すうがく

　すうがく the japanese word for mathematics. My primary interest is in fact mathematics so naturally I became interested in the Japanese mathematical tradition. While I had seen the names of famous Japanese mathematicians sprawled across my various textbooks such as (中山、たかぎ, こだいら）and known about the impressive array of awards given to Japanese mathematical institutions, I never knew about the origins of their mathematical communities and how exactly it related to the much more familiar traditions in America, Russia, France, and Germany. Well why is Japan's mathematics so interesting? Unlike other so called non-western countries such as India and China which have produced many amazing mathematicians the majority of them carry out their work in communities in the west and as such been shaped by the ideas and the traditions their. Japanese mathematics on the other hand has remained isolated, with an entirely self-sufficient community with a more limited interaction with the west. As a result of this, many unique and interesting ideas that seem somehow peculiarly Japanese have been produced, they posses a certain strangeness and phenomenal amounts of obscene yet beautiful creativity. In mathematics, there exist two main divisions: that between algebra which finds its basis in the abstract and analysis/geometry which finds its basis in more concrete objects. Japanese mathematics has been marked by a mastery of using extremely abstract ideas to elegantly prove very concrete and fundamental facts in both geometry and analysis. The stage on which these great feats have been performed are the fields of arithmetic geometry, algebraic geometry, representation theory, and ideas in algebraic analysis (a field which most pioneered by Japanese mathematicians) These ideas have driven forward mathematics in ways that had previously never been conceived. Japanese mathematics is somewhat reflective of Japanese society, which though I have no first hand experience with, seems to me a society that is forged out of abstract principles and rules that have very real consequences on the way people act and interact with the world, again a the application of the abstract to the concrete. It is amazing to me how large the scope of Japanese culture is. Almost every aspect of my life I am able to find something so unique and fascinating in its representation in Japanese culture.