User:Historian

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Contents 1 About me 1.1 General 1.2 Rugby union 1.3 Scottish origins 1.4 Worldwide family 1.5 Favourite quotations 2 My wiki-interests 2.1 Japan-related 2.2 Other 3 Images which I have uploaded 4 Wiki-Honour received 5 My non-wiki publications 5.1 Books 5.2 Press releases

[edit] About me

[edit] General

Hello! My full name is Ian Charles Ruxton. (Call me 'Ian', or 'Mr. Ruxton' if you prefer to be formal, or 'Professor Ruxton' if you want to embarrass me!) My home page away from wikipedia is here. I was born in Lima, Peru on November 16, 1956. (By coincidence I share this birthday with Brendan Laney and all these notable people.).I grew up in England from age one to 18 briefly in Meols on the Wirral peninsula and mostly in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire where I attended Cheltenham College.

I was elected a scholar of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge in December 1974, matriculated in October 1975 and graduated with a BA - later changed to MA in the time-honoured but rather confusing fashion - from Cambridge University in June 1978. I read modern languages (French and German) for Part One (one year) and law for Part Two (two years) in the Cambridge Tripos. Thus my degree took, you will no doubt agree, three years in total. QED! (Don't you love acronyms ?!)

I lived until age 31 in England. I have lived in Japan continuously since April 1, 1988 (and no, this is not an April fool!). I lived for the first six years in the Kansai area (Awaji island, Ashiya and Kobe, in that order). Since April 1, 1994 I have lived in Kitakyushu, a large city in Kyushu. (Tempus fugit...)

My work, you ask? After a brief dalliance with accountancy which ended due to what might be termed "irreconcilable differences" by members of that learned profession (i.e. I was very bored!) I became a teacher of French and German in English schools (Merchant Taylors' School, Crosby, Uppingham School and Hurstpierpoint College over a period of about seven years). When I came to Japan I switched to teaching English, which I now do at Kyushu Institute of Technology and have done since 1994. (Yes, since I moved to Kitakyushu...) I am now an associate professor (jokyouju　助教授), promoted from lecturer (koushi　講師) with effect from October 1997.

[edit] Rugby union

Away from wikipedia I have a Japanese Rugby page - a kind of rugby blog I suppose - which I started way back in 1996, and which I still update sometimes when I have time and the spirit moves me. (The Six Nations Championship usually rouses me from my cybernation! ;-) I have recently joined Wikipedia:WikiProject Rugby union. I still play rugby occasionally for Japanese veteran teams in Fukuoka prefecture, and I also have played football sometimes with my local Kitakyushu pub team, Xelha F.C., though this is really to keep fit for the rugby and daily life! (As I have recently discovered, I am definitely NOT a serious soccer player! ;-)

[edit] Scottish origins

Like a lot of other Wikipedians I have recently discovered userboxes. One of these below states that I am Scottish, another that I am proud to be so. How Scottish am I? Well, I helped in the registration of the Ruxton family tartans some years ago and three of my grandparents (I had four, as most people do ;-) were Scots from Aberdeen and Glasgow. My Glaswegian grandfather attended Hutchesons' Grammar School. My father was at Loretto School and my mother at Edinburgh University, but I have never been to school or lived in Scotland. (You either feel your ethnic origins or you don't, I suppose. I definitely do!!) I have visited Scotland several times, but have never been back to South America where I was born - yet.

[edit] Worldwide family

I also have family relations living near Christchurch in New Zealand which I have visited twice, and in South Africa though I have not been there yet. I have two brothers and a sister, all living in the United Kingdom. One brother works for Oxfam, the other for London 2012. There are also many others with the same family name of Ruxton throughout the world, both close and distant relations. My wife is Japanese by the way.

[edit] Favourite quotations

Ndiwelimalambo enamagama.
(Xhosa language - "I have crossed famous rivers." See the Xhosa wikipedia, one of the many wikipedias in many different languages.)

十人十色。Juu Nin, To Iro
[Japanese saying.] Literally: "Ten People, Ten Colours."
Meaning: Everyone is different and unique.

It sure ain't perfect, but it sure is perfectible.
I just made this one up myself about wikipedia.

My userboxes This user tries to do the right thing. If they make a mistake, please let him or her know. en This user is a native speaker of English. This user's time zone is UTC+9. This user enjoys writing. 10000+ This user has over 10,000 (mostly minor) edits so far on the English wikipedia ! Cor Blimey... This user loves The Beatles. This user remembers using a rotary dial telephone. This user is a Scorpio. 猴 This user was born in the year of the Monkey. This user is an omnivore. This user eats potatoes. This user is a Doctor Who fan. This user is a member of WikiProject Rugby union. This user plays rugby union. Oh Flower of Scotland This user supports SCOTTISH RUGBY JPN This user supports the Japan national rugby union team This user plays football with hands only when tending goals. This user does not smoke. This user teaches at a university or other institution of higher education. ACADEMIC JOURNAL This user has had his/her work published in an academic journal. This user is a Caian and very proud of the fact! This user is a Cantabrigian. This user comes from Scotland.

