Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to another student takeover episode of The
Speaker 1: Sociology Show. This episode is with Olive Smith and she's
Speaker 1: going to be talking about romanticization the effects of globalization
Speaker 1: on Japan. Fascinating stuff. Thank you very much for sending
Speaker 1: it in a file, Olive. Before we get to the episode, though,
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Speaker 1: fascinating in depth look into globalization and so why not
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Speaker 1: let's have a listen to this episode then. This is
Speaker 1: from Olive Smith, who attends Westcliffe High School for Girls
Speaker 1: in Essex, and the title of this episode is Romanticization
Speaker 1: the effects of Globalization on Japan. Enjoy As already likes.
Speaker 2: To assume we are moving into a more postmodern world.
Speaker 2: I am particularly interested in how globalization affects the world
Speaker 2: around us. For those who don't know what globalization is,
Speaker 2: it is a sociological term for how the boundaries of social, political,
Speaker 2: and economic means have been broken down across the world,
Speaker 2: so you're able to access information from everywhere at any
Speaker 2: point through the Internet, and Giddins, who's a sociologist, described
Speaker 2: it as a runaway world that it's moving so quickly
Speaker 2: and we can't stop it, and it was actually dubbed
Speaker 2: the space of flows by Manuel Castele and other sociologists
Speaker 2: because information is constantly moving and there's no way to
Speaker 2: stop it. So particularly I wanted to focus on Japan
Speaker 2: and how globalization has impacted not only its culture at home,
Speaker 2: but more so how we in the West have adopted
Speaker 2: its culture and not necessarily twisted it, but how we've
Speaker 2: taken it and changed it from what it necessarily was
Speaker 2: in Japan. So Japan has actually been trading with the
Speaker 2: West since fifteen forty three when a Portuguese ship wrecked
Speaker 2: in Tanegeshima, and particularly in the eighteen hundreds, we saw
Speaker 2: this rise of Japanese art and culture spreading across Europe,
Speaker 2: which was described as Philip Bertie in eighteen seventy two
Speaker 2: as Japanism. And in the modern day, I think we
Speaker 2: can all see how ideas and parts of Japanese culture
Speaker 2: have really established well in the West. But I particularly
Speaker 2: wanted to focus on four elements media, fashion, image, and food.
Speaker 2: So when I say media, I'm really mostly going to
Speaker 2: be focusing on the Japanese art form of anime. It
Speaker 2: is a huge thing here in the West. I myself,
Speaker 2: I'm not a particular fan. I wouldn't say that I'm
Speaker 2: a die hard anime watcher, but I have watched the
Speaker 2: media now and then, and actually in the West, until
Speaker 2: about nineteen eighty eight, it was just called japanimation. We
Speaker 2: didn't actually adopt the term from japan anime, but that
Speaker 2: was until the film Akira came out in nineteen eighty eight,
Speaker 2: and it's sort of been attributed to the birth of
Speaker 2: anime as a real big thing in the media in
Speaker 2: the West, which was followed by Pokemon and Dragon Ball
Speaker 2: Z in the late nineties. And even though I was
Speaker 2: born in two thousand and seven, I remember that those
Speaker 2: were shows that were frequently on TV growing up, especially Pokemon. Now,
Speaker 2: what a good thing is about things like anime spreading
Speaker 2: across the world like this is that it keeps an
Speaker 2: art style alive. Not necessarily saying that anime was a
Speaker 2: dying art form, I don't think it is by any means,
Speaker 2: but it really helped to sort of inspire people across
Speaker 2: the world and allow them to explore this art style
Speaker 2: that maybe they weren't aware of before, and they really
Speaker 2: like it, and they're able to really delve deep into
Speaker 2: other artists that maybe aren't from their country or aren't
Speaker 2: as well known just because they aren't doing these really
Speaker 2: famous modern or traditionalist art pieces. But it also breaks
Speaker 2: some boundaries. So obviously, because this is an art form
Speaker 2: coming from Japan, a different culture, some people might have
Speaker 2: preconceived notions about Asia, particularly East Asia, and because of
Speaker 2: this art form, they are able to be immersed somewhat
Speaker 2: in the culture of that country just from the media
Speaker 2: that they are being shown. And I think that could
Speaker 2: be quite a powerful thing, being able to look at
Speaker 2: just a piece of media and whilst it might not
Speaker 2: accurately portray one hundred percent what that culture is about,
Speaker 2: you're able to see elements of it and possibly be
Speaker 2: interested and research further. However, like everything, there are always
Speaker 2: negatives to this, and I think particularly this has come
Speaker 2: in live actions of traditional anime and manga pieces done
Speaker 2: in Japan. Two very prominent ones off the top of
Speaker 2: my head, was the Ghost in the Shell movie with
Speaker 2: Scarlett Johansson. Now she's a white woman who was cast
Speaker 2: to play an Asian woman. And I haven't really seen
Speaker 2: a lot of back classroomers. Obviously there has been, but
Speaker 2: definitely at the time at least I didn't see a
Speaker 2: lot of people being like, isn't it a bit weird
Speaker 2: to just completely erase a characters of original ethnicity. And
Speaker 2: the other one was the Death Note remake in twenty
Speaker 2: seventeen from Netflix that actually has a well known actor
Speaker 2: in it. It's got Willem Dafoonet playing Reuke, the shinagami
Speaker 2: who's one of the main characters, but it's they decided
Speaker 2: to take it from Japan and not only said it
Speaker 2: in America, but changed the characters to be American. So
Speaker 2: rather than have Misa, I believe one of the character's
Speaker 2: name is, it was Mia. And it just feels like,
Speaker 2: how could we not have changed the story or at
Speaker 2: least adapted it if we wanted it to be in America?
