Anime - Princesse Mononoke

Is it a high or low cultural genre, according to Napier (2005)? What are some of its subgenres?

As a main genre, the genre to which anime belongs, according to Napier (2005), is he culture of 'popular' or, in Japan, the 'mass' culture.  However, in America it fall under a 'sub' culture. 

As stated by Napier (2005), anime has been seen more as an intellectually and more challenging form of art which is a form of popular culture that adds to high culture traditions as it not only includes influences from traditional Japanese arts such as Kabuki.

The issue of appearance within Japanese anime has often been brought up by critics.  The characters that the Japanese comics portray typically look non-Japanese.  Napier (2001) believes that a possible reason for this choice of style is that the Japanese audiences that the artists design anime for, are able to receive a sort of "alternative world" (Napier 2005, p.25 ). 

Napier then goes on to describe the design of the facial characteristics of the anime characters, saying that it's quite ironical how the facial features such as the large childlike eyes and lipless mouths that are so common in the Japanese anime characters, actually originate from the American cartoons of the 1930's.

In relation to the issue of appearance with the Japanese anime that I have raised, you can see with characters in Princesse Mononoke that, even though, their clothing remains intact with the Japanese tradition, their facial appearance relates to more of a European look. If you look at Princesse Mononoke's eyes, they're round and almost childlike - adapting the American cartoons technique. Even the character Jigo, very Japanese in clothing and style, but his face looks more Russian that it does Japanese because of these facial features that have been westernized.

References:


Napier, S. (2005). Anime and Local/Global Identity. In Anime: from Akira to Howl’s Moving Castle
        (pp.15-34). Hampshire: Palgrave/Macmillan. 

Week 10 - cult TV

This week we have studied about cult TV and it was interesting to know that they are ongoing popular genre through the years. One of the best series is Buffy the vampire slayer and this is one of the examples of cult TV. According to Hills (2004), cult TV is characterised by a number of shared textual attributes from a narrative world where the audience can never fully encounter. The world that they create has its own textual world with distinctive and characteristic rules for its operation. Buffy is a character that looks like a normal teenage girl but has the power to kill vampires. The amazing fan culture evolve from the fantastic story lines and background of science fiction, horry and fantasy (Jones, 2002).

It is not targeted to a specific audience and it made the audience love the programme with high quality stories and also humour inside the show. The life of an abnormal girl who has the secret power to defeat the vampire is not a life we know about. It makes people get addicted to the story and also the characters. Following on Hills (2004), soap narrative thread is typically multi-stranded and correspond to one narrative thread among many. However, with cult TV programmes it focuses on a narrative puzzle that explains the fantasy narrative worlds. Because it is a different kind from soap operas and comedy shows, the fans get sucked into the story, the series of cult TV. I remember in intermediate school, Buffy, Angel, Charmed, etc.. were so popular and would appear in every teenage magazine covers with all the stories that are related to the programme and the characters. In that period of time it was targeted to adult audiences but it was mostly famous among teenagers. According to Rose (2002), the gender roles an expectations have been blurred so the relationship between creature and creator in Buffy is more complicated and the boundaries are less clear. Riley Finn is a creature of Maggie Walsh and she had a vision for Riley's future. This was tied to her cyber-creation, Riley is helpless to resist Adam's summons but at critical moment , the connection with him and Buffy allows him to regain his will and reject the dehumanization of technology. It was interesting to see the episodes and whether they get to fight the evil and be together at the end.

Weeks 7-8; Sci-Fi - The Man in the High Castle

What was does Dick (1995) himself theorise about the I Ching?

 

First of all, Philip K. Dick points out that the 'I Ching' was used to "develop the direction of a novel". The I Ching, is an ancient Chinese oracle-text which Dick used as a means of plotting his narrative The Man in the High Castle; "a ground-breaking narrative experiment that has distinct cybertextual, as well as oracular, resonances" (Mountfort, 2006). Overall, Dick's literary experiment with the I Ching oracle was a brave and radical one.

Dick himself has an interesting theory upon his use of the I Ching, he stated in an interview:

"Well, the I Ching gives advice beyond the particular, advice that transcends the immediate situation. The answers have a universal quality. For instance: 'The mighty are humbled and the humbled are raised.' If you use the I Ching long enough and continually enough, it will begin to change and shape you as a person" (As cited in Mountfort, 2006).

