The Integration Of Japanese Anime In The Us Culture
The global reception of Japanese cultural exports has reached a new demand in the modern era of production and consumption. In the case of Japanese animation, or better refer to as “anime,” has found its way to the U. S. since 1960’s and has become more mainstream in U. S. popular culture since then, alongside it’s comic book equal, manga. Including other anime related materials such as videos games, merchandise, and the growing popularity of cosplay (the act of wearing costumes and other accessories to represent a specific fictional character). With the growing popularity of anime, it has brought a substantial number of foreigners who travel to Japan every year, to visit the birthplace of their new found cultural fascination. Methods of cultural homogenization and the restructuring of economies and markets has allowed for the accommodation of anime and its influence in the U. S. Such as the airing of anime on U. S. television networks, English voice overs (or English-dubbed) versions of animes voiced by American actors and produced by an American production company, and anime conventions held in various U. S. cities year-round. Including the popularity of Japanese food products that are commonly shown in many animes such as ramen, Pocky, mochi, and matcha green tea. The viewership of anime has increased within the past decade due the growing number of streaming services like Crunchyroll, Funimation, and most recently Netflix and Hulu that shows anime on its platforms. Ranging from American childhood favorites such as Pokémon and Dragon Ball to more recent animes such as Attack on Titian and One Punch Man. Including third-party websites that have illegally uploaded copyrighted anime that have been translated by fans of anime in many languages. However, the entanglement of anime into U. S. mainstream culture have been motivated by capitalist influences within and outside the U. S. Such as the need to modify cultural aspects within English-dubbed versions of an anime to fit the cultural comprehension within U. S. population. This alteration of commodity can limit or give inaccurate representation of a culture, by mispresenting core values and beliefs of that cultural commodity. Cultural commodity and its relationship with production and consumption, stems from rapid developments in products of mass production. Enable by the alteration of economic practices by capitalist nations, to be use on a global scale. As seen time and time again in anime when certain scenes or actions presented becomes “lost in translation. ”<br> Appadurai discusses the idea of global flows, by view global flows as disjunctive and chaotic to explain how they replace the standard geographical thinking done in social-cultural theory and analysis. Appadurai emphasis disjuncture to prioritize shifting flows in the global market using homogenization, heterogenization, and indigenization to further explain how they have influence over cultural commodities and how they are distributed and consumed. Homogenization and heterogenization play a hand with the global flows of culture. The homogenization of a culture occurs when a local becomes overtaken by a more dominant culture, stripping away the individuality that goes into local culture. Making it even more difficult for local cultures and smaller or lesser known cultures to represent themselves due to growing competition of mass media and growing markets that are based on the capitalist concept for the supply and demand of cultural commodities. The fact that mass media is controlled by huge western, or in most cases American companies, corporations are a both a threat and a benefactor to the spread and expression of cultural heritage and products. A benefactor meaning that they have the resources to spread products of a local cultural on a transnational level. And a threat because they have the power to decide which cultures should be popularized based on its profitability and what how it should be presented in local cultures. Unlike the homogenization, the heterogenization of a culture is when a region’s culture is assimilated into other cultures, allowing for cultural diversity in local culture. Resulting in the indigenization of other cultures by making it more native or better suited for local culture outside its territory.
The alteration of commodity is further theorized in Appadurai’s article “Disjunction and Difference in the Global Culture Economy. ” Appadurai classifies that the central problem of modern-day globalization is the conflicts between homogenization and heterogenization. Cultural homogenization plays a role in cultural globalization, where local cultures are transformed and absorb by prominent outside cultures. Meaning cultural homogenization can impact the national identity and culture of native people. Heterogenization on the other hand embraces other cultures by adopting and accepting another culture. However recent scholarly work has debunked past theories on homogenization and claims that it’s more about the mixture of different cultures, rather than just the spread of a single culture. Though Appadurai acknowledges this concept of homogenization, he believes that the argument around homogenization is commonly categorized into an argument about Americanization or an argument about commoditization. Appadurai is claiming that current theories do not consider various cultural and societal elements that have been indigenized to fit local culture. Such as when forces from metropolises are brought into new societies or satellite territories, they tend to become indigenized. Meaning that the concept of homogenization isn’t just the idea of Americanization, but a term used to describe various situations where elements of one culture have an influence on another. Appadurai claims the disjunctions of economies, culture and politics all relates to the complex relations within the global market.
