Workshop on Film & Visual Media from Japan, Seoul, Feb. 24

[Alex Zahlten]

Invitation to the second Workshop on Film & Visual Media from Japan in Seoul 

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We are pleased to announce the second Workshop on Film & Visual Media from Japan. The next edition will take place on February 24 (Friday) at 19:00 o?clock. This time the workshop will be hosted by Prof. Earl Jackson and Prof. Kim Soyoung at the Korean National University of Arts.  

The Japanese Film & Visual Media Workshop aims to provide a space for presenting and discussing new and innovative research on films, TV, games and other forms of visual culture from Japan or in interaction with the media ecosystem of Japan. A wide array of theoretical perspective and methodology is welcome. The workshop is open to any interested parties and appreciates participants from any discipline. The workshop is primarily held in English, but contributions in Japanese and Korean are also welcome.

In this edition of the workshop Alexander Zahlten will present on the transformation of fictional bodies in audiovisual media in Japan (see detailed description below).
For any questions, please contact Alexander Zahlten at alex.zahlten at gmail.com or Earl Jackson at earljac at gmail.com. We hope to see you at the workshop!

Earl Jackson
Korea National University of the Arts


Magical Voices and Funerals: The Transforming Status of Fictional Bodies in Japan 1970s - Present
Alexander Zahlten
Dongguk University

This paper will explore the fictional body at its breaking points. Starting from the funeral service held in honor of Rikiishi Tôru, a character from the popular boxing manga serial Ashita no Joe (Tomorrow?s Joe), in 1970, it will span to the funeral 37 years later of Raoh, a character from the manga series Hokuto no Ken (Fist of the North Star), conducted with 7 priests conducting the ceremony and 3000 guests in attendance at a tempel in Tokyo. While the former event was initiated by avant-garde artist Terayama Shûji, the latter was organized by the distributor for the promotion of the latest animated feature film of the Hokuto no Ken series. 
The public reaction to these events is starkly different. The funerals also loosely delineate a period in which the media industry in Japan - and most of the postindustrial media societies - moved towards a radicalized media mix system. Looking at different developments in popular audiovisual media culture during that time ? especially manga, anime and video games ? this paper will attempt to map a specific trajectory of self-reflexivity that leads to various sociopolitically influenced manifestations of the fictional body.


Alexander Zahlten is assistant professor in the Department of Film & Digital Media at Dongguk University. He wrote his dissertation on the role of genre in film from Japan at Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, and has been a researcher at Nihon University and conducted postdoctoral research at Meiji Gakuin University. For ten years he was also a co-organizer of the Nippon Connection Film Festival, the largest festival for film from Japan.

Location:
This month?s workshop will be held at Korea National University of the Arts in room #114 of the School of Film, TV and Multimedia. In the future we will change between different venues with different hosts. Please find the location description at the end of this e-mail.

Access:
The workshop will be held in room #114 of the School of Film, TV and Multimedia on the Seokgwan-dong campus of the Korea National University of Arts. Nearby subway stations are Sangwolgok and Dolgoji (both line 6) and, a little bit further to walk, Sinimun station (line 1). For a map please see the KNUA website: http://eng.karts.ac.kr:81/karts/main/html.jsp?c_no=003001008 

If you have trouble finding the venue, please call Earl Jackson (Korean and Japanese ok) under: 010-9236-5963

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