Sustainability in Early Modern China through the Evolution of the Jesuit Accommodation Method

Inmaculada Rodriguez-Cunill, Miguel Gutierrez-Villarrubia, Francisco Salguero-Andujar and Joseph Cabeza-Lainez
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Inmaculada Rodriguez-Cunill: Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Sevilla, Calle Laraña 3, 41003 Sevilla, Spain
Miguel Gutierrez-Villarrubia: Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Sevilla, Calle Laraña 3, 41003 Sevilla, Spain
Francisco Salguero-Andujar: Campus de El Carmen, School of Engineering, University of Huelva, 21007 Huelva, Spain
Joseph Cabeza-Lainez: Department of Composition, School of Architecture, University of Sevilla, 41012 Sevilla, Spain

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 21, 1-25

Abstract: This article clarifies the often overlooked facts attributed to European missionaries in Asia, especially Jesuits, who acted as catalysts of a kind of nuanced acculturation named Accommodatio (adaptation). To a great extent, they became harbingers of culture and science more than faith itself to the dismay of many, including the Roman Church. Such cultural and scientific transference was actually two-pronged, for simultaneously they presented in Europe unique findings related to language, e.g., the Chinese characters (considered to be the sole natural language), geography, cosmology and even governance. Here we try to prove that such procedure contributed positively to the modern scientific notions of sustainability and to provide the kind of accoutrements that model the modern world as we know it. However, in the process, many Jesuits clearly became sinified and eventually acculturated.

Keywords: Asian architecture; Asian heritage; China; Japan; urban design; garden and landscape design; reformation of the arts (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:21:p:11729-:d:663373

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