Estudios Complutenses de Asia Oriental

Lenguas y familias lingüísticas de Asia oriental en el Diccionario de la Lengua Española. Revisión y propuestas de reforma y de inclusión de nuevas definiciones

Santiago J. Martín Ciprián — 2025-07-02

Lenguas y familias lingüísticas de Asia oriental en el Diccionario de la Lengua Española. Revisión y propuestas de reforma y de inclusión de nuevas definiciones

The meaning of Goguryeo’s mural funerary iconography and its relation to the paintings of the Han Dynasty and the Six Dynasties period

Pablo Cadahía Veira — 2025-09-22

The present paper aims to explain the religious significance of the tomb murals of the Goguryeo Kingdom (37 BC – 668 AD). For this purpose, the main categories and typologies of these images will be identified and separated. Since the iconography of this Korean kingdom bears a strong relationship to the religious images of the Chinese tombs of the Han Dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD) and the Six Dynasties period (220 – 589 AD), they will be referred to when necessary, as they help to understand the function of the Goguryeo murals.

Dressing in hispanic-asian attire in the mid-17th century: jewelry, weapons, and luxurious accessories of governor Don Diego Fajardo

Valeriano Sánchez Ramos — 2025-07-28

The baroque attire constitutes a very relevant visual language of the elites, especially in the peripheries of the empire, where other cultures converged with their own cultural representations. In the Spanish Empire, the first globalization uniquely characterized the Indians of Asia, where aesthetic transfers competed with Eurocentric ones. The case of don Diego Fajardo, governor of the Philippines, allows us to discover these characteristics in his own attire, which becomes the second skin of the character. Little treated by historiography, accessories and complements constitute fundamental pieces of clothing, since they emphasize the meanings and signifiers of its purpose.

El Reino de las mujeres en Viaje al Oeste: aspectos culturales chinos de un pueblo femenino

Xie Fang — 2025-09-30

As a masterpiece of classical Chinese literature, Journey to the West (西游记) is a paradigmatic representative of the narrative of deities and demons. In the episode of the Female Kingdom, Wu Cheng’en constructs a feminine utopian world. In both text and visual representation, the Female Kingdom in Journey to the West continues to show how, beneath the appearance of female primacy, it is still difficult to escape the social structure of patriarchy rooted in Chinese society. Therefore, this article takes the novel and its film adaptations as objects of analysis and examines the female characters and the structure or narrative form of the Female Kingdom in Journey to the West within the framework of semiotics. The analysis reveals that in both the linguistic and iconic stratum, the apparently matriarchal textuality reproduces the patriarchal archetypes of the Confucian social imaginary.

La estética musical en las óperas revolucionarias chinas

Juan Carlos Moreno-Arrones Delgado — 2025-10-23

Entender la realidad estética de la dimensión musical de las óperas revolucionarias chinas conlleva ahondar en el fenómeno que la Revolución Cultural supuso para China en la década de los sesenta del siglo pasado. Es preciso entender también que la producción artística obsesionó tanto a las clases dirigentes que reorientaron esfuerzos nacionales para la consecución de unos fines estéticos que ellos entendían como básicos para hacer la revolución dentro de las masas de obreros, agricultores y soldados. Así pues, se presenta en este artículo el estudio pormenorizado de las características fundamentales para entender el plano musical de las óperas revolucionarias chinas, haciendo un barrido general de lo tradicional para, sobre él, cimentar la renovación que llevó a cabo el Partido Comunista de China de toda la dramaturgia. Sólo entendiendo que la finalidad no era puramente propagandística, sino que había un horizonte estético claro, se podrá vislumbrar el titánico esfuerzo que un puñado de hombres formados dentro y fuera del país asiático llevó a cabo en un período menor a una década renovando siglos de tradición semiótica.

The landscape identity of the Longjing temple and its relation with the tea cultivation

Antonio José Mezcua López — 2025-10-15

In this article the relationship between Longjing temple and tea through its historical evolution is examined using the methodologies of landscape studies. It demonstrates how specific geographical conditions give rise to a transformation of the landscape from a material point of view and in the different narratives that are built around it. In this sense, we will demonstrate that the fame of Longjing tea raise from the Buddhist landscape identity of the site and later on will parallel the resurgence of West Lake as famous landscape and tourist destination in Ming and Qing periods.

