New Book Announcement: "Art x Research x Archives: Investigating Art and Creative Humanities" edited by the Center for Future Creation and Inheritance, Tokyo University of the Arts / 東京藝術大学未来創造継承センター編『アート×リサーチ×アーカイヴ――調査するアートと創造的人文学』

Art x Research x Archives - Investigative Art and Creative Humanities
Supervisor: Yoshitaka Mori
Edited by Tokyo University of the Arts Future Creation and Inheritance Center
Getsuyosha 2,400 yen 46-size (188mm long x 130mm wide x 19mm wide, 310g weight) 272 pages (8 pages in color) ISBN: 978–4–86503–207–9 C0070

Contemporary art has expanded its scope by adopting research methods from sociology and cultural anthropology, while traditional humanities have also begun to incorporate new endeavors related to vision and hearing into their research. Archives do not simply support culture, but are beginning to play a role in actively creating it. The forefront of art is introduced through the multiple different practices of artists and researchers active in a cross-disciplinary field! [This book is a transcript of a portion of the public lectures given at the "Yurakucho Geidai Campus" in collaboration with the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, Mitsubishi Estate, and Tokyo University of the Arts.]

Authors: Watanabe Hidenori (Professor at the University of Tokyo Graduate School), Kawase Itsushi (Visual Anthropologist), Shitamichi Motoyuki (Artist), Okahara Masayuki (Professor Emeritus at Keio University), Takayama Akira (Director and Artist), Hasegawa Ai (Artist, Keio University), Habaya Kazuma (Center for Future Creation and Inheritance, Tokyo University of the Arts)

アート×リサーチ×アーカイヴ――調査するアートと創造的人文学
毛利嘉孝=監修
東京藝術大学未来創造継承センター=編
月曜社　本体2400円　46判（縦188mm×横130mm×束幅19mm, 重量310g）272頁（内カラー8頁）ISBN:978–4–86503–207–9　C0070

現代芸術は社会学や文化人類学などのリサーチ手法を採用することでその領域を拡大し、伝統的な人文学も視覚や聴覚などにかかわる新たな試みをその研究に取り込み始めた。アーカイヴは文化を単に支えるだけでなく、それらを積極的に生み出す役割を担いつつある。横断的な領域で活動するアーティストや研究者による、複数の異なる実践から紹介するアートの最前線！【本書は、東京都と三菱地所と東京藝術大学の三者連携による「有楽町藝大キャンパス」公開講座の一部を収録した講義録です。】

著者：渡邉英徳（東京大学大学院教授）、川瀬慈（映像人類学者）、下道基行（アーティスト）、岡原正幸（慶應義塾大学名誉教授）、高山明（演出家・アーティスト）、長谷川愛（アーティスト、慶應義塾大学）、幅谷和眞（東京藝術大学未来創造継承センター）

For more information: https://urag.exblog.jp/243923067/

Presentation Announcement:「The “Crisis” of Sociality: Caring for the Dead Otherwise with Anne Allison」

May 23, 2025 / 6:00pm -7:30pm / Room 301, Building 10, Sophia University / In person only / No registration required

Responding to the record low birthrate and population decline of the year before, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida declared Japan “on the brink of not being able to maintain social functions” in 2023. Seeing this as a crisis of social reproduction, he announced policies to incentivize young people into having and raising children—to reembrace the family as the center of life/livelihood. For youth themselves, however, this is a model declining in both viability and appeal. This talk addresses a different contingency; as sociality continues to downsize in Japan—to single households, solo lifestyles, childless futures—what are the effects on the elderly who once counted on “the family” to both care for and bury them? This is another dimension to the “crisis” in sociality today: the post-(re)productive who increasingly find themselves “without anyone else to depend upon” (miyori ga nai) in what some call Japan’s “era of family-less dead” (ienaki jidai no shisha). Facing all-aloneness as they age and enter the grave, seniors—and Japan itself—must confront a model of (reproductive) sociality that is not only being rejected by youth but sentencing the elderly to a wastebin of neglect. Looking at moves that are arising to both avoid and anticipate such an end, the talk considers what any of these new “ending” trends portend for a post-familial future as mapped by caring otherwise for the dead.

For more information: https://www.icc-sophia.com/post/the-crisis-of-sociality-caring-for-the-dead-otherwise-with-anne-allison

Announcement & Call for Participation: 1st Kansai Sociolinguistics Colloquium for Young Researchers @ Doshisha University, Institute for the Liberal Arts

The Doshisha University Institute for the Liberal Arts in cooperation with the University of Bremen (Germany) is initiating the first colloquium for young researchers in the field of sociolinguistics. We invite graduate students, postdoctoral, and early-career researchers to participate in our colloquium and present their current work. The aim of the colloquium is to connect young scholars in the field of sociolinguistics (broadly imagined) and provide a supportive space to discuss their ongoing research. Our focus is to provide a forum for feedback for emerging academics and their unfinished research projects. The conference will be an in-person-only event, and the conference presentation language will be English (with support for Japanese, German, and Spanish during the Q&A and informal spaces). The colloquium will be held at Doshisha University (Imadegawa), on 12 July 2025. Depending on the interest of participants, we plan on several thematic sessions to group scholars of similar sub-fields together, to create an ideal working environment. Each participant will have 10 minutes to present, preparing the audience and the mentors for a 20-minute discussion guided by the presenter. This should leave ample room for feedback and productive criticism. As we are focusing on young researchers, we will refrain from charging a participation fee. We will reserve space for lunch at a local, reasonably-priced restaurant. We also plan to invite all participants for informal drinks in Kyoto after the Colloquium.