In his book 'Schizophrenia and the Book of Changes" (1965) Dick further mentioned; "I speak from experince. The Oracle - the I Ching - told me to write this piece". He also says that in a sense, it was the I Ching that wrote The Man in the High Castle, not him.

Dick became obssessed and 'hooked' on the concept, and that it made decisions for him. When he became Schizophrenic, bitter, and paranoid, he decided it was the I Ching that had made him this way. That is had purposefully misled and betrayed him, saying it was a "malicious spirit":

"And then, just about the time that it's gotten your, you know, your credulity is there - you're willing to trsut it - just about the time you've given it your faith and trust, it will zap you with the most malevolent, wrong information. In other words, it sets you up. I regard the I CHING as a malicious spirit". (as cited in Mountfort, 2006). 

Personally, I think Philip. K Dick's theories regarding the I Ching are delusional yet extremely fascinating. His mind is clearly in a world of it's own, and his words are hard to make sense of; but even the slightest bit of my understanding enables me to realise he certainly had strong beliefs about the power the I Ching had over him, and it's important role in creating The Man in the High Castle. 

I think a good way to describe Dick's theory upon the I Ching is that it is a 'beautiful monster'; to him, it was vital in the narrative of his amazing novel, but it also destroyed him and set him up for, well, mental failure.

References

Dick, P.K. (2001;1962). The Man in the High Castle. London: Penguin. 

Dick, P.K. (1995) Schizophrenia and the I Ching. In Sutin, L. (Ed.), The Shifting Realities of Philip K. Dick (pp.175-182). New York: Vintage.

Mountfort, P. (2006). Oracle-text/Cybertext in Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle. Conference paper, Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association annul join conference, Atlanta, 2006. 

Science fiction normally sets in a different world we live in, and importantly it somehow involves science/technology. In Science fiction stories also has to have some kind of odd/advanced technology that could exist in the future and characters in Science fiction have supernatural power. There are many Science fiction works now-a-days and Ones that I know are Iron Man (2008), Avatar (2009) and The Time Machines (H. G. Wells, 1895)

Speculative fiction a subset of Science fiction, but in Speculative fiction, 'What if...' condition applies, and often Speculative fiction consists alternation of history. I would label speculative fiction as a broad literary genre encompassing any fiction with supernatural, fantastical, or futuristic elements. Examples of speculative fictions would be the final noel in Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games series, 'Mockingjay', and 'Surface Detail' which is written by Iain M. Banks.

The novel 'The Man in the High Castle' also has elements of Science fiction like the background different world. However in my opinion, 'The Man in the High Castle' goes under Speculative fiction category as PKD sets up a What if condition as what would have happened if Japan and Germany won the World War 2. Also PKD alternated history of World War 2, which is one of the element in Speculative fiction.


Reference
Newitz Annalee. (2011). The 15 Best Speculative Fiction Books of 2010. Retrieved from http://io9.com/5714039/the-14-best-speculative-fiction-books-of-2010

Fantasy

A Wizard of Earth Sea

"All fictional stories as we know them today have their origin in storytelling as was done by our ancestors.  At some point mythology came into the picture with stories about the fantastic deeds of gods and the horrors committed by terrible mythical creatures.  Gods or godlike characters are still very popular in the fantasy genre, often based on ancient cultures like the Greeks, the Romans, the Vikings or the Egyptians. Mythical creatures like vampires and werewolves also often pop up.  The actual start of the genre of fantasy, as we have come to know it today, originates from the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century." (Origin of Fantasy, n.d.)

Fantasy is a genre that touches on the desire to be more than human.  Making the impossible, possible.  People in this day and age seem to be obsessed with the 'supernatural' side of life - yet I believe, in the wrong way.  I feel that the route that the media has chosen to take within the supernatural realm is really dark and unnecessary.

As a Christian, I feel really uncomfortable with the genre of Fantasy.  I feel that it's a realm of life that has been created in order satisfy a need for the 'supernatural' created by society.  I believe, that the genre is associate with the spiritual realm and a person can open themselves up to unwanted spirits which can lead to horrible things - even if you just think about a child having a nightmare after watching a scary movie.  I feel that people seek out movies or immerse themselves in a genre in order to gain a desired reaction or effect without thinking about the consequences that come with it.

