#especially with how *aestheticized* it is online

[clamorybus]

stop trying to fight diet culture like this, you're not doing what you think you're doing

[2001hz]

Isn't aestheticism the opposite of individualism tho? You're ascribing every aspect of your personality to this extremely defined "aesthetic" when in reality no human being is like that. So actually what ur doing is hyper individualism but that's okay. People who aren't individuals are fucking boring.

they both go hand and hand, hyper individualism is more so something you’ll see on the internet rather than irl, aestheticism has always been in fashion and u can say the same for music too, when these two gets differentiate is when its getting consumed by chronically online enthusiasts that’s always having to put a label on everything especially w fashion, trends and 'cores'.

as opposed to u assuming im hyper individualistic ima have to disagree. I don’t cater to an audience or more so induce on a certain aesthetic and consume it w my personality, I just automatically connect art w another art form that’s just how my brain works.

[ottiliere]

what are your go-to resources for phantom blood fashion historical accuracy...... ...

ok I'm glad you asked this because I've been writing up a whole other post on dio's fashion sense and i wasn't sure how much of the period's fashion trends to explain since I didn't want to make an assumption that nobody knows anything about late victorian fashion. this will be a good reference post for me...and you... and anyone else who wants to use it.

regardless; I hate to say it but the best way to start drawing period clothing is to do a little reading on the fundamentals of [late] victorian dress because it will seriously assist you in the long run, e.g., you won't have to scratch your head and spend time wondering why you keep coming across two different lapel types on tailcoat fashion plates if you're aware that both peak tips and shawl collars were in vogue in the late 1880s and the '90s.

I'll put some basic information that I've collected for myself here so you don't have to go looking for it; I'm going to write this assuming you're a newborn baby deer poking your nose into the victorian era for the first time in your life fully unaware of the customs.

reference links for the wayfarer so you don't have to scroll all the way to the bottom:

Etiquette books. Look for anything written in the 80s/90s; again, period trends change. There's usually always a section on how men should be dressing on different occasions (weddings, funerals, daily casual travel, etc.) in these. In an ideal world one would only have to reference books written/published in London, however I've found that there are many more from US. This is fine though IMO, there was a lot of cross-talk between countries due to the implementation of the telegraph and hence a lot of etiquette standards are "universal" (it's why fashion between EU/US/AU can look pretty similar at the same time--they were all talking to each other). If there's a difference between the "New York" way of doing things and the "London" way of doing things, the authors usually point this out. kind of funny. I love reading these, they're also very good for understanding the general quirks of late Victorian society and how the standards at the time characterize their behavior.

The National Portrait Gallery (link is an advanced search; you can change the dates. I set the results to be located in "london")

Victoria & Albert museum online gallery

The Met museum online gallery (in general for clothes on mannequins, but they also list an archive of fashion plates here, separated by year. A lot of them are misfiled though so be wary of that)

Alamy website. genuinely one of the most all-encompassing resources I've used, I use it for everything and especially when I'm into period pieces. "boy 188*" "man 1880s portrait" "man 188* suit" etc. you find a lot of illustrations from the time period this way too. it fucking rules. my computer is on the brink of crashing 24/7 because I keep too many alamy tabs open at all times. A lot of really good Vanity Fair illustrations are on here too, just plug it in with a year and see what pops up.

Sites like this (Gentleman's Gazette) with little articles giving a run-down of period clothing can be helpful...... to an extent. idk. I don't really trust them. GG is solid for the most part and so is The Black Tie Blog and Victorian Web, but I've spotted too many errors on other sites to trust anything they say wholesale. Fashion Institute of Technology is worth mentioning as well, though, despite their coverage on men's fashion being pretty brief. Goes by decade, though, with a lot of information on women/children's fashion, too (it's very interesting! I linked their 1880s fashion rundown, highly recommend going through it, especially the Aestheticism segment). TL;DR: My advice when it comes to website hopping is "stick with primary sources".

How to Read a Suit (A Guide to Changing Men’s Fashion from the 17th to the 20th Century) by Lydia Edwards. Look this up on libgen. It's broken down into chunks of decades; REAAALLLYY recommend reading the introduction to "Chapter 4: 1860-1899". Probably the most historically informative consolidation of relevant fashion information in one place. Very interesting writing, pretty short too. If you're gonna read one thing out of this whole list, make it this.

The Dictionary of Fashion History by Valerie Cumming. look this up on libgen. for when you don't understand what some article or book is talking about and google will not give you answers. as it is it wont to do. (could not wrap my head around top frocks until this point; the wikipedia article for it is quite frankly embarrassing.)

here's my google drive of fashion for this time period, I had just been keeping these on local folders but I think drive would be better so I started transferring them here... compiled myself. this is a "work in progress" and will be updated.

