Research Frontiers
Early English printed books and the unique features of individual copies
Satoko Tokunaga, Associate Professor
Faculty of Letters, Keio University
July 17, 2018
Satoko Tokunaga, Associate Professor, Faculty of Letters, Keio University.
Currently, many libraries in the United States and Europe are undertaking projects to record copy-specific information about historically important books and publish the results on open access databases available to the public. Prof. Satoko Tokunaga is collaborating with colleagues at Keio University and overseas to build a database that caters both to assembling historical and cultural information as well as comprehensively analyzing it.
Joining the project are Dr. Takako Kato, a senior lecturer at De Montfort University in Leicester, UK, Prof. Mari Agata of the Faculty of Letters, Keio University, and Assistant Professor Mayumi Ikeda of the Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University. "Currently, we are focusing on 15th-century English books. Then, we will record the history written in each printed book using the markup language XML to create a database that can be searched, including images," says Tokunaga.
To-date, Tokunaga's team has mainly been collecting data in cooperation with colleagues around Europe and the United States. In the future, they plan to cross-analyze data registered in multiple repositories to shed new light on books as cultural resources.
Contact
Keio University Global Research Institute (KGRI)
2-15-45 Mita, Minato-ku, Tokyo 108-8345 Japan
E-mail : kgri@info.keio.ac.jp
http://www.kgri.keio.ac.jp/en/index.html
Further information
Satoko Tokunaga, Associate Professor
Faculty of Letters, Keio University
http://k-ris.keio.ac.jp/Profiles/129/0012858/prof_e.html
Recent research
As of July 17, 2018
Satoko Tokunaga's research activities cover the following areas:
- 2007-2009: A Census of the Early English Printed Books（1473-1600）in Japanese Libraries
- 2010/10-Present: Rubrication in Caxton's Early Books
- 2011/12-Present: Caxton and Beyond: Copy-Specific Features of English Incunabula (with Dr Takako Kato, De Montfort University)
- 2013-Present: Editing Caxton's The Golden Legend (with Profs Mayumi Taguchi and John Scahill)
Related publications
Books
- Satoko Tokunaga and Takako Kato, Gutenberg Meets Digitization: The Path of a Digital Ambassador, York Medieval Press, pp. 297-305, 2014.
- Satoko Tokunaga, Emprynted in thys manere: Early Printed Treasures from Cambridge University Library, Cambridge University Library, pp. 94-95, 2014.
- Satoko Tokunaga, Anchoritism in the Middle Ages: Texts and Traditions, University of Wales Press, pp. 163-75, 2013
- Satoko Tokunaga, Scribes, Printers, and the Accidentals of their Texts, Frankfurt am Main, pp. 157-76, 2011
Articles
- Satoko Tokunaga, "Rubrication in Caxton's Early English Books, c. 1476-78", Incunabula on the Move: The Production, Circulation and Collection of Early Printed Books, ed. Ed Potten and by Satoko Tokunaga, Transactions of the Bibliographical Society, 12/ 1, 58-78, 2014.