Otmazgin article “Anime in the US: The Entrepreneurial Dimensions of Globalized Culture,” further draws Appadurai theory on the changes of commodity for a local audience by explain the global phenomena of Japanese cultural exports, regarding the growing popularity of anime in the United States. Otmazgin focuses on the organization of anime in the U. S. market and the need for entrepreneurship and its role in bringing together organization and cultural differences between Japan and the U. S. While also mentioning the crucial role of cultural agents, the effects of globalization, the glocalization of anime and the need for it to adapt to local cultures. Otmazgin findings shows differences in business practices between Japanese and American production and publishing companies often delay, if not completely stop, the output of animes and its related materials due to cultural differences. The key argument presented in this paper is that entrepreneurship is a central feature in the process of circulation of commodities on a transnational level. Such as the distribution, reproduction and consumption of cultural commodities, that entails a multilayered system involving the economic, political and cultural nature of many countries and transnational companies, that at times can be disconnected. Otmazgin does well in making the connection between entrepreneurship and the difference in business practices between Japan and the U. S. However, he doesn’t acknowledge that Japanese businesses are being pressured to conform to western standards of entrepreneurship, and its effects such as the loss of foreign business relations and exclusion in the global market. But like Appadurai, Otmazgin acknowledges the role key players such as informants within industries and businesses themselves have role in how products are distributed.
Appadurai’s suggestion on the assimilation of cultures and the transnational interpretations of text, are a result of conventions that set theses narratives that both nations and people must oblige by. Such as the processes that governs communications between elites and their followers in order to solve problems of both sematic and pragmatic nature. Sematic being both political and business concepts that can translate uniformly across borders, and pragmatic where words and actions can be taken out of context because they can’t be universally translated to mean the same thing making it difficult for general understanding of cultural elements. Suchlike the misused term “sensei,” used by English-dubbed versions of animes by associating the word with someone who teaches some form of Japanese martial art style such as karate or kendo. Even though the true meaning term in Japanese is associated with any instructor in a given profession, such as a professor, a kindergarten teacher, or even a chief that is instructing a cooking class.
Similar to Otmazgin who acknowledges the role of key players in the anime market, Dension shows her extensive knowledge on anime in her article, “Transcultural Creativity in Anime: Hybrid Identities in the Production, Distribution, Texts and Fandom of Japanese anime,” where she uses her knowledge and research on Asian film and television, to examine the overlooked transcultural aspects and components of the creativity that goes into anime industries. And how they interact with international re-producers of their texts. Based on multiple case studies conducted around industrial, textual, and consumer contributions, it’s argued that anime can adapt to multiple transcultural creative practices. With the usage of hybridization and the creation of new forms of text and disruption, Dension attempts to draw attention from looking at the transcultural aspect of Japanese anime, to discussing its relevance involving other nations distribution methods. Although Dension clearly explains the cause and effect relationship between supply and demand, her analysis doesn’t go into depth about the relations between transnational companies, such as one having more dominance over another in the global market. If this aspect of supply and demand were explained, it would give further insight to why at times it’s difficult for transnational corporations to meet each other’s demands.
Appadurai coins the concept of “the image, the imagined and the imaginary,” to lead us to something critical and new in global cultural processes, the imagination as a social practice. Where it is used in the organization of work, in the sense of labor and cultural practices, and as a form of negotiation between sites of agency. Like how fans of anime organize their social life by forming social groups based on similar interest for anime and other Japanese related content. As these fans grow older, their social life has already been set based on current trends in consumption and new forms of communication. Such as online forums, anime conventions clubs, and enclaves that represents Japanese culture. Similar to how businesses and transnational organizations socialize in the world economy by using capitalism to further push a uniformed model of cultural exchange and commodification for maximum profits. The imagination is a key component to all forms of agency. In order to address the conflictions between current global interactions between cultural homogenization and cultural heterogenization.
