1. Aims
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Japan is a country of pop culture. A history enriched by pop culture formed this country. Its comic and games media take a world-leading role, and its advanced mobile equipment and toy robots represents the new production industry of the country. A saturation of vending machines, love hotels, and flyers for dirty businesses thicken the surrounding atmosphere. The power of supply in arts and services is founded on the demands from a varied and critical audience of users. However, such aspects are not seen to be flourishing either in the financial field or in international politics. The nineties is not the “lost decade.” What we have lost is a hundred years. In the process of digesting modern civilization, we have taken up the industrial economy as our only axe. If we lose our confidence in it, we have nothing else to rely on. Or, we may find that the nineties were the first decade in which Japanese pop culture started penetrating throughout the world, if we look back in a hundred years time. Although the Net bubble has burst, the digital revolution is still going on. The “analog millennium” of has come to an end, and the “digital millennium” has begun. Everyone is creating information, broadcasting it, sharing it, and communicating with each other. In such an era, how should Japan utilize its potential and develop its own way? Planning this is our aim.
2. Areas to Cover
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We will compare and analyze industrial structures, social culture, technologies, and legal systems between Europe, North America, and the Far East. Based upon the modern history of these regions, including the after-war period, the following areas will be examined:
- The areas in which Japan is internationally competent (comics, animations, and games)
- Conventional media (films, music, and literature)
- New digital media (mobile equipment, Web contents, and toy robots)
- Others (industrial design, martial arts, genre culture, including vending machines and love hotels.)
3. Host Organization
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Stanford Japan Center/CANVAS
4. Discussion Procedure and Groups
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1) Establish Japan As Pop-culture Association (JAPA).
Members will include researchers, cultural leaders, Otaku (animation freaks), business leaders, housewives, and politicians.
2) Establish an Internet community.
Form discussion groups according to the topic and encourage discussion under the lead of young participants
3) Promote international research (2003 and after)
5. Japan As Pop-culture Association (JAPA)
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1) JAPA shall be a on line discussion community.
2) Each committee member can introduce one other member.
3) No chairperson will be assigned. Only mediators and organizers are assigned.
4) JAPA shall open in October 2002 and close in March 2003.
5) The conclusion of discussions shall be reflected in the NPO “CANVAS” and in a report to the Foundation for Multimedia Communications; information will also be made available through seminars, journals and other publications.
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