Globalization
This course is about global cultural flows, using the movement across cultural borders of Japanese cultural materials from Godzilla to Pokémon to Hello Kitty , we will look at the movement of cultural forms through global contexts shaped by transportation systems, new information technologies, and the global capitalist economy.
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Concepts covered include: alterity, assemblage, capitalism, commodification, consumption, conflict, global flows, friction, moral panics, hybridity, modernity and modernization, hyperreality, Orientalism, postmodernity, reterritorialization, simulation, soft power, world system, youth culture, xenophobia
J-Pop
This course explores many aspects of Japanese popular culture, especially as it leaves Japan and travels into additional sites around the world.
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Some of the concepts and genres you will learn about in this class include: Anime, Baby Metal, Cosplay, Fujoshi (“Rotten girls”), Fushigi (Mysterious phenomena), Hikikomori, Kaiju (Giant monsters), Kawaii (“cuteness”), Lolita Fashion, Manga, Otaku (compulsive fan), Sarariman (“Salaryman”), Shoujo, Shounen-ai manga (erotic manga), Taisen (contests), Tokusatsu (special effects), Yaoi (fan art), Yokai and much more.
Play & Gaming
Play is a fundamentally human activity and as such is of interest to anthropologists. Understanding play as a frame for action, students will learn how play is distinguished from non-play activities, and describe some of the pleasures of play. They will look at how gaming is like and unlike other forms of play and expressive culture. Students will also explore concepts of authorship and intellectual property, everyday versus narrative worlds, play and gaming as forms of expressive culture, and practices of “gamification.”
About Dr. Peterson
Mark Allen Peterson is professor of Anthropology and International Studies at Miami University. He is the author of Connected in Cairo: Growing Up Cosmopolitan in the Modern Middle East (Indiana, 2011) and Anthropology and Mass Communication: Media and Myth in the New Millennium (Berghahn 2003). He also co-edited and co-authored the textbook International Studies: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Global Issues (Westview 2017). He received his PhD at Brown University and his BA at UCLA.