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Paper short abstract

Prohibited in early modern period, news reporting is quite a modern practice in Japan. This paper examines how narrative techniques reporting current affairs changed in Japan from the late 19th century until the interwar period, which, concomitantly, led to transitions in perceptions of reality.

Paper long abstract

News reporting was quite a modern practice in Japan, for it had been prohibited in early modern period. Pioneering journalists, many of whom were literary writers, had to create ways to convey real-world events to readers, sometimes modifying classical literary styles, and other times refining styles of existing oral culture.

Employing the classical writing style based on the Japanese reading of classical Chinese passages (kanbun kundoku style) with heavy use of couplets and metaphors, newspapers and magazines for intellectuals originally presented news reports as solemn pieces of literature. As modern concept of journalism spread, however, reporting articles started using fewer rhetorical expressions and presenting matter-of-fact reports of events. Since around the turn of the century, moreover, the kanbun kundoku style was gradually replaced by the “da-dearu” style, supposedly colloquial, yet in effect, used mainly in written language, in which the narrator is suppressed and thus sounds objective. Yet, even if written in this style, when the text consists of narration based on the author’s inner thoughts and of direct citations of featured people’s words, it could present the represented world in a quite mimetic way.

The modern news reporting has its origin in popular periodicals as well. Early newspapers for the less educated, launched in the mid 1870s, included news articles in the “desu-masu” style, a colloquial style used for both spoken words and writing, in which the enunciation of the narrator was emphasized. Written in this discursive style, popular periodicals presented news reports as stories narrated by the author, echoing oral performing arts. While the enunciation of the narrator sounds quite mimetic, the represented world of events was not mimetically presented. In contrast, during the interwar period, popular news reports increasingly put an emphasis of enunciation not on the narrator, but on the featured: with the narrator’s “voice” oscillated and retreated, and the enunciation of the interviewees pronounced, they presented the interview scene quite mimetically.

Examining the narration of diverse news reporting in Japanese mass media from the late 19th century until the interwar period, this paper reveals transitions in expression of “reality” and explores their implications.