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EDITORIALS
May 31, 2006

'Benevolent act' undermines pension

An illegal practice by the Social Insurance Agency came to light last week. Social insurance offices in Osaka, Nagasaki and 24 other prefectures have waived premium payments into the national pension (kokumin nenkin) program by more than 110,000 low-income people without their application.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 4, 2006

Bridgestone museum celebrates 50th anniversary

During the past 130 years or so following the Meiji Restoration, many industrialists are remembered not only for having made huge fortunes, but also for using part of their riches to amass collections of art.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 16, 2006

Critical concerns about cinema

ASIAN CINEMAS: A READER & GUIDE, edited by Dimitris Eleftheriotis and Gary Needham. Edinburgh University Press, 2006, 474 pp., £19.99 (paper). CONTEMPORARY ASIAN CINEMA: Popular Culture in a Global Frame, edited by Anne Tereska Ciecko. Oxford: Berg Publishers, 2006, 250 pp., £16.99 (paper). Critical...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 2, 2006

It's a different war through the eyes of civilians

LEAVES FROM AN AUTUMN OF EMERGENCIES: Selections From the Wartime Diaries of Ordinary Japanese, edited by Samuel Hideo Yamashita. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2005, 332 pp., with b/w photos, $26 (paper). There are a number of reasons for keeping diaries -- to preserve time, to account for it,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Mar 28, 2006

Offi's Zumi Stool, Tadao Hoshino's dresser drawers, the 'Shadow Series' chairs, Muji's Wagon Set

With the cherry blossoms finally blooming and spring-cleaning in the air, it's a good time to think about updating your home's interior. And it isn't only a few university students who will be looking for new furnishings to go with the new digs that they move into at the start of Japan's school year...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 19, 2006

Myths behind the rise of the mobile

PERSONAL, PORTABLE, PEDESTRIAN: Mobile Phones in Japanese Life, edited by Mizuko Ito, Daisuke Okabe, and Misa Matsuda. Massachusetts: MIT Press, 357 pp., $39 (cloth). Consider the refrigerator. The changes this appliance brought in its wake are monumental. Thanks to that big humming machine in the kitchen,...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 22, 2006

The new Japanese woman, from virginity to menopause

INSIDE AND OTHER SHORT FICTION: Japanese Women by Japanese Women, compiled by Cathy Layne, foreword by Ruth Ozeki. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 2006. 237 pp., 2,400 yen (cloth). As Ruth Ozeki writes in her foreword to this very interesting collection of new writing: "Japanese society is undergoing...
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Dec 20, 2005

Undercover's Zamiang, Billionaire Boys Club vs. The Ice Cream Store, Youth Dew . . .

Undercover art adventure
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Dec 20, 2005

Names, cards and insurance

Naming a child I have heard that Japan does not allow middle names, even for children with foreign parents. Why not? Is there a way I can "sneak in" a middle name? Can I use a hyphen? I really want my children to have middle names.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 1, 2005

The reign of Vivienne

From being prosecuted under Britain's obscenity laws for her risque punk fashions to twirling pantyless after receiving an honor from the Queen whose image she once defaced with safety pins, Vivienne Westwood has always had a habit of causing controversy.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Nov 22, 2005

Spore's lighting solutions, Kenichiro Ohmori's Ice Partition, My Shade chair, Ryu Line Black Series, Metaphys' Factory

The Japan debut of 100% Design, an event held during Tokyo Design Week earlier this month, was a strong one, which emphasized cutting-edge interiors. The show already has a well-earned reputation in London as one of the top events on designers' calendars. Although most of the big manufacturers in the...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Oct 9, 2005

Breaking the silence on sexuality in Japan

GENDERS, TRANSGENDERS AND SEXUALITIES IN JAPAN, edited by Mark McLelland and Romit Dasgupta. London: Routledge, 2005, 218 pp., £60 (cloth). Now that the conspiracies of silence have begun to evaporate, scholarly works on gender and transgender have begun to proliferate. This very interesting collection...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Sep 15, 2005

Independent brushstrokes

A commonly heard accusation is that Japanese oil painters are followers rather than innovators. It is a criticism that has been made against many early adopters in this country -- be they filmmakers, fashion designers, chefs or rock musicians -- and one that has even come from painters' compatriots....
EDITORIALS
Jul 24, 2005

The economy of plastic bags

A s this summer marks the 10th anniversary of the promulgation of the law for recycling containers and wrapping materials, the government is moving to strengthen the law to force a change in the behavior of consumers. The target is plastic shopping bags provided for free by supermarkets, convenience...
JAPAN
Jul 20, 2005

