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Background: Emotional design of multimedia lessons involves adding features that are intended to increase learner enjoyment and promote learning—such as adding narrative, anthropomorphizing non‐human elements, and using warm colours. Objective: The present study extends this work to examine the potential of Japanese animation (anime) for improving science learning. Method: Specifically, 134 English‐speaking students learned about cells in the human body by viewing the popular anime, Cells at Work, either in Japanese with English subtitles or dubbed in English with no subtitles (anime groups), or by viewing a slideshow containing the same information (slideshow group). The anime conditions were vibrant story‐driven lessons that depicted human‐looking cells working to fight off invaders in a human body that looked like a city. The slideshow used very similar wording as the anime groups, and displayed the cells without anthropomorphism or a storyline. Results and Conclusion: The anime groups did not differ significantly from each other on any dependent measures and were therefore combined. The anime groups scored significantly higher than the slideshow group on retention (d = 0.35) and transfer (d = 0.48) tests. The anime groups also had significantly higher ratings of motivation (d = 0.60) and enjoyment (d = 1.13), whereas, the slideshow group had significantly higher ratings of distraction (d = 0.59). These results support the cognitive‐affective theory of learning with media (CATLM) and demonstrate that anime may be an effective learning medium. Takeaways: Anime should be considered as a medium for science learning, especially when students might not otherwise be motivated to learn. Lay Description: What is currently known about this topic: Anime is a form of Japanese animation similar to an animated comic book.Cells at Work is a series of anime lessons on cells in the human bloodstream.Cells are represented with anthropomorphism, colours, and rounded shapes.Emotional design involves using anthropomorphism, colours, and rounded shapes. What does this paper add: Students viewed an anime or an equivalent slideshow on the human bloodstream.The anime group performed better on a post‐test and reported less distraction.Anime can be considered a form of emotional design for science lessons. What are the implications for practitioners: Anime can be used to teach about cells in the human bloodstream.Instructional designers should consider using anime as a medium for science instruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This work is the extended version of a paper presented at the conference HMM2021, about the history of mechanical engineering. First, the initial cultural and industrial steps in the robotic field in Japan are introduced, to display the beginning of this interlaced path, before WW2; then, in the context of the aftermaths of the war, some famous anime heroes are presented as ancestors of the coming mecha anime series. The rising research in the field of robotics and more generally the developments of contemporary Japanese automation industry are then drawn, as a technological substrate for mecha conception. In particular, Masahiro Mori studies are taken into consideration to identify an actual robot design pattern to apply to the following comparative description and examination of the different mecha; finally, thanks to this analysis, the common breeding ground whence robotics and mecha (and their reciprocal influences) arise, is outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Soundtracks and music are key elements of narrative and emotional expression in anime, which is a prominently popular animation genre. Nevertheless, the music used in the early decades of Japanese animation production does not have the same sonority and functionality that the music of contemporary anime. Thus, in this paper we analyze the music of the early years of Japanese animation, from the 30s to the 50s, focusing on its different functions, characteristics forms and techniques, the most representative composers, and the most remarkable animations works relative to their characteristic musical aspects. We will show how, in general, these soundtracks were highly influenced by the musical pieces of western animation that arrived in Japan during the period studied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper looks at recent isekai ('different world') anime in relation to 2018s Goblin Slayer. It argues the latter is a settler-colonialist critique of the unconscious structural violence within former's tropes and presumptions. Isekai anime provide a space where superexploitation and the redistribution of surplus value are buried within a fantasy of non-alienated, non-commodified labor, and Goblin Slayer represents the exhaustion of this fantasy and the return of the repressed unconscious of settler violence on the frontier. Using Patrick Wolfe's theorization of a neoliberal settler-colonialism, this paper argues that Japanese settler-colonialism is not a primitive form of capitalism or a historical episode shed by postcolonialism but a contemporary mode of production that coexists alongside imperialism. Through an analysis of the historiography of the Japanese Empire, this paper constructs a general theory of settler-colonialism that situates Japan at the forefront of the late capitalist world system, anime as the system's cultural representation, and otakudom as its labor regime. Finally, it asks what lies beyond the settler-colonialist critique and the space Goblin Slayer opens up against its own ideological limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Japanese popular culture has become a major global phenomenon, with thousands of manga, anime, and video game titles translated and localized every year in dozens of countries. However, despite the international success of Japanese pop culture, fandom in Japan remains insular and socially marginal. Japanese society generally regards otaku and fujoshi as undersocialized, immature, and even dangerous. This paper examines the collision of these two fan cultures as depicted in Kio Shimoku's manga Genshiken. A somewhat self-deprecating love