Seeing Japan Through One’s Media of Choice

When I came to Japan in 1991, I brought with me a large body of knowledge of Japan’s popular culture, from anime to manga to Ultraman. While it was nice to have this information handy, the reality was that the “true” Japan I encountered was — of course — not the same as the stylized world I’d seen. Many things I encountered here, like narrow streets or bankrupt pachinko parlors or shouting deranged men on trains were nowhere to be seen in the anime or manga that I’d consumed while learning Japanese. It’s analogous to Japanese who learn English by watching Hollywood movies then wonder why Bruce Willis isn’t hanging out on every street corner waiting to bust some bad guys. While there’s probably no way to avoid this tendency to see Japan through your media of choice, my advice is to mix things up as much as you can by sampling different kinds of popular culture. Japan’s dramas, while still presenting a stylized subset of the “real” Japan, might be a good place to start.

I’ll bet you’ve never seen one of these babies in your favorite moe anime.