Category: Rural & Folk Culture Current Events

• The DELUGE has come

  

  In Writing Culture, George Marcus wrote about 2 types of ethnography: the salvage mode and the redemptive mode.  He described the “salvage mode” as being ethnography conducted before the DELUGE.  Well, last week that “deluge” came to Akita, but not in the metaphorical sense that Marcus meant it. Beginning around July 15 while other parts…

  tohokubento

  July 24, 2023

  Akita–General, Rural & Folk Culture Current Events

  climate change, Cultural Anthropology, Ethnography, festivals, Japan, Japan Studies, Modern japan, PhD research, Rural Heritage

• 41 Dances NEWLY added to UNESCO

  

  Of course, right after I leave Akita the big news hits: the Nishimonai Bon Odori is inscribed as a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity! There are many bon-odori 盆踊り(i.e., dances performed during the time of O-bon お盆 at the end of summer) in Akita, but the one performed in the quiet rural town of…

  tohokubento

  March 15, 2023

  Rural & Folk Culture Current Events

  Akita, Buddhist, Cultural Anthropology, Ethnography, Hokkaido, Japan, Japan Studies, Modern japan, Nanzan University, Okinawa, PhD research, Rural Heritage, UNESCO