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Transcending labels and panics: the logic of Japanese youth problems

Transcending labels and panics: the logic of Japanese youth problems AbstractSocial scientific research on Japanese youth experienced somethingof a boom in the 2000s and is attracting further attention following the tripledisaster of 11 March 2011. But while advances have been made in understandingyoung people’s relationship to work, marginalization, and activism, for instance,the premises of this emerging field of research remain shaky. Despitecursory critiques of associated labels and recurring “moral panics,” the dynamicsof youth problems have not yet been sufficiently understood. This paperdraws on the well-known case of the “nerdy” otaku to illustrate how youthproblems arise from the complex interaction of labels, incidents, and prominentactors – that is, their more visible side – with underlying assumptions, strategies,and interests – that is, the less salient dimension of such problems. Afterhighlighting important connections between the otaku phenomenon and thetwo subsequent phenomena of hikikomori and NEET, four key mechanisms areset out that govern the way youth problem debates emerge and evolve moregenerally (i.e., the respective roles of “industries,” “translators,” rhetoricalstrategies, and youth as a “muted group”). The paper concludes by relating thefindings to post-tsunami Japan, arguing that the way in which young peopleare debated in the 2010s may turn out surprisingly similar to the debates in the2000s, unless the very configuration of the institutions and actors that constructyouth debates changes. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Contemporary Japan de Gruyter

Transcending labels and panics: the logic of Japanese youth problems

Toivonen, Tuukka; Imoto, Yuki
Contemporary Japan , Volume 25 (1): 26 – Mar 1, 2013
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Publisher
de Gruyter
Copyright
© 2013 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin Boston
ISSN
1869-2737
eISSN
1869-2737
DOI
10.1515/cj-2013-0004
Publisher site
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Abstract

AbstractSocial scientific research on Japanese youth experienced somethingof a boom in the 2000s and is attracting further attention following the tripledisaster of 11 March 2011. But while advances have been made in understandingyoung people’s relationship to work, marginalization, and activism, for instance,the premises of this emerging field of research remain shaky. Despitecursory critiques of associated labels and recurring “moral panics,” the dynamicsof youth problems have not yet been sufficiently understood. This paperdraws on the well-known case of the “nerdy” otaku to illustrate how youthproblems arise from the complex interaction of labels, incidents, and prominentactors – that is, their more visible side – with underlying assumptions, strategies,and interests – that is, the less salient dimension of such problems. Afterhighlighting important connections between the otaku phenomenon and thetwo subsequent phenomena of hikikomori and NEET, four key mechanisms areset out that govern the way youth problem debates emerge and evolve moregenerally (i.e., the respective roles of “industries,” “translators,” rhetoricalstrategies, and youth as a “muted group”). The paper concludes by relating thefindings to post-tsunami Japan, arguing that the way in which young peopleare debated in the 2010s may turn out surprisingly similar to the debates in the2000s, unless the very configuration of the institutions and actors that constructyouth debates changes.

Journal

Contemporary Japan – de Gruyter

Published: Mar 1, 2013

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