I am going to write a bit about men's fashion at the time period under the cut because I think it's important to understand, if you don't know much about the victorian period, that the dress decorum was heavily emphasized and if you wore the wrong ensemble in the wrong setting everyone WOULD think you were ill-bred and would not invite you back into their home again. because just seeing you exist like that was impolite and quite frankly very embarrassing to witness. these resources are great but not if you don't know where and when these guys would be wearing these things... for instance i know the fashion plate archive there are some drawings of men in livery and you may be tempted to put dio in something like this because WOW! they do look kind of cool. with the big brass buttons... but I think he would more readily batter another human being physically than dress up like a butler at a dinner party and get mistaken for a butler. it's the little things.

first thing: you were expected to dress differently for different times of day. This consists of: morning dress, afternoon dress (semi-formal; not really "mandatory" except at special events, like weddings, at least for men), and evening dress (anything past 6 o'clock or "by candle light" is the general rule).

here are overview excerpts from Modern Etiquette in Public and Private published by Frederick Warne and Co. in 1887:

and excerpts from The Complete Bachelor: Manners for Men by Walter Germain, written in 1896:

Cecil B. Hartley states in his Book of Etiquette and Manual of Politeness (1860) that "by dress we show our respect for society at large, or the persons with whom we are to mingle".

He advised men that there were “shades of being ‘dressed;’ and a man is called ‘little dressed,’ ‘well dressed,’ and ‘much dressed,’ not according to the quantity but the quality of his coverings.”

Black was "the" color. As Lydia Edwards writes in How to Read a Suit (2020), "while it is unrealistic to imagine that all men everywhere only wore black, the acceptable color palette was certainly more limited at this point than it had been for the first half of the century. The rising professional middle classes seemed to embrace a centuries-old association with black for certain professions, which perhaps made this an inevitable choice for the evolving and expanding world of work in the nineteenth century."

I'm going to add illustrations now; humbly request you ignore how terrible the paint canvases i threw things in. Things to note moving forward:

there were three different types of shirt collars in vogue at the time: stiff, high stand collars that hugged your neck, wing-tip collars, and one that's closer to the "regular" collars you typically see nowadays (banker collar). don't really see the last one in any of the fashion plates but you do see it in portraits.

Do note that walking sticks were commonplace and in fact expected to be touted around, hence why they (in addition to umbrellas) keep reappearing in the illustrations;

(1890)

Frock coats were the most "formal" of the daywear. When going through the National Portrait Gallery website you'll notice that most men are wearing either a morning coat or frock coat; the lounge coat was still too informal to be considered for how much money you'd spend to get a photograph taken. Don't you want to look nice?

Lounge suits, again, were the ultimate "informal"; they were viewed with distain by the frock-coat. (here's a good thread on this, actually; i love this fucking guy lol). really, really don't think Dio would be wearing one that often. maybe a double-breasted one? i really think he's too much of a snob to wear what he sees as filthy poor people rags. appearance is everything, etc.

~~~

waistcoats you have a lot of freedom/liberty with, at least in regard to design (except for evening waistcoats). different lapel shapes, no lapels... unfortunately shifting into the later decades of the 19th century it was pretty much expected that the fabric of your waistcoat match the fabric of your suit (along with your trousers; called a "ditto suit"). jonathan would conform to this mode IMO, i don't think it stops dio. he has a vision & his waistcoats are likely very extensively detailed. actually I just remembered that we do see one as depicted by araki's tenuous grasp of historical fashion and it is. awesome. i, too, love to wear cravats directly underneath my shirt

(1891 / 1892)

~~~

Evening dress is (comparatively) much more simple & men had much less artistic freedom in their choice of dress: black tailcoat, white gloves, white tie, waistcoat in either black or white, black button boots. Regardless, it was its own beast in the fact that this was something that you really weren't supposed to dick around with. (Dio would've found a way, but that's a discussion for a post that isn't crashing every 3 minutes.) From A Gentleman by Maurice Francis Egan (1893):

If a young man is invited to a dinner or to a great assembly in any large city, he must wear a black coat. A gray or colored coat worn after six o’clock in the evening, at any assembly where there are ladies, would imply either disrespect or ignorance on the part of the wearer. In most cities he is expected to wear the regulation evening dress, the “swallow-tail” coat of our grandfathers, and, of course, black trousers and a white tie. In London or New York or Chicago a man must follow this last custom or stay at home. He has his choice. The “swallow-tail” coat is worn after six o’clock in the evening, never earlier, in all English-speaking countries.

