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Paper short abstract

In the wake of revelations of abuse perpetrated by the late idol producer Johnny Kitagawa, this paper outlines and evaluates current efforts towards safeguarding the next generation of idol performers in Japan and beyond, incorporating insights from history, survivors and policymakers.

Paper long abstract

Content warning: This paper contains general discussion of child sexual abuse as a societal phenomenon.

In 2023, a BBC documentary investigating allegations of child sexual abuse against the late Japanese idol producer Johnny Kitagawa prompted many more survivors to come forward. Acknowledging past failures, agency that used to share his name has now rebranded itself, and is overtly committed to becoming a sector leader on the prevention of the recurrence of such abuse. But why are so many children and young people working as idols in the first place? And now the attention to Kitagawa’s abuse has died down, is enough now being done to safeguard the idols of the future?

This paper will begin with a brief social history of youth and popular music in postwar Japan, and the development of idols as a distinct style of production and performance. It will then draw out the sociohistorical roots for the persistence of key barriers to improving the safeguarding of children and young people in Japan’s entertainment industries, based on interviews conducted by the author and co-researcher Professor Kaori Suetomi with survivors and policymakers in Tokyo in the summer of 2024.

It will conclude by evaluating the safeguarding potential of a new voluntary system for checking the criminal records of those working with aspiring idols in Japan (the “Japanese DBS” system). This paper has implications for the study of child performer regulations across East Asia (such as “fostered idols” in China, and the management of K-pop idols), and argues that policy reforms to protect children and young people who perform as idols cannot happen without a consideration of the specific sociohistorical context of youth and popular music performance.

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Paper short abstract

Using Yorushika as a case study, this paper examines how international fans contribute to the global circulation of Japanese music through translations, covers, and interpretations, acting as cultural mediators who reduce linguistic and cultural barriers and enable engagement with Japanese content.

Paper long abstract

This study contributes to cultural, fan, and Japanese popular music scholarship by examining the creative practices of the transnational fandom surrounding Yorushika, a Japanese pop-rock duo formed in 2017 whose members remain anonymous. With Japanese-only social media, high-context lyrics, and limited physical media distribution, Yorushika did not initially appear to target overseas audiences. Their music relies heavily on complex, multimodal storytelling that requires access to multiple media forms and high levels of Japanese language literacy, which would seem to limit engagement by non-Japanese fans. Nevertheless, the band has gained increasing international recognition since the COVID-19 pandemic.

This shift can be attributed to a combination of factors: Yorushika’s presence on streaming platforms that were widely used during this period, early collaborations with the anime industry, and, most significantly, the efforts of overseas fans. Fannish engagement, visible in discussions of narrative interpretations, accounts of personal experiences related to the music, and the exchange of recommendations, often provides the initial encouragement for new listeners to engage more deeply with Yorushika’s work. In this process, fan productions become the primary mediators of Japanese language and culture.

Drawing on qualitative research that includes an open-ended questionnaire and a series of in-depth interviews with self-selected members of Yorushika’s international fan community, the study examines how practices such as instrumental and vocal covers, lyric translations, and interpretive essays have facilitated the band’s global reach. Fan activities play a fundamental role in the growth of this border-crossing fandom in two key ways: by disseminating Yorushika-related content and by reducing the cultural distance between the artists’ work and non-Japanese audiences. The latter is particularly important, as understanding Yorushika’s complex storytelling requires specific linguistic and cultural knowledge.

The paper presents empirical data on how international fans discovered Yorushika, the factors that transformed casual listeners into fans, and the role of fan-produced content in shaping engagement. In doing so, the study highlights how fans act as cultural agents in the global circulation of Japanese popular music that is primarily intended for local audiences.

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Paper short abstract

This paper examines “world music” as a framework shaping modes of listening in Japan since the 1980s. Focusing on Ainu musician OKI, it traces shifts in how vernacular music is framed in the Western-influenced Japanese popular music industry, from exoticised authenticity to reflexive recomposition.

Paper long abstract

This paper examines 'world music' in Japan as a cultural framework through which vernacular musics have been classified, performed, and reconfigured from the 1980s to the present. Rather than treating world music as a transient boom or a stable genre, the paper approaches it as historically situated modes of listening and representation whose effects continue to shape contemporary musical practices.

Japan’s engagement with world music developed within a distinctive historical and geopolitical context, informed by Western Orientalism, imperial hierarchies, and its ambivalent self-positioning between 'the West' and 'Asia'. For Japanese audiences long accustomed to Western classical and popular music since the modern period, world music provided a framework through which musics marginalised in the Western mainstream, including Japanese music, could be heard as 'exotic'. Japanese folk songs, ritual and religious music, and contemporary performances using traditional instruments were juxtaposed and staged within a global soundscape, with music festivals playing a crucial role in mediating live encounters with perceived cultural differences. While the category of world music facilitated the circulation and recognition of diverse musical practices, it also reproduced asymmetrical relations of authenticity, exoticism, and cultural authority. These tensions did not dissipate with the decline of the boom but instead informed subsequent transformations in musical practices and reception.

Focusing on developments from the boom period to the present, the paper highlights a shift from labelling towards reworking and recomposition. To illustrate this argument, the paper examines the case of OKI, an Ainu musician active from the world music boom to the present, showing how earlier framings that emphasised ethnic authenticity within world music circuits have given way to more reflexive engagements foregrounding mediation, authorship, and contemporary creativity.

By tracing these trajectories, the paper posits that world music in Japan should be understood not as a concluded historical episode but as an evolving cultural framework. In this respect, the paper contributes to Japanese studies by situating world music within the context of Japan’s postwar cultural history. It demonstrates how global musical categories were selectively appropriated, institutionalised, and reworked within Japan’s specific social and cultural conditions.

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Paper short abstract

This presentation analyzes the mutual portrayal of Japan and South Korea in local musicals, focusing on how these representations shape national perceptions. It addresses historical tensions and evaluates musicals' potential to enhance mutual understanding through cultural representation.

Paper long abstract

This presentation examines portrayals of Japan in South Korean musicals and of South Korea in Japanese musicals. Combining music, text, and image, musicals emerged as a powerful soft-power instrument that forms the image of the Other among local and foreign audiences. The presentation centres on how Japanese and South Korean musical theatre becomes a performative platform for cultural auto-images (self-images) and hetero-images (images of the Other) in connection with Japan–South Korea relations, which have been characterised by a colonial past, wartime antagonisms, post-war identity building, as well as the contemporary pop culture exchange. Through a comparative approach, drawing on elements of imagology and collective memory theories, by examining several musicals featuring explicit or implicit references to their respective neighbouring countries, I will aim to explore technical and artistic differences in the conditions of articulation of the historically shaped images of the Other. I will also argue that although Japanese and South Korean musicals reinforce several stereotypes, they also prove that well-implemented auto- and hetero-images may favourably influence the image of a given nation.