Speaker 2: Could we have not adapted it? So that is based
Speaker 2: off of Death Note, but it is not completely one
Speaker 2: to one, but instead we've just inherently whitewashed it. I
Speaker 2: guess you could say to make it more appealing to
Speaker 2: a Western audience, and the main problem with that is
Speaker 2: is that that just removes opportunities from Asian actors. I'm
Speaker 2: not claiming to know everything about the struggles it means
Speaker 2: to be an Asian actor in Hollywood. I am not
Speaker 2: Asian nor an actor, but I know from things I've
Speaker 2: seen in the media, from things that Asian actors have said,
Speaker 2: that they really struggle to get out of those stereotypical
Speaker 2: roles that Hollywood has placed on them. And so by
Speaker 2: taking characters that arguably should go to these East Asian actors,
Speaker 2: these Japanese actors, and giving them to any famous white
Speaker 2: actor or actress, it just really creates stigma in this
Speaker 2: whitewashing and it normalizes it, which is such an issue
Speaker 2: and widespread issue which I really feels like needs to
Speaker 2: be addressed more often. So I'm gonna talk about fashion.
Speaker 2: So fashion is actually one of the main reasons I
Speaker 2: decided to focus on Japan. I myself am interested in
Speaker 2: a particular j fashion style that's a subcultural style of
Speaker 2: harajuku called Lalita, not the book as some people think,
Speaker 2: but rather it is a style that takes inspiration from
Speaker 2: Rococo and Victorian England silhouettes, and it's all about big,
Speaker 2: proofy dresses in fun prints, and there are a lot
Speaker 2: of different styles within that. It's really a subculture within
Speaker 2: a subculture. But there are many other styles. We've got
Speaker 2: yaru vk og Decora, just to name a few that
Speaker 2: I particularly look at myself, and as someone who's interested
Speaker 2: in fashion, I find it quite interesting how you can
Speaker 2: see how other cultures have responded to like sociological movements.
Speaker 2: So Lalita is a a response to a feminism movement,
Speaker 2: and it is all about empowering women by giving them
Speaker 2: the ability to dress however they want, dress as like
Speaker 2: pretty as they want, as feminine as they want, without
Speaker 2: feeling judged, without making them feel like they're going to
Speaker 2: be sexualized for it. And I think it's so important
Speaker 2: to not only with globalization see that happening, but be
Speaker 2: able to take inspiration from it.
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Speaker 2: Again, a negative is though, is that we see these
Speaker 2: death of subcultures. We see them warped and with fast
Speaker 2: fashion and micro trends, we see how particularly Lolita, I've
Speaker 2: seen they take the basic ideas without looking further into
Speaker 2: what the style is, about what certain brands are there,
Speaker 2: and because it's a subculture, the things they do as
Speaker 2: part of the fashion, it's not just a fashion. With
Speaker 2: most of these like a lifestyle, particularly with Yaru and VK.
Speaker 2: They have specific things that the people who indulge in
Speaker 2: them focus on, and because of social media and globalization,
Speaker 2: this has been watered down. The other element of fashion,
Speaker 2: though it is obviously traditional Japanese dress, The one I'm
Speaker 2: focusing on is the kimono, which is obviously probably the
Speaker 2: most well known one. There was actually a huge scare
Speaker 2: in probably like the two thousand's early twenty ten of
Speaker 2: people worrying that the traditional garments of Japan were going
Speaker 2: to die out because the young people were only wearing
Speaker 2: them for special occasions and they weren't feeling connected to them.
