JAWS 2007

In the urban landscapes of cities like Osaka, Kobe, Kyoto, and Tokyo, various kinds of lights are seen and thought about. Some landmarks are lighted up at night for conveying further beauty to the images of cities, or perhaps for showing its importance. In the recent use of LED (Light Emitting Diode) and eco-friendly lightings, one may feel change in urban lights seen in events and public spaces. Neon lights and some other kinds of artificial lights are used in signs, advertisement, and message boards in public urban landscapes. Some became famous and a kind of landmarks. Nowadays some artists make art works of lights, and these could be seen in public spaces. Sometimes artificial lights are seen like a flood of lights in cities. On the other hand, lights of fires are used in some traditional festivals. In summer, people enjoy seeing firework, and in winter, Christmas illuminations. In this presentation, I concentrate on the urban lights seen in public spaces as part of urban landscapes, and reflect on the roles and the characteristics of these. The lights (both artificial and natural) are more than physical parts of landscapes. They also are a part of mental cityscapes.

Kensuke Shimizu
European Ethnology
University of Turku

Changing life and living styles are leaving their traces in how Japanese approaching the life stage of old age anticipate and organize their lives as elderly. Although most of them think themselves in the frames of belonging to an ie, this does no longer imply any guarantee or security potential concerning their housing, familial involvement, and economy in their old age years. While the de facto obligation of the first born/the children seems to be fading, new ways of household organization like strengthening neighbourhood bonds, house sharing as well as a revival of two generational households and other forms of kinship-households are diversifying the possibilities open to this age group to choose the most suitable form for themselves. The paper based on qualitative interviews intends to look at the perception of ie as physical living space as well as, as an emotional bond among those Japanese, who now are roughly between 50 and 65. They are concerned with the housing and living question and have a rather clear concept of how, where and with/near whom they want to live. Furthermore they have an idea of wanting to develop an active, fulfilling and personal life style. In the centre of the projects attention are those people, who see themselves living as long as possible in their own home either alone or in some kind of proximity relation ranging from own children to friends and neighbours.

Anemone Platz
University of Aarhus

In:
De-materializing Ie: fragmentation and diversification in the Japanese home and family
Panel Organizer: Allison Alexy

In the twenty-first century, Japanese traditional arts are gaining a following among young people in Japan. This phenomenon is exemplified by the recent popularity of Tsugaru Shamisen, a dynamic musical genre with roots among blind beggars in northern Japan in the 19th century. Tsugaru Shamisen’s popularity demonstrates the relationship between Japanese culture and the influence of Western popular music. This presentation discusses the rise of Tsugaru Shamisen in the last ten years, exploring how young musicians have become like pop stars with huge youth audiences in Japan and increasingly abroad. The music’s resurgence has occurred through a blend of carefully crafted images, musical styles incorporating improvisation and experimentation, and musicians with proven track records in Tsugaru Shamisen performance. I will explore the ways Tsugaru Shamisen musicians combine innovative techniques with a reverence for the past, resulting in music that shifts between categories like folk or pop. I examine the recordings, performances, and images of Tsugaru Shamisen’s biggest stars, the Yoshida Brothers and Agatsuma Hiromitsu. In the context of Tsugaru Shamisen’s rich history, the effect of new government regulations on the arts, and growing international exposure, this music’s popularity is a signal of larger trends in Japanese popular culture.

Michael Peluse

In my paper I focus on the following questions: How do new religious movements in Japan demonstrate and symbolize their power through the architecture of their buildings? Which religious, social or even political goals of new religious movements are reflected in the design of their buildings? The sacred buildings of selected new religious movements are taken as examples to analyze the symbolic messages of power they want to convey to the inside and outside world.

Iris Wieczorek
GIGA Institute of Asian Affairs
Hamburg

The modern Japanese household registration system (koseki seido), which emerged in 1871 with the Household Registration Law, still retains its central place in Japanese society. This under-researched household register (koseki) can reveal why and how "ie" remains relevant in today’s Japan. Properly understood, this register can also unveil a deeper understanding of the Japanese social order. It is generally said that the "ie" system emerged from the family law statutes of the 1898 Civil Code only to disappear again with the revised 1947 Civil Code. The 1898 family law was, however, a product of the administrative Household Registration Law which in the intervening three decades had gradually evolved into a new regime for structuring family and distributing legal and social status. Over the next century koseki has continued adapting itself and it remains, arguably, the main site for obtaining desirable status – statuses which registrants can secure through strategic deployment of the resources the koseki system provides at a given time. The koseki system and the physical registers can lead to a dynamic, multifaceted, changeable, and thus resilient conception of "ie.""Ie" is here understood as the particular scope of household organization which is possible under the existing household registration law.

