Posts by KenR
The Japanese Diaspora in Japan
What does it mean to be Nikkei, a member of the Japanese diaspora? By being simultaneously Japanese and non-Japanese, Nikkei are forcing a re-evaluation of Japanese identity.
Japanese identity is complex and often oversimplified, its nuances underappreciated. Through interviews with Nikkeiâparticularly those who have returned to their ancestral homelandâI hope to shine a light on their experiences as outliers of Japanese identity, find common threads, and gain a deeper insight into the edges and unspoken essence of Japanesenessâwhat it means to be Japanese.
Read MoreWhite Lines
Horizontal lines on an earthen wall. Found on the outer walls of temples, some shrines, and the Imperial Palace, these lines indicate close historical ties to the Imperial family. Some temples have three or four lines, but the walls of monzeki jiin, where members of the Imperial family have served, are decorated with five.
Throughout the city of Kyoto, these lines are so ubiquitous as to go unnoticed by visitors and residents alike. For me, they have a mysterious beauty. Amidst all the classic scenes of Kyoto, I have found myself photographing these simple walls again and again. They are images which were literally painted by the weather.
Read MoreKagami: the Resonance of Ryuichi Sakamoto
Wearing a black suit and tortoiseshell glasses, he leans over a grand piano. Spotlit, his neatly cropped silver hair shines in the distance. Coming closer, I can see freckles on his pale face. He lifts his hands, lets them fall on the glossy keys, and begins âBefore Long,â the first of ten solo pieces he will play tonight. I can see the hammers of the Yamaha twitch.
How is this possible? The piano was not in the theater minutes earlier. And the musicianâRyuichi Sakamotoâpassed away in March of 2023. Is he real? Is he present in this room? He canât be, of course. But what does it mean to be present? To be real? The music, the sound waves, are alive. Is his spirit encoded in these frequencies and amplitudes?
Read MoreCultural Fluidity/First Experiences
âWhat is your oldest memory of something Japanese? What cultural product, news story, food, or schoolbook can you recall encountering as a child?â
To expand on the theme of cultural flow, we asked this question of all KJ 106 contributors and staff. Their answers, a small sampling of experiences, are microcosms of how Japanese culture has diffused around the globe and how this flow has changed over the last century. In many cases, those things remembered were only later discovered to be Japanese.
Reminiscing Ryoma
RyĆma was born in 1836 to a family that held the lowest rank in the samurai hierarchy, a title purchased by an ancestor who had made his name as a sake brewer. Despite these humble beginnings, RyĆma went on to become a master swordsman, and in recognition of his skill, his Tosa clan allowed him to continue his training in Edo. It was during his time in the old capital that American Naval Commodore Matthew Perry sailed to Japan to forcibly end the shogunate’s policy of national isolationism.
Read MoreSearching for the Self
 âIn Japan,â the French-born American novelist and diarist AnaĂŻs Nin writes in her Diary in the summer of 1966, âI had a weeping fit. The sweetness, kindness, consideration touched me. For once in my life I felt I was treated as I always treated people.â
Read MoreInvitation to contribute â KJ 107 (Fire & Kyoto)
Fire transforms, renews and purifies. It is deeply embedded in the culture of Kyoto as a powerful destructive force, sacred agent and essential component of everyday life. The Repeated disastrous conflagrations over its long history have left an indelible mark on the psyche of the city, even today. Fire remains an integral part of spiritual and cultural practices in Kyoto, and the prevention of fire is an ever-present concern.
Read MoreTrigger of Light
I live in the spare, high desert of the American Southwest, a land of apparent and often illusory emptiness, a blinding bowl of light that triggers one to write with an economy of words. The eye follows winding arroyos, mouse tracks, and blowing seed. The breath gathers momentum along ridges, faults, and prehistoric waterlines. Fossils scatter at the feet, clay shards glisten after a sudden rain.
Read MoreThorns of Suffering
Hiromi Itoâs remarkable work, The Thorn Puller, takes readers on a pilgrimage across time, space, and literary genres. First serialized between 2006 and 2007 in the magazine GunzĆ as Thorn Puller: New Tales of the Sugamo JizĆ (Toge-nuki JizĆ: Shin Sugamo JizĆ engi), the work won the Hagiwara SakutarĆ Prize in 2007 and the Murasaki Shikibu Prize in 2008 before appearing as a single volume published by KĆdansha in 2011.
Read MorePhotography Without Borders: Kyotographie 2023
One of the pleasures of KYOTOGRAPHIE has always been the opportunity to explore Kyoto spaces that are not normally open even to longtime residents, and to appreciate the imaginative ways in which the exhibitions have been staged in them. This year, the number of main venues has expanded to 15, while their geography has contracted, presumably to accommodate the influx of day trippers and international visitors. At the same time, the number of KG+ satellite exhibitions in far-flung locations around town has increased to 92, in addition to the 10 KG+ Select and 9 Special exhibitions.Â
Read MoreThe 72 Japanese micro-seasons
Ever since our ancestors gazed skywards or closely observed the wonders of the natural world around them, they saw patterns in cycles and found ways to recall them. Different cultures around the world have developed systems to mark the passage of time, and every calendar reveals something about how the people who created it related to the world around them. The ancient Japanese almanac of 72 micro-seasons provides a map of time that is a fascinating mixture of culture and nature.