letter to otaku and fujoshi, the text depicts a university otaku circle that is eventually joined by an American exchange student, Susanna Hopkins. Through the inclusion of this exchange student the text expresses anxieties about the exportation and repatriation of Japanese subculture. Sue only expresses herself in quotes from subcultural texts, suggesting that the process of exportation transmogrifies Japanese subculture to the point where it is no longer legible to Japanese fans. This subculture, dehistoricized and decontextualized from the social and cultural strata of Japanese fandom, is made illegible in its home country, revealing deep uneasiness about the spread of Japanese subcultural fandoms that have escaped Japanese cultural authority and invites scrutiny to insular fandom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents examples of collaboration between anime producers and the Japan Self-Defense Force. By situating the transitions within the context of the broader trends in collaboration between anime producers and locations (namely, the development of contents tourism), the key turning point in anime producer — JSDF collaboration is be identified and explained. Then, the reasons why in recent years JSDF has been actively collaborating with the production of pop culture contents in the realms of fantasy and fiction with an anime fanbase will be discussed. What is happening in Japan today is a fantasization (= contentsization) and consumption of the military, rather than a 'drift to the right' or resurgence of militarism. The pressures to produce military or 'moe military' anime are driven by the market rather than the military. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently the Japanese government revised its copyright law, and one of the major changes in it is that illegal downloaders in Japan now face up to two years' imprisonment or a fine of ¥2 million (approximately US$19,265), or a combination of the two for downloading certain kinds of copyrighted content. These momentous changes have triggered backlashes around the country from below, as might be expected. Interestingly, the industrial practices of Japanese content industries have developed certain domestic and foreign copyright-related strategies that tolerate some alleged copyright-infringing fan activities. This paper argues that, although some of these strategies are incompatible with the current copyright law regime, and specifically the aforementioned revision to Japan's copyright law, they have unconsciously created unexpected positive outcomes. This paper uses an integrative approach that combines market analysis and comparative law methods--to examine these copyright strategies, and proposes an alternative solution to deal with the copyright problems raised by fanbased activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper deals with the harem genre of Japanese animation as a representative example of Japan's socio-cultural reality in terms of dating and marriage patters in the early 21st century. Animation and manga (comics) are an important part of the public sphere in Japan and one of the most widespread forms of popular culture. Three animated series are discussed in this paper namely: Zero no Tsukaima (Zero's Familiar), Ameinaideyo!! (Ah my Buddha!!), and Asu no Yoichi (High School Samurai). The main characters are a Japanese Knight, a Buddhist Monk, and a Samurai. The paper concludes that the harem genre in animation and comics represents a turning point in Japanese culture in terms of popular attitudes regarding romantic love and also embodies some of the inherent contradictions involved in the transition from arranged marriages to the Western ideal of chivalric romantic love. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Miyazaki Hayao has achieved international renown for a succession of feature-long animations that have been noted for their visual flair and highly imaginative world-constructs. Many of the narratives in these films have been situated in fantasy worlds with often only a tenuous representation of the world as experienced in some conventional contemporary (or historical) sense. Yet beyond the surface of these figures and fantastical plot devices there is a clearly discernible stream of engagement with the past. Focusing primarily onSen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi (Spirited Away)of 2001, this paper critically engages with the leading commentaries on nostalgia and memory in Miyazaki’s work, contrasting the “culturalist” approach of Susan Napier with the “machinic” approach of Thomas Lamarre. In turn, the aesthetic theory of R.G. Collingwood, in particular his concept of “magic”, is employed to demonstrate how certain aesthetic devices within the film facilitate an imaginative engagement with the past, one that is subtle but nonetheless highly evocative of distinctive nostalgic emotions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper lists several web sites on Japanese popular culture. Dentsu Institute of Human Studies provides information on different Japanese media ranging from video and arcade games to television and radio and from magazines to computers. It includes the outline of the White Paper on Information Media which summarizes the information for publishing, broadcasting, films, music and so on for a given year. Kinema Club is an informal group of scholars studying Japanese cinema and other moving image media which was formed out of the shared need for bibliographic information. It has information on holdings in North American libraries, links to Japanese production companies, film festivals, actors, data and search engines, a guide to film specialty bookstores in Japan and how to find prints in the U.S. Anime Web Turnpike has a searchable list of hundreds of links to anime on the web. Japanese TV Guide provides the schedule for about ten days of programming for different regions of Japan; also sorts by genre. Kodansha has links to the e-zines Friday, HotDog PRESS and Young Magazine as well as information about the magazines and comics that it publishes. Ronza is an opinion monthly published by Asahi on political and social issue. Its site provides table of contents for latest issue.