The Origin and Development of Chinese Language Studies in Spain from the Perspective of Sinology

Li Qiuyang 李秋杨 — 2025-07-03

: Chinese language education and studies in Spain originated from Spanish sinology. Early Spanish missionary is the first group of sinologists and language experts in Europe. In the process of contacting, learning and studying Chinese, they constructed the field of Chinese language research that integrates Chinese and Spanish language studies. Chinese language studies experienced the rise and fall with the development of Spanish Sinology. The research contents, theoretical perspectives and research methods of Contemporary Spanish Chinese tend to be diversified, and Chinese research literature has high linguistic research value. This article reviews the evolution process and key figures of Chinese Studies in Spanish Sinology since the 16th century, and identifies the development context and research fields of Chinese language studies conducted by the Spanish linguists, so as to reveal the important role that Chinese language plays in the exchange and mutual understanding between Chinese and Spanish civilizations, and provide a historical reference for the development of contemporary Chinese education in Spain.

Back to the future or to the past? On the Former Buddhas and the Buddhist messiah, Maitreya, in the Konjakumonogatarishū

Efraín Villamor Herrero — 2025-09-30

The historical figure of Gautama Buddha was exalted by his followers. The interpretation that he had understood the Dharma gave rise, even before our era, to the cult of the Seven Former Buddhas (過去仏) in Indian Buddhism. These served to sanctify the figure of the historical Buddha. Some of them are described in the medieval Japanese text Konjakumonogatarishū (KON), an anthology with a marked Buddhist catechetical intent. This work analyzes the narrative of the Seven Former Buddhas present in the KON, with the aim of understanding why their presence is so limited in the Japanese religious context. The results show the transmission of the Indian narrative about the Former Buddhas, as well as a paradigm shift—through contact with the religions of Central Asia—that enshrined the hope of future salvation in the figure of the Buddhist ‘messiah’: Maitreya. This temporal leap in the KON reflects the progressive loss of prominence of the Former Buddhas, among whom Gautama Buddha himself was relegated over time.

The demon slayer sword Dōjigiri Yasutsuna: Japanese Folklore and Legend of Demonic Entities Through Art History.

Marcos Andrés Sala Ivars — 2025-09-16

Those beings whose evil exceeds the thresholds of the human, we usually attribute the qualification of demons. However, the Japanese interpretation of such a phenomenon, distances itself and diversifies from our Judeo-Christian conception. In this way, we will find in ogres (oni), ghosts (yūrei) and other supernatural beings (yōkai), some examples of entities that torment the human world. At this point the heroes intervene, mortal human beings, but momentarily acquire a status of equality with the demons when they face them in combat. The samurai, the Japanese warrior nobility, assume this role, and their swords (nihontō) will be the item that will forge the legend, cutting the space that separates this universe from the one "on the other shore". This article search the analysis of the written sources that, directly or indirectly, relate to this sword, with the piece itself being the ultimate reference, using, in particular, the example of the Dōjigiri Yasutsuna sword. Thus, this masterpiece positions itself between myth and legend. The conclusions will justify this nihontō as one of the most important art works in Japanese history.

Deep South’s Zen: Flannery O’Connor, Reviewer of the Oriental

José Manuel Correoso Rodenas — 2025-07-02

In 1959 and 1963, Flannery O’Connor published two extremely interesting approaches to zen and the methods to master it. To do that, she composed two reviews that emphasized the traditional values of this Buddhist school for the development of everyday life in the United States. Those years, O’Connor wrote the aforementioned reviews, being the first published in 1959 and remaining the second unpublished until 1983. The main objective of the present article is to study how O’Connor, a devout Southern catholic, reflected about the postulates of zen, assimilating them in her ordinary life, through the access to the books she reviewed.

Una guía para el estudio de la cultura ‘Li’ (en chino: 礼)

Hanxuan Zhao — 2025-07-02

With a history spanning more than five millennia of civilization, China has a fundamental component rooted in its cultural tradition: the culture of ‘Li’. A deeply historical concept that has exerted great influence on the evolution of Chinese society and history, standing out for the richness and complexity of its content when analyzing the classical literature of the Asian giant.

Given this situation, the publication of "A study on the family ritual culture of the Jia Mansion in Dream of the Red Chamber" emerges as an invaluable contribution. It stands as a highly relevant academic resource for researchers interested in the subject. This literary classic provides the reader with comprehensive information on Li culture, covering aspects such as etiquette, rules, ceremonies, and family customs. Through detailed explanations, the origin and evolution of these practices are explored, as well as the relationships between the characters, social taboos, and norms of etiquette according to the different classes.

Edición y traducción de «Los chicos guapos de Japón», de Matsuda Osamu

Jorge Rodríguez Cruz — 2025-07-17

Traducción del texto Edición y traducción de:

Matsuda, O. (1978). Nihon no bishōnentachi: shintōfu o otte 「日本の美少年たち・神統譜を追って」. JUN, 12 (2), 69-72.