Yojiro Takita’s Departures (Okuribito) is a well directed piece of film that depicts the life of a once cellist turned mortician. This change not only sounds unusual printed but even more so for our main character Daigo Kobayashi. Within the film I experienced a look into what it means to have an “appropriate” job in Japan. I use quotations because the conflict between Daigo’s wife, friends, and himself were apparent, frightfully so. The whole movie can be looked at in comparison of social constructs within American and Japanese culture. Losing his job as a cellist for an orchestra Daigo seems to have successfully completely derailed from his “track” in life. This isn’t a new concept for most of the working world, but to see it so chaotically happen to someone for me at least gained my attention and empathy. To then see the frantic scrambling to put the broken pieces of his life together made it even more real. I felt worried. I felt worried about the different people who go through these events every day, it really made me think. …show more content…
Daigo seemed appalled at the actual job even though the pay seemed more than fair without any prior experience. I feel that yes finding a new job that as quickly as he did would be both rare and a blessing, even if it isn’t the most regular one out there. I could already see the stigma and difference between Japanese and American culture. Although in the United States we aren’t totally comfortable with the idea of a living person handling death I think it was apparent that Japan had a more negative view on morticians, even though someone has to do
Much of what is considered modern Japan has been fundamentally shaped by its involvement in various wars throughout history. In particular, the events of World War II led to radical changes in Japanese society, both politically and socially. While much focus has been placed on the broad, overarching impacts of war on Japan, it is through careful inspection of literature and art that we can understand war’s impact on the lives of everyday people. The Go Masters, the first collaborative film between China and Japan post-WWII, and “Turtleback Tombs,” a short story by Okinawan author Oshiro Tatsuhiro, both give insight to how war can fundamentally change how a place is perceived, on both an abstract and concrete level.
Christopher Benfey’s work The Great Wave is a narrative driven by a collection of accounts, stories and curious coincidences tying together The Gilded Age of New England in particular with interactions and connections to the Japan of old and new. In the context of The Great Wave, Benfey's own personal journey to Japan at the age of sixteen should be understood. Embarking on this voyage to learn traditional writing, language and Judo, his story can also be seen as a not only a historical continuation, but also a personal precursor to the vignettes he discovers and presents to the reader.
In Yoshie's work, “Gender in Early Classical Japan: Marriage, Leadership, and Political Status in Village and Palace (2005),” she takes the example of Toji, women known to have played a m...
...althier freedom than he had with heroin. He is able to channel his struggles caused by heroin into something beautiful with his music. Through this realization, the narrator also knows that he is in denial of his own tragedies when the tears fall out as he remembers people such as his mother, his dead uncle and his daughter.
Brazell, Karen. Traditional Japanese Theater: An Anthology of Plays. New York: Columbia UP, 1998. Print.
Life is filled with different possibilities and as people develop, it is up to them to pursue their goals and fight the distractions that might injure their dreams. Sonny's suffering made him stronger and inspired him to acquire a better life style. His music was his savior. With the darkness surrounding Sonny, his music shined through and redeemed him.
Suzuki, Tomi. Narrating the Self: Fictions of Japanese Modernity. Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 1996.
Matsumoto studies three generations, Issei, Nisei, and Sansei living in a closely linked ethnic community. She focuses her studies in the Japanese immigration experiences during the time when many Americans were scared with the influx of immigrants from Asia. The book shows a vivid picture of how Cortex Japanese endured violence, discriminations during Anti-Asian legislation and prejudice in 1920s, the Great Depression of 1930s, and the internment of 1940s. It also shows an examination of the adjustment period after the end of World War II and their return to the home place.
However, throughout the story the narrator’s thoughts on the music begin to shift to a more positive view. As Sonny explains the ways of coping to the narrator, the narrator begins to understand why Sonny needs music in his life and during Sonny’s performance fully understands the meaning of music in Sonny and his life. The narrator has flashbacks of his life and the feelings that were associated with those events while he listens to Sonny’s Blues and becomes aware of the struggle going on on the stage. In this event, the narrator turns from a negative view on music to an absolute positive view on the importance of music in people’s lives.
Denison. B. (2002, January 1). A Basic Overview of Japanese Culture . . Retrieved May 3, 2014, from http://www.mizukan.org/articles/culture.htm
In addition, shortly thereafter, she and a small group of American business professionals left to Japan. The conflict between values became evident very early on when it was discovered that women in Japan were treated by locals as second-class citizens. The country values there were very different, and the women began almost immediately feeling alienated. The options ...
Ohnuki-Tierney, Emiko. "The Ambivalent Self of the Contemporary Japanese." Cultural Anthropology 5.2 (1990): 197-216. Print.
Sugita Kojo of Tayama Katai’s “The Girl Watcher” (1907) and the chair maker in Edogawa Rampo’s “The Human Chair” (1925) react to new ways of life in a similar, vulgar manner. Both stories include aspects of society new to that time: Trains and chairs, respectively. These pieces from the Meiji & Taisho period, a period where stories began to express the character’s thoughts, depict the importance of understanding novel and foreign aspects of daily life by showing how these modern ways of living may be used inappropriately.
Western Washington University (2011). US / Japan culture comparison. Retrieved February 9, 2014, from www.wwu.edu/auap/english/gettinginvolved/CultureComparison.shtml
Throughout history, there has been an inescapable struggle between instilling ancestral customs and following the path of progress through adaptation. Author Yukio Mishima experienced this struggle during the time he wrote the novel The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With the Sea as his political ideology leaned towards conservatism and preserving traditional Japanese beliefs such as the samurai lifestyle. Post World War II was a transitional period for Japan as it started embracing the Western mannerisms of the Allied countries. Mishima’s internal conflict between this dichotomy -- westernization and traditionality -- is represented in the novel through the character of Noboru. Noboru struggles between his immersion in traditional