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Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Nov 30, 2015

From 'samurai' to 'Hello Kitty,' search data show how the world's view of Japan has changed

Analytics data suggest Japan is better known abroad as the land of Hello Kitty than as a country full of swaggering samurai and mincing geisha.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Nov 30, 2015

Japan's tiny refugee community urges Tokyo to open doors wider

Hitoshi Kino, a bespectacled clerical employee at a university near Tokyo, doesn't stand out. Only a slight Vietnamese accent betrays his past as he speaks in Japanese about being stranded on a rickety boat in waters off his war-torn homeland in 1980, starving with 32 others and left by pirates with...
JAPAN
Nov 30, 2015

JNTO launches video contest for non-Japanese

The Japan National Tourism Organization has announced it will hold a video contest for non-Japanese tourists and residents as part of a campaign to promote the country through foreigners' eyes.
EDITORIALS
Nov 29, 2015

Macri's moment has come

With Argentina's legislature still controlled by the Peronists, new President Mauricio Macri faces an uphill battle to implement the reforms necessary to turn the country's economy around.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Nov 27, 2015

Cannabis-infused joe becoming popular drink-of-the-day

It was during an endless drive home from a camping trip in eastern Washington state that entrepreneur Adam Stites came up with his latest product. "What would happen if I infused heavy cream with cannabis, then mixed it with my coffee?" he mused. ("My van doesn't go very fast, so I have a lot of time...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Nov 26, 2015

Jennifer Lawrence, Natalie Dormer and Gwendoline Christie laud the heroic women of 'The Hunger Games' saga

At the London premiere of "The Hunger Games: Mockingjay — Part 2," actress Natalie Dormer, who plays Cressida in the film, received quite the surprise when she was accidentally kissed on the mouth by costar Jennifer Lawrence. The Internet went nuts.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film / Wide Angle
Nov 25, 2015

Welsh filmmaker John Williams has made it in Japan against all odds

It's not easy for anyone to make indie films in Japan. Audiences, venues and funds are all shrinking. And if you are not Japanese, you face additional barriers of language, culture and credibility. Even if your name is the only foreign one on the credits, many will consider your film not "really" Japanese,...
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 24, 2015

How China can prevent the antibiotic apocalypse

China's millions of farmers are notorious for pumping their livestock full of antibiotics, a practice that is fueling the rise of bacteria resistant to some of the world's most powerful 'last resort' antibiotics.
ASIA PACIFIC
Nov 23, 2015

China uses flamethrower to hunt Xinjiang 'terrorists'

Chinese forces used a flamethrower to force more than 10 "terrorists" from a cave in the western Xinjiang region, the military's top newspaper said Monday, in a graphic account of the hunt for what Beijing called foreign-led extremists.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 23, 2015

United with Putin against terror?

Putin sees the Paris terrorist attacks as an opening for Russia to improve its ties with the West, and he wants to take advantage of it. The West should not shut him out.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 23, 2015

The nation needs workers, and women are ready

'Womenomics' has a chance to succeed, mostly because of Japan's demographic shortcomings rather than an earnest desire by companies to treat women better.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Nov 22, 2015

Improv pioneers Pirates of Tokyo Bay plan big bilingual birthday bash

The Pirates of Tokyo Bay, who claim to be the capital's only bilingual comedy group, have been bridging cultures through humor since 2010.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 22, 2015

Higher education badly in need of a spending boost

The global rankings of Japanese universities will keep falling unless more money is spent to improve the quality of higher education.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Nov 21, 2015

There's no time like the Christmas present

It may not be a traditional custom in Japan, but Christmas gift-giving is always played up by shopping malls here. If you're finding it all a bit overwhelming but still looking for something special, our writers are here to help with a few ideas that they think will make perfect gifts for your friends,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Nov 20, 2015

Ride's long road back to the stage

'I'd never seen anything like it!" says Ride frontman Mark Gardener as he recalls the first time the recently reformed shoegaze pioneers stepped foot on Japanese soil.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 19, 2015

Tepco's Kashiwazaki nuclear plant safer after upgrades, inspectors say

The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant has become safer in terms of physical hardware, while plant workers appear to be improving their emergency-response skills, overseas experts who inspected the facility Thursday said.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Nov 19, 2015

Japan's State Guest House could soon be open to tourists

As part of campaign to attract more overseas tourists to Japan, the government is planning to open the State Guest House in Tokyo's Minato Ward to general visitors as early as April next year, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said Thursday.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Nov 19, 2015

Genetic sleuthing helps sort out complex ancestry of modern Europeans

DNA extracted from a skull and a molar tooth of ancient human remains discovered in the southern Caucasus region of Georgia is helping sort out the multifaceted ancestry of modern Europeans.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Nov 18, 2015

Kohei Oguri's 'Foujita' struggles to win over foreign audiences

Veteran auteur Kohei Oguri's first film in 10 years, "Foujita" is a biopic of artist Tsuguharu "Leonard" Foujita. The toast of prewar Paris for his elegantly drawn women and cats, Foujita radically switched styles on his return to a militarized Japan and his propaganda art for the war effort was heavily...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Nov 17, 2015

The ripple effect of Tawaraya Sotatsu's waves

'The most important Japanese artist you've never heard of." That is how James Ulak, senior curator of Japanese art at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery in Washington, describes Tawaraya Sotatsu, the focus of the gallery's current magnificent exhibition. The show presents the first in-depth examination of...
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 17, 2015

On U.S. campuses, a freedom from speech

Some U.S. campuses are so saturated with progressivism that they celebrate diversity in everything but thought.
JAPAN
Nov 16, 2015

Japan's Islamic centers report no threats, feel Islam is misunderstood here

Friday's terrorist attacks in Paris and numerous others by the Islamic State group have forced Muslim communities around the world, including in Japan, to repeat a familiar phrase: Islam isn't the problem.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Nov 16, 2015

China says global war on terror should also target Uighur militants

China has appealed for international help in the battle it says it is waging against Islamist militants in its far western region of Xinjiang, as Beijing seeks Western support for its own "war on terror" in the wake of the Paris attacks.
CULTURE / Music
Nov 15, 2015

Arashi tugs at the patriotic heartstrings on 'Japonism'

Arashi "Japonism" (J Storm)
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 15, 2015

Wrong way for China's airline industry to take off

China's first indigenously designed passenger jet should serve as a lesson that bottomless funding, a will to succeed and a large domestic market are not enough to create innovative products.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Nov 14, 2015

More couples saying, 'I do ... but not yet'

"Just the other day I had a date with a woman. We were planning on seeing a movie but it was such a beautiful day that I said, 'We can see a movie anytime, let's watch the sunset instead.' She was furious: 'Why didn't you say so in the first place?'"
Japan Times
CULTURE / CULTURE SMASH
Nov 14, 2015

Get the goods on manga and anime

Back in the Stone Age of streaming media, the most notorious and popular of pirate anime websites suddenly went legit. In January 2009, after securing distribution agreements with Japanese studios, and a licensing deal with TV Tokyo that included episodes of the global hit series Naruto Shippuden, the...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Nov 14, 2015

'Living Carelessly in Tokyo and Elsewhere' with translator John Nathan

John Nathan arrived in Japan in the early 1960s and set about constantly pushing his limits, becoming the first Westerner to graduate from the esteemed University of Tokyo. And by age 25, he had published a translation of Yukio Mishima's "The Sailor Who Fell From Grace with the Sea."

Longform

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