Wolf in her article “Imagining the Global: Transnational Media and Popular Culture Beyond East and West,” discusses the emergence of a new type of Japanese global influence, Japanese animation and the declining influence that the U. S. has as a global cultural producer. Wolf critiques previous text and scholars for using the U. S. as a primary representation of “the West,” by mention that these scholars don’t take into consideration that other western countries have their own cultures. And acknowledges the differences in Japanese consumption and interpretation of Japanese cultural aspects in western countries. Wolf’s findings show that it took longer for anime to infiltrate U. S. markets than in France because of each country’s historical relationships with Japan. The study shows the contribution and distribution of anime is more complex than what countless U. S. scholars would just simply describe as the spread of a popular regional culture. Unlike like Appadurai who only generalizes the relationships between the transferring of products on the global market, Wolf goes into detail about the historical relations between Japan, France, and the United States. Appadurai’s statement about the imaginary and how it plays a role in social organization doesn’t take into account the historical background of countries that are involved in the global process of commodity exchange. However, the imaginary does have a presence in historical and current agencies that played a role in exportation of Japanese cultural commodities. <br> By viewing anime as a transnational influence rather than just another product of Japan, we can view the creative work being done both within and beyond the anime industry as a way of representing the global reach of Japanese cultural products. Findings shows that transnational flow beyond Japanese borders has been guided by both fan-based and industry demands, that are in a constant state of change. This proves Appadurai’s statement on his version of societies that have been successful at accommodating foreign culture and make it their own by being supports of this new found export, such as voicing the need for anime and its products to have more prevalence in their societies. However, the adaptation of anime to fit local culture can alter the creative process behind the distribution of anime, by inversely causing anime and its related products to lose its authenticity on where it’s being made and produce.
The growing debate over what makes anime an anime has been arguing whether animes produced outside of Japan can be consider anime, especially if the anime were written or produce by non-Japanese citizens, and Japanese natives living outside of Japan, including the blur line between “authentic anime” and “anime inspired” shows. For instance, Rooster Teeth, an American production company based in Texas, is becoming more of a household name among anime viewers. The production company manage to produce several web-series that has gain popularity such as Red vs. Blue and Gen: LOCK. RWBY (pronounced “Ruby”) is one of Rooster’s Teeth most successful shows, that has gain popularity both in the states and abroad over the years since it released its first episode back in 2013. Although the web-series has made a name for itself, arguments have been made about the authenticity of this web series because it uses Japanese inspire art style of anime, but it’s produced outside of Japan. However, unlike most American animations and cartoons that have been inspired by Japanese anime art styles, RWBY is the first American “anime” to be exported to Japan. In which the web series have been adapted into manga, Japanese-dub, and merchandise for its growing Japanese fan-base. Furthering debates on how to classify anime styled works of non-Japanese origins. Including the ability of foreign companies to infiltrate a market and the capability of local markets being able to indigenize foreign markets and society.
The complexity of the current global economy is the result of current disjuncture’s between homogenization and heterogenization. Globalization and these aspects of the world market overlap with each other because they have an influence on where the global movement of goods, capital, information, technology, and services can freely move. In other words, the rapid pace of globalization of the world’s economy is due to the free movement of goods and services, that has allowed for the global reach of cultural markets to become borderless. The concept of commodity markets offers a way to think about contemporary globalization, by connecting the shifts and processes that happens within the global economy and changes that have an influence on how people interact in a market. The shared use of cultural commodities can be interpreted as a sign of sameness, meaning that cultural identity is now more identifiable within cultural products. The circulation of anime in the U. S. including the reception of other Japanese pop culture products where fans of these entities can be identified through its manga’s, anime, and videogames. Shows the demand from consumers for grater cultural exposure that are differ from their own. By adding important dimension to previous and current research on cultural adaptations that are modify for certain audiences.
