A Study on the Focus-Field Methodology in Country and Area Studies
The establishment of first-level interdisciplines such as Country and Area Stud-ies and National Security Studies is an important part of building a discipline system of phi-losophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics.To promote the discipline construc-tion and academic research of Country and Area Studies,it is necessary to actively con-struct methodologies that can be applied to the study of different countries and areas,which is an important prerequisite to ensure that Country and Area Studies can bring both special and universal knowledge,and thus consolidate its status as a discipline.Based on the Rela-tional Theory of World Politics,especially its advocacy of the relational ontology and zhongyong dialectics/epistemology,it can be considered that countries and areas form the perspective of Country and Area Studies are all entity-in-relations,and the focus-field methodology can be applied in the study of these entity-in-relations.Specifically,these en-tity-in-relations from the perspective of focus-field methodology have at least six characteris-tics:generative,holographic,transformative,correlated,multidimensional,and circle-layered.In terms of content,the focus-field methodology can be applied in Country and Ar-ea Studies,with a focus on exploring time,space,and the human world("the living world")and their generative changes related to specific countries and areas,examining the internal and external,left and right,up and down,and front and back relationships of specific countries or areas,as well as the dimensions of power-exchange,symbol-emotion,rule-creation,and strategy involved in their practices,and ultimately obtaining vivid and rich knowledge about different countries or areas.If it is applied to the study of the five Cen-tral Asian countries and the Central Asian region,it can be found that the focus-field meth-odology can indeed provide people with lots of new knowledge,viewpoints and perspectives on studying Central Asia.
country and area studiesentity-in-relationsmethodologyfocus-field methodologycentral Asian studies
NETL
NSTL
万方数据
