For all your intellectual J-Ent needs.

So i created this community with the best intellectual minds at heart and it's gone completely wrong. In other words i've gotten too lazy to come up with posts/discussions. Plus you've now got Cho Scandalous and its great forum to look for the latest in what's happening over in J-land and make bitchy comments about it too. But Yao did mention that i seemed to be making posts that were more... Geinouron in feeling and that made me realise that i SHOULD be putting up stuff here more often. And i will. Starting with today's topic. Which, as you can see from above, is about Japanese dramas and the section we could call the maza-con rabu. In other words, dramas which have an older woman/younger man relationship. In more words, how JE uses its young guys as toyboys to bring in the old biddies. We could also talk about the flipside with older guys and younger girls but honestly i haven't seen anything like that although i do know about that one drama with Fujiko Naohito and Aya Ueto.

I chose this topic because i'm currently watching Love and Eros from d-addicts as well as the sporadic episode of Sore wa, Totsuzen Arashi no You ni when it's been subbed. Have also watched Anego, Kimi wa Petto and Majou no Jouken and i'm sure there are other dramas i can't think of for the life of me. Oh. Long Vacation. Mustn't forget that one eh? I guess you could count Neverland as one 'cos you've got jailbait!Tsubasa and Ken being hounded/molested by older women. Can you? Oh, and Gokusen i suppose 'cos Sawada has/had a thing for Yankumi yes?

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Well. It's been a long time hasn't it? (Over 3 months actually.) And as main mod i'd like to apologise for that. I've been busy with things and recently got a job teaching so that's held me back with the community as well. But since graduating from university i've been missing discussion work and learning loads and seeing as this place is great for that i thought, 'Hell! Let's get discussing!'

Right now however, there isn't anything really pressing J-Ent wise (Unless someone has a topic they wish to talk about. Anyone?) and seeing as it's the end of the summer drama season noesunexito and i thought we'd keep it simple and have a simple, interesting discussion on what everyone's favourite Jdorama is and why. You could also give a heads-up to people about certain dramas you think they should watch/not watch/never ever look at. Now, i do remember noesunexito saying that someone will inevitably say something like Kimi wa Petto is the best thing since sliced bread and well, that's ok. It's your decision BUT you'd better be ready to give us a lowdown as to why you think it's so great. We're like that.

And in case everyone is wondering, do i have a favourite Jdorama? Hmmm... I'll have a think and get back to you. Heh.

Ahem. So that's that. Exam number two over and done with (Advanced Contemporary Asia if anyone was interested) and that means i get more time to sit around and write random essay and articles on the geinoukai and this will in turn hopefully bring people to contribute more. I do feel i have to apologise a little because there's been so little of geinouron after all that fantastic plugging by myself and noesunexito but we're back and ready to start some nice, juicy discussions.

In terms of today's discussion i thought i'd pick something that i KNOW we all can discuss and i'm pretty sure everyone has at least one thing to say. I realise that this community is looking for real academia and information when it comes to the geinoukai but you know, sometimes we all need some random discussion about topics that just cannot be taken serious. No, i'm not starting a discussion on the proliferation of the rabid Johnny's fan and the komgthxbubai! phenomenon (although i do remember essie07 asking that we take a look later) but at Japanese dramas and things you are likely to see in them. I'm using this as a topic because i think we all love Japanese dramas and there are plenty of things we've seen that are Japan specific that make us laugh/cry/think 'WTF?!' And just to make the topic a bit more academic i'm going to start with the list given on aspects of Japanese drama in 'The Couch Potato's Guide to Japan: Inside the World of Japanese TV' by WM. Penn (2003). [Great book. Looks at lots of aspects of TV: Dramas, samurai dramas, SMAP, variety shows, comedy, sports, linguistics. Hell, it's about Japanese TV. Go buy.] And to make things fun i'll be adding my random comments on what i've seen to give this depth (i wish) but will really cause you guys to agree/disagree/hate me.