Karl Jakob Krogness
University of Copenhagen
Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies

In:
De-materializing Ie: fragmentation and diversification in the Japanese home and family
Panel Organizer: Allison Alexy

This presentation looks at an indisputably material aspect of mortuary rites for pets: the gravestone. Located in pet cemeteries, in backyard gardens, and inside homes, pet gravestones can be seen in a variety of forms. In pet cemeteries connected with a Buddhist temple, the gravestones are, for the most part, similar to the traditional tombstones used for human graves. In non-temple pet cemeteries, there is space for more individualized and innovative gravestones. Of particular interest is a type of gravestone that has a laser-etched image of the photographed face of the pet. With this gravestone, the pet has an individuality in death than its owner probably does not. As commodities, the pet gravestones display familiar contemporary Japanese cultural preferences (cuteness, technological innovation, and the use of English) literally engraved in stone. As memorial objects intimately connected with death, the gravestones indicate that conceptions of personhood, kinship, memory and death itself are not, figuratively speaking, carved in stone.

Elizabeth Kenney
Kansai Gaidai University

In:
Animals at the Crossroads: Material and Mental Landscapes of Pet Loss and Pet Mortuary Rites in Contemporary Japan.
Panel Organizer: Fabienne Duteil-Ogata

want to exclusively discuss what is meant by tezukuri (hand-made) in Japanese sake (rice wine) industry, because in the last twenty years, more and more medium/small sake makers claim that their sake is hand-made, even though the definition of hand-made is vague and fluid. Some makers even claim that their sake is completely hand-made (kanzen tezukuri), although in reality they admit that significant part of the process of making sake, such as polishing rice, filtering and so on, is 100% dependent on machinery controlled by computer. My quest for the conscious and subconscious meaning of tezukuri used by sake makers reveals that there are complex connotations, ranging from representation of the skill of sake brewer even to counter-westernization and nationalism. In the post-world war, increasingly globalizing, westernizing Japanese society, tezukuri seems to be loaded with meanings far beyond what the term literally stands for. This may also be an indication of taken-for-granted trust in and attachment to hand in Japanese mind.

Noriya Sumihara
International Center for Regional Studies
Tenri University

In:
Multi-aspects of hands(te) in Japanese culture: what hands represent in person-to-person and person-to-materials relations
Panel Organizer: Noriya Sumihara

he Japanese watch has been characterized by its accuracy and precision. In 2005, Japanese watch makers produced 724 million watches (including movements), which corresponds to 58% of the world production in volume. It is notable that 99.4 % of such watches are quartz watches, which are assembled by highly-automatic production line. However, some SEIKO subsidiaries have intended to keep up producing the mechanical watches which is in danger of extinction. One of them musters watch artisans in a factory near Morioka where is famous for its traditional crafts, and has started to produce mechanical watches by hand-assembling unit. In this presentation, we will show the Hi-tech sustaining the production of precision mechanical watches and analyze the meaning of Tezukuri as well as the boom of mechanical watches in Japan.

Izumi Mitsui
School of Economics Nihon University

In:
Multi-aspects of hands(te) in Japanese culture: what hands represent in person-to-person and person-to-materials relations
Panel Organizer: Noriya Sumihara

Japanese cabin attendants in the Asian civil aviation ‘D Airlines’ are employed as ‘the out port recruitment crew’ and live as foreigners in ‘I city’ which is the D Airline’s ‘base’. D Airline is owned by a UK based transnational corporation. D Airlines’ 7000 cabin attendants are from 13 different Asian countries. They work together under the same labor agreement. About 600 Japanese cabin attendants fly on D Airlines’ all 102 routes to 35 countries in Asia including Japan, Middle East, Europe, Oceania, North America and Africa. Their important jobs are translation, making public announcement and performing service in Japanese way to avoid Japanese passengers’ complains and misunderstanding due to the cultural and language gaps. My interviews with Japanese cabin attendants revealed an interesting contrast between what are the ‘te wo kakeru’ work (=work which they are willing to look after a lot) and what are the ‘te ga kakaru’ work (=work which they are forced to look after a lot) for them. Observing the change of their work space environment under the influence of ‘Open Sky Policy’, I analyze their discourse about their daily work and their workspace culture.

Keiko Yamaki
The Graduate University for Advanced Studies (SOKENDAI,
National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka

In:
Multi-aspects of hands(te) in Japanese culture: what hands represent in person-to-person and person-to-materials relations
Panel Organizer: Noriya Sumihara

Since the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake in 1995, whenever a disaster occurs across the nation, many volunteers have rushed to a disaster area as an individual or an organization, and developed various activities to meet needs from victims. It was no exception when the Niigata Chuetsu Earthquake occurred in October, 2004. However, not a few volunteers were confused, because more efforts were demanded than ever to be trusted by the residents of the disaster area. The volunteers admired the strong solidarity of the local people under extreme conditions of disaster, but at the same time sensed an unfriendly air toward a kind of wariness the residents showed over “the outsiders” who were supporters. During the winter with heavy snow, the volunteers actively engaged in removing snow from the roofs and roads. Even now, quite a few “outsiders” are still working together with local people to reconstruct and revitalize the area. In this paper, I will introduce the actual activities the volunteers have done at a small village from immediately after the disaster until now, and review how the understanding of the idea “giving a hand and lending a hand” has changed.

Isao Hayashi
National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka

In:
Multi-aspects of hands(te) in Japanese culture: what hands represent in person-to-person and person-to-materials relations
Panel Organizer: Noriya Sumihara