Search - culture

 
 
COMMUNITY
Sep 11, 2007

Have your say

The scapegoating of Asa Two thumbs up for James Eriksson and Debito Arudou on their article (Zeit Gist, Sept. 4), the first and only in Japan that actually looks at the facts of the whole (Asashoryu) situation and doesn't just follow the bandwagon of "Asa-bashing."
Reader Mail
Sep 9, 2007

When to break one's silence

I found the Aug. 26 Tokyo Confidential article "Time to dust off the swords" (Michael Hoffman's translation of a Sapio magazine article) to be highly thought-provoking because of the strong statements about Japanese ethics or norms, a rather sensitive issue to deal with. The focal point of the article...
EDITORIALS
Sep 9, 2007

Surviving in Net cafes

Over 5,000 people in Japan spend their nights at 24-hour Internet cafes every night, according to the first, but certainly not the last, survey on so-called Net cafe refugees by the labor and welfare ministry. On one hand, it seems that school refusers were first, then job refusers, now "home refusers,"...
CULTURE / Books
Sep 9, 2007

The Japanese diplomat in Britain

JJapanese Envoys in Britain, 1862-1964: A Century of Diplomatic Exchange, compiled and edited by Ian Nish. Global Oriental, 2007, 255 pp, 55 (cloth) Next year Britain and Japan celebrate 150 years of diplomatic relations, and just on cue comes this book, "Japanese Envoys in Britain (1862-1964)," which...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Sep 7, 2007

Eating more than your fill in Osaka

Kuidaore! (Eat till you drop!) goes the old maxim about Osaka. The imperative tone of this statement seems perfectly in tune with the brashness of the culture here. So as a newcomer to Kansai, after a life spent between Kanto and Britain, kuidaore is exactly what I and a couple of friends set out to...
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Sep 7, 2007

Orbital adventures

Those who watch Phil Hartnoll at Clash26 will see one of British dance music's most influential artists.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Sep 6, 2007

Japanese tattoo art carves its mark in the mainstream

"It seems like every two or three days we are doing a koi (carp) half-sleeve or a dragon tattoo. People in the States are going nuts for Japanese. It's really blown up over the last two years," says American tattoo artist Lewis Hess of Atlas Tattoo in Portland, Oregon.
CULTURE / Stage
Sep 6, 2007

The magic of noh by firelight

At this time of year — and also in April and May, when it is neither too hot nor too cold for performers or audiences — takigi (firelight) noh is performed throughout Japan. Preferred venues are outdoor noh stages in the precincts of shrines, but as these are rare, special ones are often built in...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 5, 2007

Clock ticking as Councilor Kawada goes after what has long ailed Japan

Newly elected Upper House lawmaker Ryuhei Kawada was diagnosed with hemophilia soon after he was born.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Sep 4, 2007

Japan's Shinto-Buddhist religious medley

Most in Japan may know Buddhism has something to do with controlling lust and anger, and is associated with funerals and graves, while Shinto involves venerating nature, and weddings. But many people have trouble making theological distinctions between the two or even telling a Buddhist temple from a...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Sep 4, 2007

"The Devil's Breath," "Mr. Putter — Tabby Spin the Yarn"

"The Devil's Breath," David Gilman, Puffin Books; 2007; 377 pp. Close on the heels of Charlie Higson's highly successful Young Bond series comes another adrenalin-pumping adventure story that reads like a Robert Ludlum thriller tailor-made for teenagers.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Sep 1, 2007

Convicted Hughes certain to face abuse upon return

LONDON — In November 2003 West Bromwich Albion striker Lee Hughes was driving at speed on the wrong side of the road when his car struck an oncoming vehicle. Its driver, Douglas Graham, was killed.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Sep 1, 2007

Sekiko Kamata

Thirty years ago, the Kanagawa International Foundation came into being with the laudable aim of promoting Japan's cultural and artistic aspects to its region's audience. KIF set up the Minami Circle, which three decades later is still working in the interests of international friendship.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 30, 2007

Reforming Aboriginal affairs

SYDNEY — A rush of reform bills through Parliament, a lockdown in Sydney for an APEC heads-of-state meeting, unseasonal storms sweeping across the whole continent — what's going on in Australia? Surely the signs of an knife-edge national election ahead.
MORE SPORTS
Aug 29, 2007

Worlds notebook; Day 4

OSAKA — News and notes from Day 4 of the 2007 IAAF World Athletics Champion ships.
COMMENTARY
Aug 29, 2007

Don't toy around with Sino-U.S. relations

LOS ANGELES — An effective foreign policy requires proportionate thinking. Hysteria and demagoguery can win a few elections, but they can lose wars and economic battles of enormous consequence. In the United States, foreign policy is particularly complex: Even if the president and the executive branch...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 29, 2007

Shampoo ads ditch blondes for 'beautiful Japanese women'

Shampoo ads here typically feature glamorous blondes praising imports from Procter & Gamble of the U.S. and Europe's Unilever.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Aug 29, 2007

Let's (try to) get serious about silliness

August is known as the "silly season" in the media in the United States and the United Kingdom, as newspaper editors faced with legislators all gone on holiday struggle in vain to fill their pages and resort to, well, silly stories.
MORE SPORTS
Aug 28, 2007

Worlds notebook; Day 3

OSAKA — News and notes from Day 3 of the 2007 IAAF World Athletics Championships.
JAPAN
Aug 28, 2007

'Genji' translator Seidensticker dies

Edward G. Seidensticker, renowned American translator of Japanese literature, including a 1975 rendering of "The Tale of Genji," died Sunday in a Tokyo hospital, sources close to Seidensticker said. He was 86.
Reader Mail
Aug 26, 2007

Democracies separated by culture

Regarding Hiroaki Sato's Aug. 20 article, "Why can't Americans give up their guns?": I submit that it may be impossible for Sato to understand the cultural differences between the United States and Japan on the subject of personal liberty and a free citizen's possession of the means to defend it.
Japan Times
LIFE
Aug 26, 2007

Homegrown art: rice-paddy ukiyo-e

Mysterious "corn circles" of incredible complexity that appear overnight, or a baseball park as in the 1989 film "Field of Dreams" — who knows what you might come across in your local rural idyll these days.
MORE SPORTS
Aug 25, 2007

Hammer king Murofushi eyes first world title

In Western culture, 13 is considered an unlucky number. For Koji Murofushi, Japan's maestro of the hammer throw, it's not a symbol of misfortune; it's a number that underscores one thing: his era of dominance.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Aug 25, 2007

Dedication, goodwill go far deeper than the skin

Hideoki Ogawa vividly remembers the tears and waving flags of the Chinese soldiers and hospital staff who turned out at the port of Tiangjin near Beijing to bid farewell to his father.
EDITORIALS
Aug 24, 2007

New effort to boost tourism

The government has decided on a basic plan to promote the tourist industry as one of Japan's main policy measures for the 21st century. The basic plan sets goals in 25 areas, including three main ones — increasing domestic tours by Japanese, attracting more tourists from abroad, and increasing the...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Aug 23, 2007

Behind the mask

Noh is Japan's most inscrutable performing art. A tremendous influence on kabuki and bunraku puppet theater, it is a household name across the nation, yet relatively few Japanese have ever been to a show. Culture vultures marvel at the elaborate costumes and the esoteric, chantlike music; the plays are...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 18, 2007

Are island people an endangered species?

The passing of O-bon (the festival of the dead), seems an appropriate time to reflect on the declining population in Japan. While the population continues to decline, depopulation is also occurring in farming communities and on Japan's small islands. As an islander myself, I am confronted with the question:...

Longform

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