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SO. People. Let us DISCUSS and exchange views on the above. [Sorry, i'm a little hyper. End of exams does that to you.] Are there points that you disagree/agree with? Any comments i've made you hate/have no idea about/think are just stupid? Yes?

So i feel like a bit of a bad mod 'cos i haven't managed to put anything up for a week now but i kinda forgot i had exams (don't ask me how...) and i've been trying to catch up with my revision. Thankfully it's Gender and Sexuality so i've been able to read stuff on JE and say that it's part of my revision. Somehow.

Anyway, i've been looking through my Japanese essays and research papers looking for something we can get our teeth into (rather fitting considering the topic) and discuss and i thought i'd bring up a topic that seems to be very dear to the Japanese and the media - food. How many of us have sat down to watch anything J-Ent based and found it consists of someone famous eating something, whether it's the good old fashioned obentou (with its many meanings in Japanese dramas - seriously), a simple onigiri or even something fantastic as watching SMAP cook Cameron Diaz a fantastic meal. And am i the only person who is amused by the fact that in the West you really don't see people eating on TV (and if they're supposed to, they're obviously not) whereas in Japan you see even the biggest of stars hoovering up those ramen noodles like there's no tomorrow?

Because i feel there's actually quite a lot that can be said about food and Japanese media i thought i'd start things off with an article i randomly found. Well, it talks about SMAP so that's my interest there. Instead of giving a link, i'll put the article here and we can use that to look at any aspects anyone has thought of/wants to ask. I've got plenty of thoughts and random things i've read or seen that i will probably put up but i've got to get back to the aforementioned revision so i'll leave it to you guys to start off the discussion.

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For those that don't know, Takarazuka is the all female revue that was started in the early 1900's and is still continuing until today (just recently there has been scandal surrounding ticket fraud.) Well for my Comparative Literature final paper I wrote this in order to take everything I've learned about Noh, Kyogen, Kabuki, Bunraku and various other forms of Japanese theatre and build on it. So, I chose Takarazuka because I've been meaning to study it. Also, I managed to allude to Tiger&Dragon =P

Some disclaimers: I wrote this last minute because I am the master of procrastination and my brain basically refuses to work unless the deadline for something is less than 24 hours away. Also, this is my first time reading extensively on Takarazuka (all I've seen of actual performances are the like, 5 clips on Youtube and the Smap skit on it.)
Criticism and comments certainly welcome!

I have another essay on the anime/manga Paradise Kiss, but I feel like anime theory is too common so I'll save it for a later day.

EDIT: I forgot to mention, the beginning of the essay refers to a Kyogen play my class members and I put on. It was pretty hilarious but regretably I can't reproduce it for you here.


Takarazuka: On Modernity, Gender, and the Continuing Tradition of Japanese Theatre
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Seeing as it’s Tuesday here’s our first reading piece. It’s a paper entitled: The Use of Gender and Sexuality in the Marketing of w-inds. The essay has been written by a fan for their ‘Gender, Race and Class in Contemporary Popular Culture’ class (says so at the bottom). The link is HERE.

What do you guys think about what the writer has said? Do you think the writer has adequately explained the reason for w-inds popularity? Do you agree/disagree? Thoughts and comments please. (I’ll comment later on. Considering I wrote my dissertation on a similar topic it might be a little long…)

It's been less than a week and already we've got over 30 members here at geinouron! That's fantastic considering Yao and I thought there'd be around 6 of us in total when we first came up with the community. And thanks to Yao and tsubalicious we've got off to a flying start with the J-Ent discussions with some really good points being made and I think everyone has learned something new. Right? ::hopes so::

Anyway, as mods Yao and I have decided that we want to give you guys more than just good old fashioned analysis and debate so every now and then we will be posting up articles and papers that we’ve found or read that are linked to Japanese entertainment. Hopefully, we will be able to use these articles as a starting point for other topics of discussion and go on from there. If anyone else has an article or paper that they would like to talk about then ask us and we’ll put it up for posting.