In October 2005 UNESCO produced its Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity. This was largely a response to the worries of countries, especially in Europe and not least of which France, which feared the damaging effects to their cultures if trade in entertainment products remained too one-sided. Generally the argument of this paper is that while initial tensions between the United States and Europe were motivated by the usual commercial concerns, Europeans were increasingly worried about the cultural impact of this commerce. The Japanese, however, have not been nearly so concerned as the Europeans about becoming 'Americanized'. This lack of tension between the United States and Japan in the area of film and television is due to several factors. First, there is a complementarity between American entertainment and the Japanese electronics industry. Second, the Japanese are major players in some aspects of the entertainment industry, most especially in the area of animation, and they are especially influential in Asia. Finally, issues of cultural conflict between the United States and Japan are simply less salient to Tokyo than those which characterize Japan's relations with its Asian neighbors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the use of Edo as a trope for Japanese post-modernity in the 1980s and 1990s and its transformation at the turn of the millenium in order to better situate Japanese visual artist and theorist Murakami Takashi's 2000-1 exhibition, 'Superflat'. Is Murakami's 'Superflat' — which links contemporary anirne and anime-influenced art to the works of Edo-period artists Kano Sansetsu and Katsushika Hokusai — merely another expression of the Edo boom of the 1980s and 1990s? Or does it present a different use of Edo from that which came before? In order to address this question, this article looks at the works of Ötsuka Eiji, Okada Toshio and Karatani Köjin, a group of writers to whose works theorist Azuma Hiroki links Murakami's genealogical endeavors, and takes up Azuma's critique of these writers and Murakami himself. Finally, turning to Nan Yoshitomo's and Murakami's works themselves, seen through the lens of Azuma's arguments in his recent The Animalizing Postrnodern, this article argues that their art — and in turn the Superflat itself — is guided by a logic of compositing that is far more informed by contemporary modes of digital imaging than by the mode of appropriation and quasi-historization that characterized the use of Edo in Japan's postmodern 1980s and 1990s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay deals with two kinds of movement common in cel animation: 'drawing movements' and 'moving drawings'. Drawing movements is common in traditional cel animation that strives for full animation. The latter ndash; moving drawings – becomes pronounced in techniques of limited animation, common in anime. The goal is not, however, to identify and consolidate differences between animation and anime. On the contrary, this paper explores how drawing movements entails a decoding of live-action cinema,which is intensified in the techniques of moving drawings that are prevalent in anime. Thus, anime is seen as a part of movement away from one kind of cinematic experience, towards something like new media and information. The goal of the essay is to think across media, to explore the ways in which different movements have an impact on narrative, genre and spectatorship. Miyazaki Hayao's Tenkuno shiro Raputa (Castle in the sky) (Studio Ghibli, 1986) provides a site for analysis of the ways in which anime technique generates and exploits potentials such as flatness, jitter and weightlessness. Miyazaki's emphasis on floating and gliding presents one way to deal with 'anime-ic' potentials - one that has definite consequences for the imagination of gender, history and nature, as well as the anime-ic experience of information. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]