This essay reads the testimonies of four Fukushima women interviewed by journalist Iwakami Yasumi... more This essay reads the testimonies of four Fukushima women interviewed by journalist Iwakami Yasumi in the summer and fall of 2011. At the time, mandatory evacuations had emptied the zones closest to the triple meltdowns, but people in surrounding areas were le to decide for themselves: should they stay at their ancestral homes, or flee to protect their bodies? These four women are inspiring as leaders and as activists because of their ability to think beyond the crippling dichotomy and become worthy of Fukushima as an "event" in the sense explored by Deleuze in The Logic of Sense (1969).
Katsuya Hirano asked me to write an "accompanying essay" when I translated his 2016 interview wit... more Katsuya Hirano asked me to write an "accompanying essay" when I translated his 2016 interview with Kamanaka Hitomi. This is the result: a synopsis of what makes the interview's critique of neoliberal "recovery" policies compelling, and a feminist analysis of 2 of Kamanaka's recent films.
My translation of a 2016 interview between documentary filmmaker Kamanaka Hitomi and UCLA histori... more My translation of a 2016 interview between documentary filmmaker Kamanaka Hitomi and UCLA historian Katsuya Hirano.
This is one of two essays on Oe that I wrote for my book project on post-Fukushima public intelle... more This is one of two essays on Oe that I wrote for my book project on post-Fukushima public intellectuals. The other will come out in _positions asia culture critique_ in 2019, and focuses on Oe's literature. Abstract for this piece: "In newspaper columns and speeches Oe read Japan's post-Fukushima political landscape with the same fierce commitment to problematizing systemic violence that Eve Sedgwick famously called “paranoid.” If paranoia is knowing but rigid, and if many of Oe's remarks were also affectively flat, can we nevertheless read them in excess of Sedgwick's dreaded "resistance vs. capitulation" paradigm? This essay uses Sylvan Tomkins' distinction between shame and contempt to argue that Oe is a master of shame, and that shame makes his post 3.11 activism more interesting than it first appears."
This essay discusses Irigaray's response to Chernobyl ("A Chance to Live") in the context of her ... more This essay discusses Irigaray's response to Chernobyl ("A Chance to Live") in the context of her affinity for Ilya Prigogine's work on self-organizing systems, arguing that Irigaray's "good science" is similar to that of Isabelle Stengers in books like _the Invention of Modern Science_ and _Power and Invention_.
This essay reads 2 texts -- _Na no hana_ [Rape Flowers, 2011] and _Star Red_, (1989) -- to argu... more This essay reads 2 texts -- _Na no hana_ [Rape Flowers, 2011] and _Star Red_, (1989) -- to argue that Hagio's Science Fiction manga offers a profoundly eco-critical alternative to our dominant Lacanian understanding of desire as contingent upon a cut with the material world.
My contribution to Nina Cornyetz and Keith Vincent's 2010 volume _Psychoanalysis in Japan_, this ... more My contribution to Nina Cornyetz and Keith Vincent's 2010 volume _Psychoanalysis in Japan_, this chapter reads Tanizaki's _Yoshinokuzu_ together with the Yoshino chapter of Nakagami's _Kishu_ to argue that while both are about the politics of abjection, Tanizaki's text is, surprisingly, more insightful.
A feminist reading of scriptwriter Konaka Chiaki's 2001 anime Malice@Doll that traces the Deleuze... more A feminist reading of scriptwriter Konaka Chiaki's 2001 anime Malice@Doll that traces the Deleuzean, "Alice in Wonderland" politics of Konaka's better-known work Serial Experiments Lain.
An Irigarayan reading of Nakagami Kenji's Kishu: ki no kuni ne no kunimonogatari [Kishu: Land of ... more An Irigarayan reading of Nakagami Kenji's Kishu: ki no kuni ne no kunimonogatari [Kishu: Land of Trees and Deeply Rooted Narratives].
A zadankai with Aoyama Shinji, Asada Akira, Karatani Kojin, Takazawa Shuji, Tsuahima Yuko and Wat... more A zadankai with Aoyama Shinji, Asada Akira, Karatani Kojin, Takazawa Shuji, Tsuahima Yuko and Watanabe Naomi. Originally given as a keynote address at the 2004 Kumano Daigaku summer seminar in Shingu, this piece weaves my remarks together with the conversation that followed.
Reads Tanizaki's "culturalist" essays from the 1930s -- "In'ei raisan" (In Praise of Shadows), "R... more Reads Tanizaki's "culturalist" essays from the 1930s -- "In'ei raisan" (In Praise of Shadows), "Ren'ai oyobi shikijo" (Love and Lust) and "Geidan" (On Art) -- to argue that they introduce "traditional" Japanese beauty as a modern masochistic formation formed in response to a western superego that says "you must be like me, you may not be like me."
A reading of "Shunkinshō" that traces the parallel between Freud's and Tanizaki's accounts of fet... more A reading of "Shunkinshō" that traces the parallel between Freud's and Tanizaki's accounts of fetishism to argue that Tanizaki's is much more critical of modern subjectivity's insistance on castration for women.