Speaker 2: And I guess a real positive of globalization is that
Speaker 2: people look at those styles from other countries and they're like, Oh,
Speaker 2: I really like that, Let me incorporate that into my
Speaker 2: fashion designs. And so, for example, we have Tom Brown
Speaker 2: in his spring summer show in twenty sixteen using the
Speaker 2: kimono's inspiration and allowing for it to be preserved in
Speaker 2: a way. There's also been a resurgence of the komono
Speaker 2: in Japan's recently, though, with the sort of pushing that
Speaker 2: kimono is a personal thing and allowing the youth to
Speaker 2: creative freedom with the way they wear it so they
Speaker 2: feel more connected to it because it's more personalized with
Speaker 2: the other cultures. However, looking at that and taking inspiration,
Speaker 2: there is obviously the room for the debate of whether
Speaker 2: it's cultural appropriation or appreciation. And while you may not
Speaker 2: be able to discern yourself whether the actions you were
Speaker 2: taking or for the right and wrong reasons, it is
Speaker 2: something we need to keep in mind when we're looking
Speaker 2: at other cultures, particularly in dress, how we're adapting these
Speaker 2: things to fit our own culture, our own style, and
Speaker 2: make sure that we're not just cherry picking the things
Speaker 2: that are appropriate to us, or inherently changing them and
Speaker 2: ignoring their history. A big thing about fashion is its
Speaker 2: history and how it's evolved. And if you ignore the
Speaker 2: cultural history behind how these fashions have come about, you've
Speaker 2: really watered down their meaning, which could be seen as
Speaker 2: cultural appropriation. Now, with image and food, I'm going to
Speaker 2: try and keep it as brief as possible because there
Speaker 2: isn't a lot to say. But with image in particular,
Speaker 2: I find that when we google Japan, when we look
Speaker 2: at Japan and Japan appears in the media to us
Speaker 2: in the West, it always looks very pristine, very pretty.
Speaker 2: It focuses a lot on the culture of Japan that
Speaker 2: is deeply rooted into the country. But with this we
Speaker 2: tend to ignore some of the darker side of Japan.
Speaker 2: So in terms of crime statistics, certain sexual crimes have
Speaker 2: very high rates in the country. Particularly mobile phones over
Speaker 2: there have to have the ringers on because of the
Speaker 2: amount of like reports of people taking photos of women
Speaker 2: on the train without their consent. But mainly I've seen
Speaker 2: this erasure of the colonial past of Japan in World
Speaker 2: War Two. Now it is really really heavy. So I'm
Speaker 2: not going to elaborate on everything that they did, but
Speaker 2: countries like Korea have felt that the atrocities that happened
Speaker 2: as a result of Japan's sort of imperialist colonial past
Speaker 2: that they tried to cover up, they haven't really fully
Speaker 2: been addressed. And I know that this has been something
Speaker 2: that obviously every country doesn't want they're horrible past to
Speaker 2: come up. But I think because of this particular rise
Speaker 2: in acknowledging the imperialist past of England, of America, the
Speaker 2: backlash of America trying to cover up certain topics to
Speaker 2: do with the racism in their past, I feel like
Speaker 2: this should be a cut si extended to the whole
Speaker 2: of the world. And whilst I'm not I don't want
Speaker 2: it to come across as I'm just targeting Japan on this,
Speaker 2: I think there are many countries that do this that
Speaker 2: needs to be addressed. I think because I'm talking about Japan,
Speaker 2: I should make it known that we have a very
Speaker 2: romanticized view of Japan that doesn't necessarily reflect the history
Speaker 2: of the country all the way through. Now with food,
Speaker 2: it's a lot lighter. There's not really a lot of
Speaker 2: negatives to say about food. One of the particular things
Speaker 2: I've seen is food like sushi raman. It is like
Speaker 2: everywhere you can get in supermarket. There are really popular
Speaker 2: fast food chains such as Wagon, Mammas and Yosushi that's
Speaker 2: just a couple of them, obviously loads and also small
Speaker 2: independent businesses as well. It has really become a big
Speaker 2: thing over here for people to enjoy food from other cultures,
Speaker 2: and Japan I think has really benefited from this, Like
Speaker 2: you can literally get Japanese food in most supermarkets, in
Speaker 2: most places on the high street they will have something.
