Islands of Eight Million Smiles
Subtitle: Idol Performance and Symbolic Production in Contemporary Japan (Harvard East Asian Monographs)
Publisher: Harvard University Asia Center
Published: July 15, 2005
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 300
ISBN-13: 9780674017733
Subjects: Popular culture; Social & cultural anthropology; History & Criticism - General; History; History - General History; History: World; Japan; Asia - Japan; Genres & Styles - Pop Vocal; History / Japan
Description: "Since the late 1960s a ubiquitous feature of popular culture in Japan has been the "idol," an attractive young actor, male or female, packaged and promoted as an adolescent role model and exploited by the entertainment, fashion, cosmetic, and publishing industries to market trendy products. This book offers a set of ethnographic case studies regarding the symbolic qualities of idols and how these qualities relate to the conceptualization of selfhood among adolescents in Japan and elsewhere in East Asia where the phenomenon has spread. The author explores how the idol-manufacturing industry absorbs young people into its system of production, molds them into marketable personalities, commercializes their images, and contributes to the construction of ideal images of the adolescent self."--Jacket.