'85 JAL crash still painful for the families

Relatives of the victims of the 1985 Japan Airlines jumbo jet crash have published a collection of essays as part of efforts to keep alive the tragedy -- which killed 520 people -- ahead of its 20th anniversary on Aug. 12.
JAPAN
Jun 3, 2005

Japan to hold major fashion event in autumn

A group of Japanese designers, apparel industry experts and textile makers will organize a major fashion event in Tokyo this fall after the Paris Collection in France, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said Tuesday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Mar 23, 2005

A great selection from the Electors' finest treasures

Dresden -- from the Sorbish, meaning "dwellers in the marshy forest," was transformed in the late Renaissance from a Slav village to the jewel in the crown of the Duchy of Sachsen. This evolution had much to do with the art patronage of two monarchs, Frederick Augustus I, Elector of Saxony (1670-1733)...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Feb 23, 2005

Lights up on gifted artist

The Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts is the ne plus ultra of honors in Canadian art. Some 2,000 of the country's cultural elite attend the annual awards ceremony, a black-tie affair held at the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, Ontario. But last year, organizers faced a dilemma:...
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Feb 3, 2005

"Pirates!" "Mammalabilia"

"Pirates!" Celia Rees, Bloomsbury; 2004; 296 pp. Celia Rees's "Pirates!" is a gripping read from page one: It gains on you like Blackbeard's fearsome pirate ships, takes you hostage, and holds you without mercy till the last page. Her story of two young women taking to a life at sea as pirates is so...
Japan Times
Features
Nov 14, 2004

'Supercasual' Tokyo at odds with fashion elite

The Spring/Summer 2005 Tokyo Collections -- the autumnal tranche of the biannual extravaganza of fashion shows presented by the Council of Fashion Designers, Tokyo, along with their vernal offering in April -- has just wound up giving the press and buyers a preview of what more than 30 Tokyo-based designers...
JAPAN
Oct 11, 2004

10 million have missed pension payments, audit finds

Some 10 million people -- roughly 45 percent of those registered with the National Pension System -- failed to pay at least one month of premiums in fiscal 2002 or fiscal 2003, the Board of Audit said Sunday.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Sep 26, 2004

Short and deep: Matsuo Basho's parallels of poetry

BASHO'S HAIKU: Selected Poems of Matsuo Basho, translated and with an Introduction by David Landis Barnhill. Albany: State University of New York Press, 232 pp., $23.95 (paper). Matsuo Basho (1644-1694) raised the haiku from a transient pastime to an enduring literary genre. He was among the first to...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Sep 5, 2004

Traveling with eyes wide open

SUN AFTER DARK: Flights into the Foreign, by Pico Iyer. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004, 224 pp., $22.95 (cloth). "They say travel broadens the mind," says G.K. Chesterton, adding, "but you must have the mind." Further, that mind must be both attentive and reflective, independent and philosophical, and...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jul 4, 2004

Utagawa Hiroshige: Around the provinces in 69 plates

HIROSHIGE'S JOURNEY in the Sixty-odd Provinces, by Marije Jansen. Amsterdam: Hotei Publishing, 2004, 160 pp., 70 full-page plates and other illustrations, $34.95 (paper). Here is a beautifully printed and edited reproduction of the complete "Famous Views of the [Sixty-odd] Provinces" (Rokujuyoshu meisho...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Jun 12, 2004

Martin Katz

Recently Martin Katz came on a first visit to Japan. He brought to exhibit in Tokyo a collection of diamond jewelry valued at 10 billion yen. The collection included many pieces worn by Hollywood stars at the red-carpeted award ceremonies of the Oscars. Martin is widely known as the jeweler to whom Hollywood's...
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
May 13, 2004

Confessions of a schizo environmentalist

I have a confession to make. For the past month I've been suffering from a strange affliction: I can't seem to buy and dispose of plastic bottles without being overcome by a mild case of environmental schizophrenia.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Apr 1, 2004

"Sideways Stories from Wayside School," "Where Willy Went/ Cinderella's Bum and Other Bottoms"

"Sideways Stories from Wayside School," Louis Sachar, Bloomsbury; 2004; 139 pp.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 18, 2004

We just can't get enough

With Valentine's Day just past, let's pay tribute to one of the most enduring love affairs of our time -- that between Japan's gallery-going public and France's Impressionist artists. It's the Real Thing.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?