The worst which has been thought and said? : Defining popular culture -- Floating worlds : the birth of popular culture in Japan -- Delicate dancing : early modern Japan's culture wars -- Popular culture as subject and object of Meiji modernization -- Cultural living : cosmopolitan modernism in imperial Japan -- Entertaining empire : popular culture as a "technology of imperialism" -- "Our spirit against their steel" : mobilizing culture for war -- Democracy, monstrosity, and pensive prosperity : postwar pop -- Millennial Japan as dream factory -- Afterword : Contemplating cool.

Japanese Popular Culture and Globalization is the only concise overview of Japan's phenomenal impact on world pop culture available in English. Surveying Japanese forms from anime (animation) and manga (comic books) to monster movies and Hello Kitty products, this volume is an accessible introduction to Japan's pop creativity and its appeal worldwide. Written in an accessible style and illustrated with more than 20 photographs, Japanese Popular Culture and Globalization combines a historical approach to the evolution and diffusion of Japanese pop with interdisciplinary perspectives from anthropology, literary studies, political science, and the visual arts. Includes a useful glossary of terms and a bibliography of recommended readings.

The phenomenon of 'Cool Japan' is one of the distinctive features of global popular culture of the millennial age. A History of Popular Culture in Japan provides the first historical and analytical overview of popular culture in Japan from its origins in the 17th century to the present day, using it to explore broader themes of conflict, power and meaning in Japanese history. E. Taylor Atkins shows how Japan was one of the earliest sites for the development of mass-produced, market-oriented cultural products consumed by urban middle and working classes. From traditional monochrome ink painting, court literature and poetry to anime, manga and J-Pop, popular culture was pivotal in the rise of Japanese nationalism, imperialism, militarism and economic development, and to the present day plays a central role in Japanese identity. With updated historiography throughout, this fully revised second edition features: - A new chapter on popular culture in the Edo period - An expanded section on pre-Tokugawa culture - More discussion on recent pop culture phenomena such as TV game shows, cuteness and J-Pop - 10 new images - A new glossary of terms including kanji This improved edition is a vital resource for students of Japanese cultural history wishing to gain a deeper understanding of Japan's contributions to global cultural heritage.

In this study, a group of young Japanese sociologists scrutinizes the sociological foundations of the ways in which the Japanese people produce and consume cultural commodities and live their everyday lives surrounded by these products.

This insightful book explores the intense and ultimately fleeting moment in 1980s America when the future looked Japanese. Would Japan's remarkable post–World War II economic success enable the East Asian nation to overtake the United States? Or could Japan's globe-trotting corporations serve as a model for battered U.S. industries, pointing the way to a future of globalized commerce and culture? While popular films and literature recycled old anti-Asian imagery and crafted new ways of imagining the "yellow peril," and formal U.S.-Japan relations remained locked in a holding pattern of Cold War complacency, a remarkable shift was happening in countless local places throughout the United States: Japanese goods were remaking American consumer life and injecting contemporary globalization into U.S. commerce and culture. What impact did the flood of billions of Japanese things have on the ways Americans produced, consumed, and thought about their place in the world? From autoworkers to anime fans, Consuming Japan introduces new unorthodox actors into foreign-relations history, demonstrating how the flow of all things Japanese contributed to the globalizing of America in the late twentieth century.

Japanese popular culture is constantly evolving in the face of internal and external influence. Popular Culture, Globalization and Japan examines this evolution from a new and challenging perspective by focusing on the movements of popular culture into and out of Japan. Taking a multidisciplinary approach, the book argues that a key factor behind the changing nature of Japanese popular culture lies in its engagement with globalization. Essays from a team of leading international scholars illustrate this crucial interaction between the flows of Japanese popular culture and the constant development of globalization. Drawing on rich empirical content, this book looks at Japanese popular culture as it traverses international borders flowing out through such forms as manga consumption in New Zealand and flowing in through such forms as foreigners writing about Japan in Japanese and how American influences affected the formation of Japan’s gay identity. Presenting current, confronting and sometimes controversial insights into the many forms of Japanese popular culture emerging within this global context, Popular Culture, Globalization and Japan will make essential reading for those working in Japanese studies, cultural studies and international relations.

A fascinating illustrated look at various forms of Japanese popular culture: pop song, jazz, enka (a popular ballad genre of music), karaoke, comics, animated cartoons, video games, television dramas, films and "idols" -- teenage singers and actors. As pop culture not only entertains but is also a reflection of society, the book is also about Japan itself -- its similarities and differences with the rest of the world, and how Japan is changing. The book features 32 pages of manga plus 50 additional photos, illustrations, and shorter comic samples.