Origin of Fantasy. Focus on Fantasy. Retrieved September, 21,  2012 from http://www.focusonfantasy.com/2010/02/the-origin-of-fantasy/

Week 8 * Man in the High Castle

Philip K. Dick born in Chicago in 1928 is a successful writer and one of the very best writers in the world. According to Brown (2001), he had a thorough grounding in philosophy, religion and psychology. He also was very interested in science fiction and first published his story in 1952 and wrote eight science fiction novels. Dick used SF to explore the obsession with the nature of perceived reality, good and evil and the abuse of power. He was very interested and was obsessed with the idea of living in a different world or the universe that was only apparently real. His novels contain big ideas that are outside of the world and writes about the many strengths of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. Dick introduces to another world inside the novel ‘Man in the High Castle’ where it is an illusion and that a better world might exist.

Inside the novel there are several characters that guide their lives based on the I Ching. Juliana Frink is a judo instructor and meets Joe Cinnadella from a dinner and gets attracted to the fascist wwar hero. She is one of the passive characters and consults the I Ching less through a spiritual motivation. The characters are connected in more indirect ways and the novel contains a loose collection of characters.

The author has created the storylines with the questions “What if …”, for example “what if the Allies had lost the war?, how might the march of titanic circumstance effect the ordinary citizen?” and the author has led the audience into the mystery of each of their fate. Following on Brown (2001), the science fiction gives us the ‘what if’ thoughts in our heads and to compare our living world with another world that might exist.

According to Brown (2002), Dick was populating his novels with fully-realized characters drawn from real life and combined people he knew and versions of himself. Dick had difficulties in his family and he believed that his mother had abandoned his twin sister who died five weeks after her birth. Dick suffered from anxiety attacks and was not able to adapt socially. This can be one of the reasons that he was interested in science fiction and also wanting to create his own world in the story and see if from a different view.

From my research, Dick didn’t think scepticism was a way of life and he provides some of what we need to deal with our fears. According to Wittkower (2011), Dick’s philosophical journeys help us to face our fears to tackle these questions in an honest and open way. 

Reference:

Brown, E. (2001). Introduction. In Dick, P.K., The man in the High Castle. London: Penguin.

Dick, P.K. (2001; 1962). The Man in the High Castle. London: Penguin.

Wittkower, D.E. (2011). Philip K. Dick and philosophy. United States: Carus Publishing Company.

Weeks 5-6; Anime - Princess Mononoke

What is the ‘shoujo’ and how does it often function in anime?

Shoujo is a subgenre of anime. The term Shoujo translates simply to "little female". It is generally limited to girls around the ages of twelve to thirteen. Metaphorically, Shoujo refers to 'coming of age', the transition between infancy and maturity. These females are often portrayed as lightly erotic, and are becoming familiar with sexuality.

Basically, a Shoujo anime story will be set in a dreamy, magical fantasy world. It's a big contrast to the dark and dreary war-time and sci-fi type plots commonly explored in other areas of anime. 

Japanese find this subgenre fascinating and entertaining because it is all about the transition from "childhood to adulthood, powerless to power, innocence to awareness". Suprisingly, this subgenre is as appealing to males as it is females. Napier states that although female teenagers addicted to "kawaii" (cute) characters and plots would be the assumed target audience, adult Japanese males make up a large portion of the Shoujo fan base.

In regards to Princess Mononoke and Miyizaki, the female characters most definitely fall into the Shoujo archetype; due to their age and appearance. However, there is one large difference. Generally, Shoujo characters are portrayed as passive, in a "timeless dreamland". In contrast, Miyizaki's characters are strong and active. They are tough, curious and courageous. They have even been referred to as "youths wearing Shoujo masks" - meaning they look the part, but most definitely do not act it!

In his film Princess Mononoke, the female characters are anything but soft, passive, and typically pretty. Miyizaki has done this on purpose. He wanted to beat the Shoujo stereotype; he was determined for his female characters to represent more than just an attractive young women, something he describes as "play toys for Lolita complex guys" and "pets".  As we discussed in an earlier lecture, Miyizaki did this for political reasons. He wanted his viewers to re-evaluate the female anime stereotype.."to turn something on it's head".

I think he did so successfully.

Princess Mononoke is completely different to that of any other Shouji anime characters, there was never anyone invented quite as different to the Shoujo stereotype as the feral and wild Princess Mononoke!

Reference:

Napier, S. (2005). Anime and Local/Global Identity. In Anime: from Akira to Howl’s Moving Castle. Hampshire: Palgrave/Macmillan. 

Typical Shoujo female characters                                   Miyizaki's Princess Mononoke