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February 19, 2018
Introduction
to the worlds of Japanese popular culture
Igor Prusa, Ph.D. et Ph.D.
The Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Oriental Institute
https://cas-cz.academia.edu/IPrusa
igorprusa@gmail.com
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 Japanese popular culture – importantly including the subcultural worlds –
has not only continued to evolve at home - it has also attracted a broad
following overseas
 While reaching global audiences on a large scale, Japan’s pop-power
gives the country a new cultural impact which complements Japan’s
economic progress
 This cultural impact informs the official political agenda (e.g.
governmental strategy of “cool Japan”, or the use of manga/anime
characters for Japan’s military PR)
 Need to redefine the terms subculture and counterculture in Japan today
Why Japanese popular culture?
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The worlds of Japanese popular culture
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Traditional Japanese culture
- pure / elite / classical culture (e.g. nō, bunraku, buyō,
shamisen, ukiyoe, haiku, ikebana, sadō, nikki)
- folk / local / agrarian culture (e.g. spectacular and
transgressive festivals matsuri)
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Pre-modern roots
of Japanese popular culture
- Kabuki (Japanese dance-drama, began with Okuni in 1603)
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Other forms of
Japanese popular culture
- Music (e.g. enka, popular songs, Takarazuka)
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Other forms of
Japanese popular culture
- Cinema (e.g. traditional films, tokusatsu films, horrors)
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Other forms of
Japanese popular culture
- Arts (e.g. gekiga, manga, avant-pop)
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Other forms of
Japanese popular culture
- Performances (hanabi, kamishibai)
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Japanese
Mass culture
- related to modernity (i.e. the spread of the consumer
market, and the development of mass communication)
- “media culture”: commercial television and popular press
(emphasis on light entertainment, food, advertisements)
- “celebrity culture”: heavy emphasis on star icons, celebs,
non-celebrities, and their omnipresent gossip and scandal
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Alternative cultures
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cosplay gatherings at Harajuku
small theatres in Shimokitazawa
gay clubs in Shinjuku Nichōme
host/hostess clubs in Kabukichō
Marginal Cultures
- i.e. those practices that
re-present an intersection
of everyday life and artistic
expression (e.g. sentō,
manzai, graffiti, haikyo)
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Counterculture
- transgressive, asocial/antisocial,
political, ero-guro-nonsensical
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- globally acclaimed paintings of
Makoto Aida, Takashi Murakami,
Nara Yoshimoto or Toshio Saeki
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Analysing manga: methods
1. historical approach
– manga comes from a strong pictographic tradition in
Japanese cultural history
– origins of manga seen in emakimono (picture scrolls that
tell a story) and kamishibai (on-street paper performances)
– manga audiences: in 1950s-1960s: largely children; late
1960s: university students; 1990s: amateur manga boom
2. textual approach
– Japanese manga often effectively intermixes the moments
of beauty and violence
– manga as a form of “odorless culture” which tends to
extinguish (“oriental”) fragrances instead of adding them
– anime as dystopian and folkloric (Akira vs Spirited Away)
3. cultural approach
– consuming manga as a form of “low-art” escapism at times
of war or during postwar crises
– moe characters now expand within the Japanese and
global market, becoming a potent economic force
Japanese subculture
and the otaku phenomenon (1)
- located at the intersection of alternative culture and marginal
culture (occasionally with antisocial traits)
- otaku are obsessed with “unsocial hobbies”, they often live in
seclusion (hikikomori), or they join otaku events (at Akihabara)
- the virtual worlds of moe : affect/obsession for fictional
characters, collecting goods, admiring idols, visiting maid cafes
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- otaku seen as “failed men” who lean toward fictional contexts
that are often separated from everyday life
- historically, otaku shifted from antisocial subculture to branded
Japanese pop culture: from vilifying otaku (1980s–1990s) to
celebrating them as part of the “cool Japan” (2000s)
- Akihabara as the (public) “home” of otaku
Japanese subculture
and the otaku phenomenon (2)
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Analysing Akihabara:
Otaku, rorikon, moe
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Analysing Akihabara:
Otaku, rorikon, moe
- The urban spot of Akihabara represents a
bricolage of electric appliances, maid cafes, foreign
tourists, and domestic otaku
- Critical perspective: Akihabara as a space of
“cuteness fetishism” and “infantile capitalism”
- Akihabara is both geek and global; traumatic and
triumphal
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