Satchi

[Lanceart]

MESSAGE REFUSED ASSHOLE
----- Original Message -----
From: Aaron Gerow <gerow at ynu.ac.jp>
To: KineJapan <KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 1999 2:29 AM
Subject: Re: Satchi


> Glad to see that the Satchi affair has produced such long, thought-out,
> and downright juicy responses.  Don't have time to be juicy myself, but I
> think there are some basic issues that need review.
>
> Peter wrote,
>
> >What I would like to posit here is possibility that there is no
subjective
> >or "willing"
> >element to be found, rather that at some refined meta-level "real" events
> >and their
> >representation in the media interact according to certain
> >naturally-arising patterns and
> >that they produce "products" (incidents, scandals etc) which send out
> >ripples through both
> >dimensions:
>
> Actually, this is basically the definition of power we see dominating
> much cultural studies since Foucault and, as a postscript, was in some
> ways the definition I was trying to invoke when discussing wideshows and
> power.  It would be amusing to think Obuchi is calling up the wideshow
> producers and telling them to attack Satchi, but no one seriously
> believes that.  We can, however, consider the question of power without
> having to think of subjects wielding it for specific purposes.  Power can
> create subjects, mold behavior, etc. through various technologies and
> apparatuses, but no one need be at the wheel.
>
> Basically, this is the view of subjectivity since structuralism, and
> especially with Peter's "ur-stories," it struck me that Peter is offering
> us a good and specific example of a structuralist analysis of modern
> Japanese culture.  Here people do not make (speak) structures, they are
> made ("spoken") by them.
>
> But while I think Peter's ur-stories have a lot of promise and can be
> utilized quite fruitfully, I wonder if we should be wary of such stories
> for the same reason there were problems with structuralism.  There is the
> tendency to see them as "natural," which often leads to a kind of
> functionalism; they become "defined" (often though a central binarism) in
> ways that occlude the fissures and deferrences of signification; they
> focus on texts and signification at the expense of reading; they tend to
> write out the messiness of historical moments in favor of longue durees;
> etc. (others can add to the list).
>
> My references to the issue of power in this discussion have mostly been
> in relation to a continuing concern of mine: the relation of text and
> reception in signification within historical contexts interlaced by power
> concerns.  A central question of power is whether or not a text like a
> wide show has the authority to enforce "its" meanings or ideologies on
> its viewers/readers.  Much poststructuralist work on reception has
> focused on how readers have the power to resist and rewrite the
> ideologicical structures contained in the text.  This, to put it
> simplistically, is the vision of a free and often critical reader.  Since
> Michael seemed to be invoking such a reader in his note, I cited the
> theoretical basis while also warning that we have to recognize that there
> are many elements in popular culture which work to train readers/viewers
> to receive texts "the way they should."  When they do that, they are in
> effect in the power of the text.  Of course, no one need be "at the
> wheels" controlling the texts for a purpose (though moments like war make
> this more possible), but there is still a power relationship being
> created (and not just by textual producers: by subjecting themselves to
> the power of the text, readers create certain pleasing forms of
> entertainment).
>
> My central question then had less to do with who was "using" these texts
> for what purpose, but rather with how we should theorize cultural
> signification in Japan in terms of power.  This does relate to issues of
> politics, industry, gender, class, nation, economy, etc., but not always
> in direct ways.  The Satchi affair is not being used by any to divert the
> Japanese people away from the Japanese Diet debates.  Rather, what I fear
> is that certain historical practices regarding signification,
> intersecting with structures of textual power, mold subjects who
> precisely don't have as much "freedom" to read as some scholars hope.
> Such subjects also end up being those who are less critical of political
> texts, which is one way these issues of signification also relate to the
> political field.
>
> Again, these are issues I am still working on, but I still wonder what
> people do think of the the intersecting issues of power, signification,
> and reception within Japanese popular image culture.
>
> Aaron Gerow
> YNU
>
>