In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, Japan’s cultural industries have found themselves in a precarious position. While inbound tourism and interest in Japanese literature and popular media have only increased in the 2020s, the devaluation of the yen and increased global geopolitical tensions have created economic and political issues that have in turn impacted the country’s much-vaunted soft power initiatives. At the same time, growing cultural diversity within Japan and the increasingly global nature of media production have created new opportunities and possibilities for artists, writers, and other media creators.

What does “soft power” mean to Japan in the 2020s? This symposium will assess how cultural and soft power is understood and negotiated in Japan’s cultural industries since COVID, moving past earlier paradigms such as the government-led “Cool Japan” initiatives of the late 2000s and 2010s. It will consider how phenomena including increasing tourism to Japan and interest in Japanese media products intersect with ongoing economic and geopolitical issues, and reexamine what “soft power” itself is and can do in an increasingly unstable and rapidly re-militarising world. Areas of discussion will include shifts in Japanese literary translation, the globalisation of media industries such as anime and video games, rising inbound tourism, the increasing demographic diversity of the Japanese population, and how changing economic and geopolitical conditions have reshaped perceptions of “Japan” both domestically and internationally.

Convener: Professor Linda Flores, Associate Professor of Japanese Literature, Pembroke College  
Organiser: Dr. Patrick Carland-Echavarria, Tanaka Junior Research in Japanese Studies, Pembroke College
Keynote Speaker: Professor Susan J. Napier, Goldthwaite Professor of Rhetoric, International and Cultural Studies, Tufts University

Register for the Conference in-person or online here.