Read MoreKyotoâs Suburban Rice-fields
As recently as the early 20th century, verdant and productive rice fields dominated the flat lands on the northern outskirts of Kyoto, squeezing small villages up against surrounding foothills. However, in post-war years this fertile farmland has been encroached on and overwhelmed by waves of suburbanization.
Read MoreThirty-One Views of Japan
This book, unique and extraordinary, is full of captivating accounts written by 31 people from all over the world who are living or have lived in Japan. Itâs not about what brought them to the Land of the Rising Sun. Itâs about the passions and interests that make them stay. âThis is a book about the journey from simply living in Japan to actually calling Japan home.â Â
Read MoreResisting Democracyâs Death by a Thousand Cuts
Part memoir and part manifesto, How to Stand Up to a Dictator is Ressaâs look back at her early life in the Philippines and the United States, a chronicle of her personal rise through the news industry as one of the most respected broadcast journalists in Asia, and her forward-looking call to action to save democratic societies from dying by what she calls âa thousand cutsâ of intimidation and injustice that add up over time. The dictator in question here is as much Big Tech as it is Big Brother.
Read MoreMeeting the Challenges of Oneâs Times
Toshi (1901-1995) is perhaps most famous for her anti-war activism and The Hiroshima Panels, a series of artworks on the aftermath of the atomic bombing, both of which she carried out in conjunction with her husband Maruki Iri. Given this legacy, it is all the more salient that in a late interview she called herself âa war criminal.â Toshi explained that during WWII she took commissions for childrenâs picture books glorifying the war. Though she did so to prevent from starving, she felt that this did not absolve her of her guilt. The Art of Persistence is about this tension between moral imperative and survival, not only during this particular time but throughout the whole of Toshiâs life.
Read MoreInsights from Sixteen Creative Japanese Ceramicists
There are, for those with the requisite sense, currents, energy flows, and dialogues to be discerned in the Japanese garden. Shunmyo Masuno contends that when arranging rocks, for example, one must âconverseâ with the stone, waiting âuntil it seems to speak and say where it wants to be put.â According to some of the subjects of Listening to Clay, a similar collaboration, or consulting, takes place between potters and their material. Artist Michiko Ogawa, for example, is very specific on this point, stating that she attempts to, âlisten to what the material has to say,â posing the question, âWhat does the clay want to be?â
Read MorePoetic Eyes
This anthology, VOU,presents striking visual-poetry (often called âvispo,â by practitioners). Visual-poetry combines visual art and poetic sensibility by manipulating images and letterforms. Itâs sassy, cheeky, and sometimes three-dimensional. Vispo is fluid, non-semantic expression thatâs beyond the poetic conventions of renga, tanka, waka, haiku, or chĆka. The VOU anthology show-cases some of Japanâs finest avant-garde artists. Artists in this anthology have earned international reputations, showing and publishing their creations world-wide.
Read MoreShopping for Children’s Books in Asia
For a few years before the pandemic I was lucky enough to travel to Asia a few timesâfor work, for pleasure and as a translator of Chinese childrenâs books. Along the way, I developed a habit of doing quick surveys of the childrenâs books on sale in international airports, cities, and museums. …I was interested to see the situation in countries where there are generally more translated childrenâs books available than in the UK.
Read MoreAn Activist for Translated Children’s Literature
As Curator of East Asian Money at the British Museum, Helen Wang might seem an unlikely activist for global childrenâs literature. But September 2021 found her tweeting daily for World Kid Lit Month (@WorldKidLit), an initiative to promote picture books through young adult novels in English translation. She also collaborates with the China Fiction Book Club, Paper Republic, Translated World, the Global Literature in Libraries Initiative, and the Bai Megui Translation Competition, and she co-founded the blog Chinese Books for Young Readers.
Read MorePortrait of Eroshenko
Eroshenkoâs experiences tell us of another era in which Japan was emerging as a cosmopolitan hub and in which Europeans might come to Japan to learn, rather than to teach. It was also an era in which contact and exchange were spreading across Asia, with ideas, people and objects all being coming to Japan from across the continent. However, the story also reveals that, whilst to some a life of travel and reliance upon friendship and the goodwill of others was an inspiration, in the eyes of the Japanese state it came to be seen as a threat.
Read MoreMy Father-in-Law the Japanese Radical
The origins of the Narita struggle date back to 1966, when the government announced it would build Japanâs new international gateway in Chiba, 60km from the capitalâwithout consulting the 360 mostly impoverished local people who farmed the land around the Sanrizuka and Shibayama hamlets. The plan, with its whiff of official arrogance and highhandedness, became a lightning rod for discontent in the economic miracle years. Many farmers resisted and supporters poured into the area, fueling a conflict that quickly escalated.
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