[edit] My wiki-interests

Solemn Declaration: I approve of, and strive sincerely to uphold, the Policies and Guidelines and the Five Pillars of Wikipedia.

The full list of my user contributions since November 16, 2004 when I first adopted the user name Historian is here:
Special:Contributions/Historian. My edit count is here.

Policies: I like to give headings to longer articles to improve their readability. I confess that I don't really understand the fuss made about multiple categorization: Scottish people are also British and so belong in both categories etc. (Life is complicated and more interesting this way! ;-)

Here is a selection (just a few) of the wikipedia pages
which I have started so far:

[edit] Japan-related

Anglo-Japanese relations

1. Anglo-Japanese relations
2. Sir Ernest Satow - my main research in the non-wiki world
3. Kikuchi Dairoku
4. Suematsu Kencho
5. Inagaki Manjiro
6. Japanese students in Britain
7. Duncan Gordon Boyes
8. Foreign cemeteries in Japan
9. Hugh Fraser
10. Henry Dyer
11. Imperial College of Engineering
12. Thomas Blake Glover
13. Richard Henry Brunton
14. Joseph Henry Longford
15. British Japan Consular Service
16. Yokohama Archives of History
17. Yamao Yozo

Japan

1. Monorails in Japan
2. Technical education in Japan

Japanese Rugby

1. Japan Rugby Football Union
2. Japan national rugby union team
3. Top League
4. Microsoft Cup
5. Sanix World Rugby Youth Tournament
6. Katsuyuki Kiyomiya
7. IBM Big Blue

Kitakyushu and environs

1. Kitakyushu Monorail
2. Kokura Castle
3. Riverwalk Kitakyushu
4. Space World
5. StarFlyer
6. New Kitakyushu Airport
7. Kyushu Institute of Technology.
8. Global Arena
9. Honjo Stadium
10. Kitakyushu Film Commission

[edit] Other

1. Donald MacAlister
2. Cheltenham College
3. Alec Broers
4. Anglo-Chinese relations
5. West Melton, New Zealand
6. Edmund Gonville

I have started a few more including such categories as "British people in Japan", "Scottish people in Japan", "British diplomats" (now very large), "British diplomats in East Asia", "Diplomatic incidents", "Old Cheltonians" and "Japanese national universities", though one or two of them anonymously before I very briefly used the name "Roxymusic". I have since settled on the name "Historian", which I prefer, and I intend to stick with this one. (After all it includes my first name "Ian". Neat, eh? ;-)

I have written quite a bit of the following pages: Scotland national rugby union team and individual players, Scottish Rugby Union, Kitakyushu and the wards of Kitakyushu, Treaty of Shimonoseki, Tsuwano etc.

And I have migrated quite a few of the VC holders from the Victoria Cross Reference website to wikipedia. (Duncan Boyes was one of these.) See Wikipedia:WikiProject Victoria Cross Reference Migration.

The following pages which I started have survived a Vote for Deletion (VfD):
Scottish rugby commentators and journalists
Andrew Miller (rugby player)

[edit] Images which I have uploaded

I have uploaded various photos taken by me and a few other images. See User:Historian/images. See also my contributions to Wikimedia Commons.

[edit] Wiki-Honour received

Giving you a barnstar for your work dealing with Japan. Take care, εγκυκλοπαίδεια* 05:12, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Note: This barnstar has been transferred from my talk page. --Historian 00:50, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] My non-wiki publications

[edit] Books

In the real world I also write books, edit or translate them. See here. (Note: Hold on to your hat, you are about to leave wikipedia! Sayonara, Farewell and Haste ye back...) Or if you prefer, you are welcome just to look at the free previews:

1. Satow's Peking Diaries: Volume One: Volume Two

2. Satow's Japan Correspondence - Volume One

3. Japanese Students at Cambridge University in the Meiji Era, 1868-1912 (translation)

4. ULTIMATE CRUSH: Waseda University Rugby, Leadership and Building the Strongest Winning Team in Japan (translation)

[edit] Press releases

ULTIMATE CRUSH
Satow's Peking diaries
Japanese students at Cambridge

This is a Wikipedia user page. This is not an encyclopedia article. If you find this page on any site other than Wikipedia, you are viewing a mirror site. Be aware that the page may be outdated and that the user this page belongs to may have no personal affiliation with any site other than Wikipedia itself. The original page is located at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Historian.