeology and history receive a large amount of attention in the popular media here in Japan. Television, magazines, newspapers, public forums, etc. One other piece of information that is important, is that peer-review is not the same here as in the USA. Last November, the media uncovered that fact the archaeologist Fujimura was planting artifacts at the Middle Palaeolithic site of Kamitakamori in northern Honshu. He and several others had been excavating the site for the past several summers; each summer was a new fascinating discovery, ranging from caches of stone tools to last year, possible evidence of houses dating back at least 100,000 years (hey this is big stuff for archaeologists). Fujimura at other sites in Japan had also had other big finds; approximately 50% of the Middle Palaeolithic finds in the past decade had been found by him alone. Well, the media catching him planting the artifacts has caused scholars to review his other site excavations. While he confessed to planting artifacts at one other site, investigations by teams of other archaeologists have demonstrated several of his other spectacular finds were also forgeries. You can read several of the newspaper reports in English at http://www.nbz.or.jp/eng/palaeo.htm The media attention has been good IMO. It has forced a more serious look at how research is done and how peer-review is done in Japan. Maybe the same can come out of the AMERICAN AMERICA debate. (Which also forces me to ask, what kind of peer review was done on this book?) Best, Mark Hall Niigata Prefectural Museum of History
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