The guiding topic of the Colloquium is “Critical Sociolinguistics in a Modern World”, focusing on Japan, Japanese, or any other context worldwide. The invitation is open to any approach within sociolinguistics as well as researchers outside of linguistics interested in language. We welcome submissions from all areas of sociolinguistics, including but not limited to:

● Language and Power
● Language Ideologies
● Multilingualism and Linguistic Inequality
● Race, Ethnicity, and Linguistic Discrimination
● Gender, Sexuality, and Language
● Migration, Mobility, and Language
● Digital Communication
● Ethnography of Communication
● Pragmatics
● Postcolonial Language Studies, Indigenous Language Studies, and Decolonial Linguistics

Abstracts are to be submitted here, containing no more than 300 words, an area of study, and institutional affiliation, by 6 June 2025 (11 a.m. JST).

Timeline:

● Call for papers ends: 6 June 2025, 11 a.m. (JST)
● Notification of results: 13 June 2025
● Registration opens: 13 June 2025
● Registration closes: 4 July 2025, 11 a.m. (JST)

Questions and concerns can be addressed via email to lgrausam@uni-bremen.de Organizing committee:
● Greg Poole – Doshisha University, Institute for the Liberal Arts
● Leon Grausam – University of Bremen, Faculty for Linguistics and Literary Studies

For more information: https://sites.google.com/view/kansaisoclincolloc/home

Announcement: 「Reading Family Albums: Indian Immigrants in Tokyo, 1976 - 2010」 Presentation by Bakirathi Mani @ Sophia University

May 14, 2025 / 18:30-20:00
Room 301, 3F Building 10, Sophia University
In Person only / No registration required

Abstract: How do we enter into, look at, and make sense of family albums? In this talk, I examine archival practices that emerge out of working with a repository of albums that documents my own family's life as Indian immigrants in Japan between 1976 and 2010. These albums and the photographs they contain operate as material and ethnographic objects that decay over time. Writing about these albums demands that I occupy shifting positions: as a subject and critic of these images; as an archivist who preserves the albums; and a daughter inheriting the photographs, who has herself migrated. As the albums travel between Japan, India and the United States, I consider what it means to dwell within these familiar archives, reflecting on methods of reading and writing about images that are among the most intimate representations of selfhood and community that I have encountered.

For more info: https://www.icc-sophia.com/post/reading-family-albums-indian-immigrants-in-tokyo-1976-2010

2025年の桜の反射: Reflections of the 2025 cherry blossoms...

See also: https://visualanthropologyofjapan.blogspot.com/2025/04/2025-expected-beauty-and-awe-of-cherry.html

See also: https://visualanthropologyofjapan.blogspot.com/2025/04/2025-na-no-hana-relations.html

LGBTQとは わかりやすく活動家が解説│課題や支援事例も紹介

"An article I wrote myself in 2022, but it was delivered as an updated article incorporating 3 years worth of changes and more! I think it's very easy to understand." - Fuyumi Yamamoto

Link: https://www.asahi.com/sdgs/article/14564464

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A little addition to my door sign...

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/14/style/le-poisson-steve-tiktok.html

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/BlNOwq8IIPU

Announcement: KG＋ Photo Exhibition in Kyoto April 12 ~ May 11

“KG＋” is a public art festival that first started in 2013 with the aim of discovering and supporting upcoming photographers and curators with 2025 being the 13th anniversary of this festival. We strive to present the state-of-the-art skills of upcoming photographers widely enlisted here in Kyoto to around the globe. In cooperation with “KYOTOGRAPHIE Kyoto International Photography Festival”, we give upcoming photographers and curators participating in KG＋ opportunities to talk and collaborate with world-renowned curators and gallerists from Japan and around the world.

“KG＋ SELECT” is another exhibition, where 10 artists out of the participants of “KG＋” are selected to exhibit their work by judges working at an international degree. KG＋SELECT Award 2025 Winner is held between the selected 10 artists, with the winner given the invitation to exhibit their work in the official KYOTOGRAPHIE program next year in 2026.

For more information: https://kgplus.kyotographie.jp/

2025お花見菜の花の関係子と: Na no hana relations...

Three plamts behind the family of three, all enjoying the cherry blossoms...

See also: https://visualanthropologyofjapan.blogspot.com/2025/04/2025-expected-beauty-and-awe-of-cherry.html