japanamerica

Bo-Peep en route to the USA First X Japan , then Vamps , and now Bo-Peep , a female hard rock trio, crash into the East Coast this autumn for a J-Rock invasion: Providence, New York, Philly, Milford, CT and Boston, with two dates in NYC, one each in Brooklyn and Manhattan. Pal Ethan Green is managing the tour; dates and info below. Starts Friday. Tokyo calling? "VIBE" USA TOUR SUSHI BURNING! GEISHA BURNING! HANABI BURNING! Friday, November 12 AS220, Providence, Rhode Island Girls Rock Showcase 9PM $10 http://as220.org/calendar. html Sunday, November 14 The Trash Bar, Brooklyn, New York 11PM $6 http://www.thetrashbar.com Monday, November 15th Philadelphia Mausoleum of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 8PM http://www.philamoca.com/ Tuesday, November 16th O'briens Pub, Allston, Massachusetts 8:30PM $7 http://www.obrienspubbosto n.com/ Wednesday, November 17th Daniel Street Club, Milford, Connecticut 8PM $8 http://manicproductions.or g/ Thursday, November 18th A...

A Haunting Woman By ROLAND KELTS I was recently interviewed by an American television reporter about a popular simulated-dating videogame in Japan called Love Plus +. The game offers players a selection of cute virtual girlfriends for dates and relationships. Once the player has chosen his partner, the game's software constantly challenges him to find ever more effective ways of romancing her and keeping her happy. At one point, the American reporter wondered why the virtual females in the game looked so young, docile and submissive. Was it OK in Japan, she asked me, a Japanese-American living in Tokyo, for men to pursue underage women? It's not, of course. Like the famous Hello Kitty character, the game's girlfriends are designed to exemplify the Japanese cultural aesthetic of kawaii —adorably, irresistibly cute and dependent figures in need of attentive care and affection. It is precisely the "mincing, simpering personification of female subservience to the male...

SOFT POWER HARD TRUTHS / Galapagos vs global: Japan's American mangaka Roland Kelts / Special to The Daily Yomiuri Japan's "Galapagos syndrome," a phrase first coined to characterize the nation's highly evolved but globally incompatible cell phones, is lately being applied to other isolated industries, even to its people. "The Galapagosization of Japan continues," trumpeted one U.S. newspaper last month, when a survey of Japan's white-collar workers revealed that a full two-thirds of them never want to work abroad. Such attitudes won't surprise anyone involved with Japan's producers of popular culture, whose minimal and often blinkered efforts to capitalize on the global appeal of their products have resulted in the downsizings, pinched margins and scant optimism plaguing Tokyo. Most of them are overworked, understaffed and underfunded; they don't have time to look up from their desks, let alone pay attention to the rest of the world. Gal...

First up, my dear friend Chisa Hidaka's three-minute media meditation on improvisatory dancing with spinner dolphins in the Pacific, Together: Dancing with Spinner Dolphins , will be screened at noon on Saturday, November 6, as part of the Big Apple Film Festival @ Tribeca Cinemas. Next, another dear friend, Linda Hoaglund, premieres her new documentary, ANPO: Art x War , a wrenching look at the 50 year-old US-Japan Mutual Security Treaty, consigning tens of thousands of US troops to Japan in perpetuity, as seen through the eyes of the Japanese artists, writers and musicians who fought and continue to resist its stranglehold on the archipelago. Linda will be on hand for the 2 p.m. screening this Saturday, November 6, at the Big Apple Film Festival @ Tribeca Cinemas.

A novel project to introduce fans of Japan and Japanese popular culture to NY-area Japanese and Japanese Americans. Details here and below. Dress up, dance. Discuss. 'Hear, hear (sans irony)!'