A01=Michael Dylan Foster
Author_Michael Dylan Foster
ayakashi
belief
Category=JBCC
Category=JBGB
Category=NHF
commodification
demons
east asian cultural studies
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
horror
human electricity
humor
japan
japanese cultural imagination
japanese culture
japanese folklore
kanji
kokkuri
malevolent
mamono
minzokugaku
mischievous
mizuki shigeru
modernity
mononoke
monsters
mountain goblins
natural history
shape shifting animals
spirits
spooky stories
supernatural monsters
toriyama sekien
water sprites
yokai
Product details
- ISBN 9780520253629
- Weight: 408g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 03 Nov 2008
- Publisher: University of California Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
Water sprites, mountain goblins, shape-shifting animals, and the monsters known as yokai have long haunted the Japanese cultural landscape. This history of the strange and mysterious in Japan seeks out these creatures in folklore, encyclopedias, literature, art, science, games, manga, magazines, and movies, exploring their meanings in the Japanese cultural imagination and offering an abundance of valuable and, until now, understudied material. Michael Dylan Foster tracks yokai over three centuries, from their appearance in seventeenth-century natural histories to their starring role in twentieth-century popular media. Focusing on the intertwining of belief and commodification, fear and pleasure, horror and humor, he illuminates different conceptions of the "natural" and the "ordinary" and sheds light on broader social and historical paradigms - and ultimately on the construction of Japan as a nation.
Michael Dylan Foster is Assistant Professor of Folklore and East Asian Cultures at Indiana University.