In addition to this, we also have a bunch of programs that look at aspects of Japanese entertainment and we will also be posting them to be uploaded later on. I don’t want to give away any details right now because it’ll build up anticipation and ‘cos Yao and I are still having issues with uploading the shows. But you should look forward to show number one around the end of this week. Hopefully. One thing to note is that because these shows are an exclusive extra we’ll be f-locking them so that members only will be able to view the post. So if you’re not a member and you’d like to be able to download the shows comment here and download away!

We’re going to have a little bit of a timetable structure here at the community with a mod-set discussion topic posted every Friday and random reading articles being posted on Tuesdays. If people feel this is too much then let us know and we’ll work things out.

Finally, if anyone has any topics or discussion titles they’d like to put to us for future discussion then here’s the place to let us know. Anything goes. Well, anything J-Ent based. Obviously.

Nazia out.

Hello fellow members!
Although the community has only been established a few days ago, I want to waste no time in starting discussions.

This topic is actually something I've been mulling over a while ever since cis and I discussed it several weeks ago. That discussion, combined with how many times Johnny's has tried to introduce some of its more popular acts to america (i.e. the Four Leaves and Shounentai) had me thinking: just what is it about Japanese popular music that American consumers dislike? Granted, recently there has been all sorts of budding industries for J-pop such as Tofu Records and Hyde having an overseas tour or whatnot, but why can I see commercials for say, Caesar's Palace and Reggaeton Hits 20 on primetime Japanese TV whereas only the most elite of my music snob friends are cognizant of certain Japanese bands?
Incidentally, do you think that underground Japanese bands attempt to metaphorically "straddle the Pacific" (i.e. Cibo Matto and Pizzicato Five who more or less garner cult followings in both nations)

My initial theory for this is that I feel "authenticity" in American music tends to be stressed more than it is in Japanese music. Whether it is a good thing or not, most popular music world trends originate in America, so when the majority is confronted with say, a very young Shounentai in the 80's wearing "street" wear and dancing to a choreography that heavily borrow from hip hop culture, there's just something amiss about it. Regardless of what that "amiss" quality may be (perhaps an unsettling sense of mimicry that calls to mind the french made satire of Meiji elties ballroom dancing? Or is it still the ever popular sense of "otherness" that is only highlighted even more when the "other" tries to not be the "other"?) Similarly, based on international artists who have garnered popularity in America, it seems like those who manage to break into the mainstream have something of their indigenous culture in the music, be it the Spanglish coupled with Latin trumpeting in Ricky Martin's songs or the Lebanese/Reggaeton influences in Shakira's songs. I think Utada tried to work in "You're easy breezy and I'm Japanesey" but the fact of the matter (besides the fact that that was sub-par pop) is that the song itself had nothing "asian" about it. Thus, it was pop anyone can find anywhere (and done better) with nothing but Utada in a bathing suit in the music video that only adventurous iTunes music video perusers and avid MTV watchers on a specific date saw.

Okay so maybe that did turn into a mini-essay.

APPLY FOR POSTING ACCESS

You might be asking why on earth a discussion community needs to have an application post. Well, it's obvious. Just like the tens of elite/quality/note-worthy icon/layout/etc communities out there, we want top quality posting here too. And the way to make sure that happens is to make people apply. Yes it's a little harsh maybe, but WE feel that if YOU are serious about learning more about Japanese entertainment in all its glory then you'd be willing to show yourselves off and write something that'll only take a few minutes. You could, of course, take longer and put a lot of thought into your entry but that's up to you. Don't worry by the way. The aim of this is to get people thinking so we can see you'll be interested in what we have to say.

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By commenting on this post, you are implying that you have read the rules and the above. If that isn't the case then do it now!

Your exam question for today children is: Why do you want to join the community and what will you bring to it if you were a member? Your 15 minutes start now.