This essay reads the testimonies of four Fukushima women interviewed by journalist Iwakami Yasumi... more This essay reads the testimonies of four Fukushima women interviewed by journalist Iwakami Yasumi in the summer and fall of 2011. At the time, mandatory evacuations had emptied the zones closest to the triple meltdowns, but people in surrounding areas were le to decide for themselves: should they stay at their ancestral homes, or flee to protect their bodies? These four women are inspiring as leaders and as activists because of their ability to think beyond the crippling dichotomy and become worthy of Fukushima as an "event" in the sense explored by Deleuze in The Logic of Sense (1969).
Katsuya Hirano asked me to write an "accompanying essay" when I translated his 2016 interview wit... more Katsuya Hirano asked me to write an "accompanying essay" when I translated his 2016 interview with Kamanaka Hitomi. This is the result: a synopsis of what makes the interview's critique of neoliberal "recovery" policies compelling, and a feminist analysis of 2 of Kamanaka's recent films.
My translation of a 2016 interview between documentary filmmaker Kamanaka Hitomi and UCLA histori... more My translation of a 2016 interview between documentary filmmaker Kamanaka Hitomi and UCLA historian Katsuya Hirano.
This is one of two essays on Oe that I wrote for my book project on post-Fukushima public intelle... more This is one of two essays on Oe that I wrote for my book project on post-Fukushima public intellectuals. The other will come out in _positions asia culture critique_ in 2019, and focuses on Oe's literature. Abstract for this piece: "In newspaper columns and speeches Oe read Japan's post-Fukushima political landscape with the same fierce commitment to problematizing systemic violence that Eve Sedgwick famously called “paranoid.” If paranoia is knowing but rigid, and if many of Oe's remarks were also affectively flat, can we nevertheless read them in excess of Sedgwick's dreaded "resistance vs. capitulation" paradigm? This essay uses Sylvan Tomkins' distinction between shame and contempt to argue that Oe is a master of shame, and that shame makes his post 3.11 activism more interesting than it first appears."
This essay discusses Irigaray's response to Chernobyl ("A Chance to Live") in the context of her ... more This essay discusses Irigaray's response to Chernobyl ("A Chance to Live") in the context of her affinity for Ilya Prigogine's work on self-organizing systems, arguing that Irigaray's "good science" is similar to that of Isabelle Stengers in books like _the Invention of Modern Science_ and _Power and Invention_.
This essay reads 2 texts -- _Na no hana_ [Rape Flowers, 2011] and _Star Red_, (1989) -- to argu... more This essay reads 2 texts -- _Na no hana_ [Rape Flowers, 2011] and _Star Red_, (1989) -- to argue that Hagio's Science Fiction manga offers a profoundly eco-critical alternative to our dominant Lacanian understanding of desire as contingent upon a cut with the material world.
My contribution to Nina Cornyetz and Keith Vincent's 2010 volume _Psychoanalysis in Japan_, this ... more My contribution to Nina Cornyetz and Keith Vincent's 2010 volume _Psychoanalysis in Japan_, this chapter reads Tanizaki's _Yoshinokuzu_ together with the Yoshino chapter of Nakagami's _Kishu_ to argue that while both are about the politics of abjection, Tanizaki's text is, surprisingly, more insightful.
A feminist reading of scriptwriter Konaka Chiaki's 2001 anime Malice@Doll that traces the Deleuze... more A feminist reading of scriptwriter Konaka Chiaki's 2001 anime Malice@Doll that traces the Deleuzean, "Alice in Wonderland" politics of Konaka's better-known work Serial Experiments Lain.
An Irigarayan reading of Nakagami Kenji's Kishu: ki no kuni ne no kunimonogatari [Kishu: Land of ... more An Irigarayan reading of Nakagami Kenji's Kishu: ki no kuni ne no kunimonogatari [Kishu: Land of Trees and Deeply Rooted Narratives].
A zadankai with Aoyama Shinji, Asada Akira, Karatani Kojin, Takazawa Shuji, Tsuahima Yuko and Wat... more A zadankai with Aoyama Shinji, Asada Akira, Karatani Kojin, Takazawa Shuji, Tsuahima Yuko and Watanabe Naomi. Originally given as a keynote address at the 2004 Kumano Daigaku summer seminar in Shingu, this piece weaves my remarks together with the conversation that followed.
Reads Tanizaki's "culturalist" essays from the 1930s -- "In'ei raisan" (In Praise of Shadows), "R... more Reads Tanizaki's "culturalist" essays from the 1930s -- "In'ei raisan" (In Praise of Shadows), "Ren'ai oyobi shikijo" (Love and Lust) and "Geidan" (On Art) -- to argue that they introduce "traditional" Japanese beauty as a modern masochistic formation formed in response to a western superego that says "you must be like me, you may not be like me."
A reading of "Shunkinshō" that traces the parallel between Freud's and Tanizaki's accounts of fet... more A reading of "Shunkinshō" that traces the parallel between Freud's and Tanizaki's accounts of fetishism to argue that Tanizaki's is much more critical of modern subjectivity's insistance on castration for women.
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