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  • THE JAPAN FORUM
My Way Your Way
Dancing Together: Yosakoi

vol.3

Dance with Life

Dancing Together: Yosakoi

"Yosakoi" is a kind of group dancing based mainly on “yosakoi-bushi” and “soran-bushi,” which were folk songs traditionally played to accompany dancing at local festivals. It first appeared in Shikoku island’s Kochi prefecture in the 1950s and spread throughout the country in the 1990s. Today yosakoi festivals are held on a large and small scale, such as Kochi prefecture’s Yosakoi Matsuri, Hokkaido’s Yosakoi Soran Matsuri, and the Tokyo Yosakoi Matsuri, from early spring through late autumn each year.
“Yosakoi chimu” (yosakoi teams) have been founded in local communities, schools, and various organizations. Each team devises not only its dance steps but its own costumes, style of narimono clappers, and music. We asked two members of the Tokai University Yosakoi Club, named “Hibiki” (which means “sound,” “resonance,” “echo”) to describe for us the attraction of yosakoi dancing.
2017.01
My Way Your Way
To Dance Forever as a Redhead

vol.2

Dance with Life

To Dance Forever as a Redhead

The video-sharing site Niconico, which was founded in late 2006, has a category called “Odotte mita” or “Danced It,” in which users post videos of themselves and others dancing along to anime and Vocaloid songs. One such user is Tadanon, who began posting videos of himself dancing in early 2007. Here, Tadanon goes on the record about what motivates him to do what he does.
2017.01
My Way Your Way
To Dance with More Freedom

vol.1

Dance with Life

To Dance with More Freedom

Fourteen years ago, Omae Koichi was hit by a drunken driver, and lost his left leg from mid-calf down. It was the night before he was to go to Niigata to audition with a dance company he greatly admired. He did not allow the accident to make him give up on his dream, however. He faced a huge setback and deep despair, but he overcame them, and today he stands upon the stage as a professional dancer.
2016.12
My Way Your Way
Sculptures from Newspaper and Masking Tape

vol.3

Art Out of the Everyday

Sculptures from Newspaper and Masking Tape

An art school graduate, Sekiguchi Kotaro today teaches art at a special education school in the Tokyo area. For several years he has been spending his summer vacations and other holidays creating sculptures made with newspaper and masking tape. Art, he says, is a means for establishing connections with other people.
2016.09
My Way Your Way
Erasing to Create: Pictures into Sculptures

vol.4

Art Out of the Everyday

Erasing to Create: Pictures into Sculptures

Creating three-dimensional figures from eraser waste or crumbles is something you could readily imagine. But erasing a picture, and then recreating the picture in three-dimensional form using the resulting eraser dust?! This is the surprising art of Irie Saya.
2016.10
My Way Your Way
Portraits with Corks

vol.2

Art Out of the Everyday

Portraits with Corks

Sommelier Kubo Tomonori works in a store specializing in French wines. When not selling wine, he creates art with wine corks. It is an art, he says, that enriches one’s appreciation of wine.
2016.08
1/365
Very Special Music Festival

Volunteer Activities

Very Special Music Festival

2016.08.03
My Way Your Way
Creating Art from Things We Throw Away

vol.1

Art Out of the Everyday

Creating Art from Things We Throw Away

Yamada Yuka creates paper art from that item so close to our lives—the toilet paper core. Her studio, designed with an all white color scheme, is in a quiet residential area in Kakegawa, Shizuoka prefecture. All her works are made solely from collected toilet paper cores. Let’s find out what is behind Yamada’s approach to “recycle art.”
2016.05
My Way Your Way
Let's Go on an Anime Pilgrimage (Extra edition)

vol.3

Putting Ourselves on the Map

Let's Go on an Anime Pilgrimage (Extra edition)

After starting university in 2014, Nose created an anime study group. Onoguchi joined soon after entering the university in 2015. They talk about the attraction of anime and their fascination with making pilgrimages to the “sacred sites” (seichi) that are the original settings for anime stories.
2016.06
1/365
Mock University Entrance Examinations

Entrance Exams

Mock University Entrance Examinations

2016.06.22
1/365
Mother's Day Present

Mother's Day

Mother's Day Present

2016.06.08
1/365
A Start of a New Life!

APR

A Start of a New Life!

2016.06.01
Editor's Blog
University Student with Sights Set on 2020

University Student with Sights Set on 2020

2016.06.01
My Way Your Way
The Yokai Town

vol.2

Putting Ourselves on the Map

The Yokai Town

Tottori prefecture's Sakaiminato attracts many tourists as a town associated with yokai, the ghosts, goblins, monsters, and otherworldly creatures of Japanese lore and legend. Yokai are actually invisible, but along the 800-meter Mizuki Shigeru Road leading out of the Sakaiminato railway station, visitors encounter statues of the yokai given physical form by manga artist and Sakaiminato native Mizuki Shigeru (1922-2015), who is famous for his Gegege no Kitaro series. The town has managed to steadily increase and maintain its tourism industry and behind its success are the efforts by the local tourist association. Chairman of the tourist association Masuda Tomomi tells us about what the initiatives the association has led and what yokai offer as a tourist attraction.
2016.02
My Way Your Way

vol.1

Putting Ourselves on the Map

"Jeans Town" Takes on the World

The town of Kojima, located in Okayama prefecture’s city of Kurashiki, is the birthplace of “made-in-Japan” jeans. The town’s central shopping district, once suffering from a blight of shuttered shops, is now the lively home of “Jeans Street,” where more than 140,000 tourists visit annually to shop at more than 30 jeans-related stores. The founding father and advocate of Jeans Street is Manabe Hisao, president of Japan Blue, the company that produces the highly reputed Japanese brand Momotaro Jeans. Manabe talks about his attachment to Kojima, the home ground of his enterprise, and the ideas that have inspired him.
2016.02
My Way Your Way
Enjoying Yokai

vol.3

Fascinated with Ghosts

Enjoying Yokai

Soon after entering university, Shuto Ozora founded a study group on yokai, and says he has been a yokai enthusiast since he was little. We ask him to tell us about this enduring fascination.
2016.01
1/365
No more pressure of entrance exam! Yeah!

Entrance Exams

No more pressure of entrance exam! Yeah!

2016.02.09
1/365
Food to eat on New Year's Eve

New Year’s Eve

Food to eat on New Year's Eve

2016.01.26
My Way Your Way
The Spectacular World of the Yokai

vol.2

Fascinated with Ghosts

The Spectacular World of the Yokai

While his calling card says that Tada Katsumi is a specialist in yōkai —the monsters, specters, and other creatures of imagination that populate Japanese lore—he nevertheless says he does not study the yōkai themselves. We asked him to explain what it is that he does study and what its fascination is for him.
2015.12
My Way Your Way
Ghost Stories for Tourism

vol.1

Fascinated with Ghosts

Ghost Stories for Tourism

Koizumi Yakumo (Lafcadio Hearn; 1850–1904) was a writer and journalist who wrote down in English and introduced to the world many ghost stories and folk tales of old Japan. His great grandson, folklorist Koizumi Bon, is now finding ways to reawaken interest in the ghost stories and the spirit behind them that is the legacy of his well-known ancestor.
2015.10

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