Speaker 2: People take inspirations from the spices, from the dishes. I
Speaker 2: think with food it is so positive how it ignores
Speaker 2: somewhat like how society may view a culture, and it
Speaker 2: purely focuses on taking inspiration and bringing a positive light
Speaker 2: to food in different countries. I love learning about food
Speaker 2: in different countries. I love eating it. Whilst I may
Speaker 2: not necessarily like something, it's always good to experience what
Speaker 2: other cultures eat, what other countries eat, And with cooking
Speaker 2: practices especially, they can be adapted in so many ways.
Speaker 2: So there is actually a cooking technique called yoshoku now
Speaker 2: that is a Japanese cooking technique where they take traditional
Speaker 2: Western dishes such as fried chicken, and they make it
Speaker 2: using traditional Japanese cooking methods. So think chicken katsu that
Speaker 2: is fried chicken made with traditional Japanese methods. And again
Speaker 2: that is such with all their hate that I think
Speaker 2: can come in this world. Food spreading like this can, honestly,
Speaker 2: for some people, be a way to learn about other cultures.
Speaker 2: It is such an easy way to learn about another
Speaker 2: culture just going into shop seeing food you don't necessarily
Speaker 2: know and being like, Oh, that looks nice, I'll try it,
Speaker 2: or oh, I've never heard of that before, let me
Speaker 2: look more into it, or oh I really like that,
Speaker 2: I want to learn more about it and try other dishes.
Speaker 2: Food is a really positive way to bring people together
Speaker 2: because we all need food. So it's unsurprising really that
Speaker 2: Japanese food has really taken a hold of the Western
Speaker 2: food market. So to conclude, I really wanted to focus
Speaker 2: on the question why do we idolize Japan. There are
Speaker 2: so many countries across the world. Why is Japan in
Speaker 2: particular one of the ones that we idolized the most
Speaker 2: in the West. And I've come up with three reasons
Speaker 2: why I think that Japan has become sort of this
Speaker 2: token child in Asia for the West to look at.
Speaker 2: The first one is pop culture, and the West is
Speaker 2: so greenland to pop culture. Nowadays, you not necessarily anime
Speaker 2: like I've focused on in my paragraph, but just you
Speaker 2: might see a name, or you might see movies taking
Speaker 2: place in Japan. You might have characters from Japan that
Speaker 2: wear traditional garments, perform traditional tasks, traditional cultural practices, and
Speaker 2: that just really helps to cement in people's mind like
Speaker 2: an idea of the country. And obviously that has positives
Speaker 2: and negatives. You can learn more about the country just
Speaker 2: f on this basic overview, but some people may take
Speaker 2: that face value and really see Japan as this beacon
Speaker 2: of light in the world, so to speak. That it
Speaker 2: may not necessarily be. It has a very rich culture.
Speaker 2: That is probably a great example of how even with globalization,
Speaker 2: even with detraditionalization, which is a phrase Giddens users, it
Speaker 2: has really held its roots and its culture. I feel
Speaker 2: like it's still something that spreads quite a lot throughout
Speaker 2: its society. And in America and England we may not
Speaker 2: feel that we have this deep rooted culture like Japan,
Speaker 2: and some people might see that and be like, wow,
Speaker 2: that's not necessarily inspirational, but that sort of feeling like heartwarming,
Speaker 2: I guess you could say. And they really idolize the
Speaker 2: ability of a country to be innovative and yet still
Speaker 2: hold its roots, and that takes us to the final
Speaker 2: point I came up with. They are a very stereotypical
Speaker 2: view in the West of how East Asia can be innovative.
Speaker 2: Their economic model is actually nicknamed the East Asian model
Speaker 2: in the West. It is very highly revered over here,
Speaker 2: and I think because of this, we've come to with
Speaker 2: this stereotypical idea that they are leaders, they are in
Speaker 2: a and whilst that's you can't say that maybe that's
Speaker 2: not necessarily the case. They are definitely they definitely have
Speaker 2: a very strong economy because they have a lot of
Speaker 2: positives about them. They're innovators, they have a rich culture
Speaker 2: that they've held onto, and they are ingrained into our
Speaker 2: pop culture. It's very easy to look past maybe some
Speaker 2: of the negatives and look past our own romanticized view
Speaker 2: of the country. This has been my very brief overview
Speaker 2: of how globalization has affected Japan, and I hope you
Speaker 2: enjoyed and thank you so much for listening.
Speaker 3: Sociology Show podcast relies on the kind contributions of sponsorship
Speaker 3: and donations. If you enjoy the show, then you can
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Speaker 3: five pounds on the go fundme page. Simply visit UK
Speaker 3: dot GoFundMe dot com and search for the Sociology Show.
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Speaker 3: Sociology Show pen as a small thank you for your
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Speaker 1: M Yeah