UNLIMITED HORIZONS

UNLIMITED HORIZONS?At the Center for the Study of World Civilizations 限りなき地平線??世界文明センターにて

　As you will see from perusing the pages of this booklet, we have assembled here, in the short time since we began, a rather amazing array of teachers, scholars, artists and guest lecturers. But an educational institution is not a Hall of Fame. It is not for the fame of these people that we have brought them here.

　A university is a place of encounter. Here we encounter ideas, people and dreams that would most probably have passed us by had we not had the good fortune of coming in contact with them.

　The primary role of education is to bring young people into contact with these ideas and people. The dreams will be their own.

　When we are young, our world is limited in space and time: Our neighborhood is the whole world; this week, an age. But gradually our world grows, and time expands, back into the past. Teachers are our guides on this journey into space and time.

　Our goal at the Center for the Study of World Civilizations is to grasp the horizon of both space and time and take it as far as it will go in the imagination of the student. The horizon in the student’s imagination is, I believe, unlimited.

　If there is one thing that I would entrust the future of Japan to it is the imagination of its young people. We are here to stimulate and stretch that imagination to its limits…and beyond.

　Roger Pulvers, Head of the Center

　http://www.cswc.jp/index.php

　

PIONEER

　pioneerは、「新分野の開拓[開発]者、草分け」「先駆者」。

○Practical Example

　“Fermi was a pioneer in the field of nuclear physics.”

　“Yes, he was one of many pioneers.”

　「フェルミは原子物理学の先駆者だった」　

　「ああ、その分野を切り拓いた人はたくさんいたが、彼もそのうちの一人だ」 　

　Enrico Fermi（1901-54）は、イタリア生まれのアメリカのの原子物理学者。1938年ノーベル物理学賞受賞。原子炉の実用化、フェルミ系統の発見、β 崩壊の理論などで知られる。

●Extra Point 　

　動詞to pioneer（「開拓する、（道路などを）開く」「（新分野を）切り開く、開拓する、……の開拓[率先]者となる」）もよく使われる。

◎Extra Example

　“Arthur C. Clarke pioneered satellite communication.”

　“Yes. He wrote about it before anybody was thinking it possible.”

　「アーサー・Ｃ・クラークは、衛星通信の分野を切り拓いた」

　「ああ、誰も具体化できると思ってなかったときに、そのことを記事にしたんだ」