Man'yōgakushi no Kenkyū reconsiders the history of Man'yōshū scholarship not as a single path of progress toward modern knowledge, but as an intellectual practice shaped by the politics, culture, and ideas of each era. Covering the early Heian period through the Edo period, it traces the field through manuscripts, reading practices, commentary, and the work of the scholar-monk Sengaku.

It reconsiders Man'yō scholarship within the cultural and intellectual structures of each period.