Six DIJ researchers and more than 30 DIJ alumni will be active at the 18th German-speaking Japanese Studies Conference (Deutschsprachiger Japanologentag) as panelists, chairs, and section organisers. Harald Kümmerle (“Die japanische Initiative ‘Data Free Flow With Trust’ aus infrastruktureller und begriffsgeschichtlicher Perspektive”), Markus Heckel (“Die unkonventionelle Geldpolitik der Bank von Japan”), and Celia Spoden (“Soziale Chancen und Risiken digitaler Technologien: Cybernetische Avatare und cyberphysische Räume als neue Möglichkeiten zur Partizipation an der Arbeitswelt”) will give presentations in the Economics section. Harald will also present a paper on “Big Data” (“Wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Verortung von ‘Big Data’ und Implikationen für die Verwendung digitaler Methoden in der Japanologie”) in the panel on Digital Methods. Together with co-editor and DIJ alumnus Hanno Jentzsch, Sonja Ganseforth will give a book talk on Rethinking Locality in Japan in the Ethnology section. Barbara Holthus and Nora Kottmann are convenors of the Sociology section. The conference takes place online from 24-26 August, 2022. Details and programme (in German) here

Twenty international experts and outstanding Japanese artists will meet at the DIJ in August to discuss how the arts can contribute to overcoming the multiple challenges facing regions in Japan. Since the early 2000s, regional arts projects and festivals have sprung up in many places in rural Japan, including the Triennial in Echigo-Tsumari and the Toyooka theatre festival. Many regions anticipate such events to create new types of social, cultural, and economic capital in the area. The symposium addresses ‘Art in the Countryside’ from an interdisciplinary perspective, including Visual and Performing Arts, Cultural Policy, Tourism Studies, and Social Anthropology. Limited places are available for on-site participation. The event is organised by Gunhild Borggreen (Copenhagen) and DIJ’s Barbara Geilhorn. It is part of their projects on Collaboration and Community Building in Contemporary Art and Local Issues Take Stage – Culture and Community Revitalization, respectively. Details and registration here

Last week’s assassination of former prime minister Abe Shinzō has shocked Japan and the world. How can we make sense of this event and what does Abe’s death mean for the future of Japanese politics and society? DIJ director Franz Waldenberger will join DIJ alumni Axel Klein (University of Duisburg-Essen) and Alexandra Sakaki (Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik) to discuss the implications of Abe’s assassination for Japan on July 15, 18.00-19.00 (JST)/11.00-12.00 (CEST), online, hosted by the Japanese-German Center Berlin. The round table discussion “Das Attentat auf Premierminister a.D. Abe – Einordnung und Folgen” will take place in German. Details and registration here     

DIJ social scientist Celia Spoden will give insights into her research project Cyber-physical spaces and avatar technologies: new opportunities for an inclusive society? at the upcoming conference of the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST) in Madrid. Celia’s paper “Visions and Realizations of Cyber-Physical Spaces in Japan: Solving societal issues by Cybernetic Avatars” is part of a panel on Aging technofutures: futuring old age in technological societies. It takes place on Thursday, July 7. In her paper, Celia discusses the technoscientific futures imagined by the Japanese government and compares them to the visions of researchers in the “Moonshot Research and Development Program” which was launched by the Japanese Council for Science, Technology, and Innovation in 2020. More information on the EASST 2022 website here

Aging inhabitants, economic decline of the primary sector, outmigration of the young generations – the postgrowth state of Japan’s peripheries challenges local communities to sustain rural living in the globalized age. To stop or even reverse this structural decline, various actors such as regional governments and research institutions forge strategies of revitalization, following national aims as well as global frameworks. For the investigation of these new and complex formations of power and knowledge in rural Japan, actor-and-network theory (ANT) can provide a window to shed light on how different allies find their goals unified in a common project and how links between centers and peripheries are established. It can, moreover, help to understand the impacts that such projects may – or may not – have on the local communities, which are supposed to benefit from them.