The book highlights the shared conflicts as American and Japanese pop cultures dramatically intersect.

    Masumi Hijiri is a 16-year-old girl about to enter her first ballet contest. The competition is fierce, and there's no telling whether she'll win, or how far her training can take her. After seeing her performance, the great director Sergeiev Alexej invites Masumi to join his company, and it is thus that she launches her career -- only to spend years dancing in the shadow of prima ballerina Kyogoku Sayoko. SWAN Vol. 1 begins the tale of Masumi's incredible journey through the great baller companies of Europe and America and through both triumph and despair as she struggles toward her goal of becoming the greatest dancer of her generation!

    From cute handwriting came manga, Hello Kitty, and Harajuku, and the kawaii aesthetic now affects every aspect of Japanese life. As colorful as its subject matter, this book contains numerous interviews with illustrators, artists, fashion designers, and scholars. It traces the roots of the movement from sociological and anthropological perspectives and looks at kawaii's darker side as it morphs into gothic and gloomy iterations. Best of all, it includes hundreds of colorful photographs that capture kawaii's ubiquity: on the streets and inside homes, on lunchboxes and airplanes, in haute couture and street fashion, in cafes, museums, and hotels.

    Arguably the central genre of Japanese literature, the 31-syllable lyric made up the great majority of Japanese poetry from the ninth to the nineteenth century and was the inspiration for such poetry as haiku and renga. Tanka has begun to attract considerable attention in North America in recent years. Modern Japanese Tanka is the first comprehensive collection available in English.Tanka retains the aesthetic sensibilities that circumscribe Japanese culture, but just as Japan has changed during this tumultuous century, tanka has undergone equally radical shifts. Responding to artistic and social movements of the West, tanka has incorporated influences ranging from Marxism to Avant-Garde.Modern Japanese Tanka includes four hundred poems by twenty of Japan's most renowned poets who have made major contributions to the hisotry of tanka in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. With his graceful, eloquent translations, Makoto Ueda captures the distinct voices of these individual poets, providing biographical sketches of each as well as transliterating Japanese text below each poem. His introduction gives an excellent overview of the development of tanka in the last one hundred years.Tracing the contemporary tanka tradition from Yosana Tekkan in the late nineteenth century to the late twentieth-century poetry of such writers as Taware Machi, Modern Japanese Tankselegantly conveys an authentic sense of Japanese lyric to a Western audience.

    In Daido Moriyama: How I Take Photographs , he offers a unique opportunity for fans to learn about his methods, the cameras he uses, and the journeys he takes with a camera.

    Although he initially finds it difficult to adjust, Dan is soon having fun wherever he goes—and recording all of his adventures in a diary. With the help of his Japanese foster brother and sister, Daisuke and Mari, Dan visits a Ninja village, tries new foods, learns brush painting, and shares the inside scoop on Japanese school life. Readers of all ages will love experiencing life in Japan from a kid's point of view!Dan's adventures include:•My First Week of School•Visiting a Ninja Village•Fun with Origami•Practicing Aikido•Making Mochi•And much more…

    In 1966, during the height of the first Batman craze, a weekly Japanese manga anthology for boys, Shonen King, licensed the rights to commission its own Batman and Robin stories. A year later, the stories stopped. They were never collected in Japan, and never translated into English. Now, in this gorgeously produced book, hundreds of pages of Batman-manga comics more than four decades old are translated for the first time, appearing alongside stunning photographs of the world’s most comprehensive collection of vintage Japanese Batman toys. This is The Dynamic Duo as you’ve never seen them: with a distinctly Japanese, atomic-age twist as they battle aliens, mutated dinosaurs, and villains who won’t stay dead. And as a bonus: Jiro Kuwata, the manga master who originally wrote and drew this material, has given an exclusive interview for our book. More than just a dazzling novelty, Bat-Manga! is an invaluable, long-lost chapter in the history of one of the most beloved and timeless figures in comics.

    

    Influenced by Western fashion trends from the mid 1980s, young teenagers, predominately adolescent girls, congregate in the urban centres of Harajuku, Akihabara and a number of underground clubs in and around Tokyo, dressed head-to-toe in gothic costumes and late-Victorian dress. The psychological characteristics of the average Japanese Goth is one of introversion and exclusivity. The majority of girls in the scene are teenagers and most usually stop dressing and behaving this way by the age of eighteen. The origin of the movement was in Osaka in the mid 1990s when young teenagers adopted Gothic fashion in response to the clothes worn and promoted by Japanese Gothic rock bands. In the ten years since the trend began it has expanded to a number of cities including Tokyo and now boasts many thousands of devotees who dedicate their lives to creating ever more flamboyant and bizarre variations on the Gothic theme.

    A complete guide to the tools used by a shokunin, or master Japanese craftsman, this book is ideal for both beginning and professional woodworkers.

    Collected by the celebrated Kawaiiartist Charuca, I Love Kawaiishowcases page after page of cute, colorful creations. Perfect for fans ofmanga and anime, and featuring innovative artists from Japanese legends TakashiMurakami and Yoshitomo Nara to the worldwide design legends Devil Robots, ILove Kawaii offers a collection of images andproduct shots that is not only cutting edge, but also as cute as can be.

    The Japanese family in dissolution figures in every one of his fifty-three films. In his later pictures, the whole world exists in one family, the characters are family members rather than members of a society, and the ends of the earth seem no more distant than the outside of the house.

    Four see-through vellum sections, of four layers each, begin with a "naked" geisha; they show, stage by stage, how her distinctive costume and make-up are assembled. You'll view the subtle changes of appearance through the round of seasonal events, and the elaborate array of equipment in the geisha's wardrobe, as well as everything she needs to do her demanding jobs. Equally revealing is the incredibly detailed information about the women's training, lives, and history.

    Coverage explores the on-board effects, low-light settings, and automatic HDR shooting. Clear explanations detail the ways in which you can use the new features of the Nikon D5100 to add unique shots to your portfolio while an explanation of photography terms gets you confident and savvy with this fun DSLR camera.Covers basic camera controls and functions, shooting in auto mode, setting photo quality, and navigating menus and the view screen Introduces the basics of photography, including the settings that control lighting, exposure, focus, and color Addresses the new low-light and HDR settings Encourages you to use the new onboard effects features and shares tips for improving images with editing software Get a grasp on the fun Nikon D5100 with this fun and friendly guide!

    From teaching you the basics to exploring the stages of the cycle of photography, Silber makes it easy for you to master the art form and create stunning pictures.Valuable photography tips from thousands of hours of interviews with professional photography masters: "What makes this book so powerful is that I have been able to distill from my 1,000s of hours of interviews with top photographers high level knowledge, that would take decades to acquire ― but I have presented this knowledge in a way that even a new photographer can grasp and put right to work. If someone applies themselves and rolls up their sleeves, with this handbook, they can become an excellent photographer and make photographs that they and others will love." You will learn valuable insights from the professional photography masters: • beginner photography tips • amateur photography tips • landscape photography tips • wedding photography tips • lifestyle photography tips • sports photography tips • animal photography tips • portrait photography tips • still life photography tips • iPhone photography tips Photography and the technology associated with it is constantly evolving, but the fundamentals remain the same. Advancing Your Photography will help to bring you the joy and satisfaction of a lifetime of pursuing the art of photography.Advancing Your Photography features: • Top tips for making outstanding photographs from iconic photographers and many other leading professional photography masters of today. • Numerous step-by-step examples • Guidance on training your eye to see composition with emotional impact • Tips on mastering the key points of operating your camera like a pro • Secrets to processing your images to professional standards • Compact design that will easily fit in your camera bag