(1885 (misfiled) / 1888 / 1888 / 1890)

MET evening suit ca. 1888; different aspects of the ensemble displayed solo at this link.

In the 80s the "dinner jacket" ("tuxedo" in US) was introduced. It was used for more informal occasions.

final evening dress "tips":

~~~

Outerwear was pretty varied… you can get a pretty wide dynamic of form depending on choice of coat, so keep that in mind. chesterfields tended to be pretty formless, top frocks a bit more fitted. Length/density would change depending on season, too.

~~~

Children's fashion:

end notes:

everyone would be wearing suspenders, not belts; belts were pretty much only worn with military uniform at this time (except in america)

sweater vests were really only considered sportswear until the first few decades of the 1900s. they would not be wearing these casually under jackets, they'd be wearing waistcoats

button boots were buttoned using a special button hook. video demonstration

NOTE: trousers being "creased" began to be more in vogue in the 90s; this is because they finally invented the trouser press. read article for more information--you sometimes see creases in the 80s, really not before then though. look at how they bunch at the knee (c.1880s)!

When it comes to gloves, different colors denoted different occasions to wear them. In the text screenshots provided in previous sections, it usually states which colors are appropriate for whichever situation. The paragraph I am about to end this on is relatively useless, but I thought I'd include it anyway:

[maybuds]

Believe me I’m no fan of late-stage capitalism, but I do feel like that last anon is in a particularly doom-laden mood with regards to creative works right now?! Yes of course the big studios and streaming services have a stultifying effect. But step even a tiny bit outside the mainstream big-budget stuff and there are amazing films being made. Not to mention that non-English language independent films are exciting and interesting and able to reach a bigger audience than ever before, thanks to the internet. Additionally, the sweeping statement that “the music isn’t even that good” just seems…unjustified? There’s loads of amazing music out there right now, even on the most mainstream labels. And you have the opportunity to fund a massive range of creators directly via Bandcamp and Patreon! But beyond that, what about all the people who don’t go to gigs just to take insta-content? What about all the people who go to watch tiny local rock bands play in the pub? Or folk bands play in a barn? Or world music played at a night event in a museum? If you spend a lot of time looking at instagram and TikTok, of course you’ll see the shiny people who only go to activities in order to film themselves there. But there are so many people who don’t do that, who listen and watch and pay attention in the moment. Who close their eyes against tears because they’re finally seeing the band they loved when they were 13, and weren’t allowed to go. Who use VPN to hunt down obscure Hong Kong movies from the 90s. Who go to themed film festivals at their local independent cinema. Yes it’s annoying that the Western mainstream is largely so shallow, but there are so many ways to access more interesting art these days…I just feel like a completely negative view is misguided and misleading. I hope the other anon can find joy in turning their attention away from the most dominant (and chronically online) Western pop culture in favour of things they value and love.

i love those descriptions, and they give me a lot of hope; they’re actually a much needed reminder about what meaningful engagement with creative works out there can still do if we just look for it. but at the same time, i also understand where the other anon is coming from, because there really is something to be said about the state of creative media production these days in general and especially the media engagement that currently happens a lot on social media. so that even if it wasn’t the barbie or oppenheimer movie but, say, some other foreign independent arthouse film from the late ’90s, or of one of the local rock bands, the way people ‘aestheticize’ it and flatten it out on social media is … frustrating to say the least. and the fact that this is one of the surest ways to really get more people to listen or watch is just so bleak to look at right now when you want to share your art to people. in a sense, it’s difficult for those who want to create meaningful art and live off of it, when all you get is this celebrity-obsessed culture. it’s like the way you can earn sufficiently from it is if you made ‘creative content’ that’s as consumable and as palatable to profitability as possible, plus you have to have your ‘identity’ (branding) down too. and even if you decided to exit the mainstream and wanted to go independent, you will still need income anyway. art is not separable from the material world, no matter how abstract it is. the way so many creative minds and energies are being ruined right now by branding and market logic is just a grim reality we’re being faced with more and more, even outside the west. and we get this excess of shallow media, and it’s what’s everywhere right now, and it’s melting all our brains, no matter if we still engage with meaningful art whenever we can.

still!!! i do have to thank you for a very hopeful message re: creative work and genuine engagement to works of art. despite everything genuinely loving art really is what it’s all about! just have to keep looking for more hehe

[notebookishbalderdash]

Following on from the bullet journaling gentrification post & your own thoughts on the topic: as somebody who posts their BuJo online, how do you deal with the pressure of creating “aesthetic” pages? Do you have to remind yourself to treat your BuJo as a tool? If so, how do you do it?

(Asking as somebody who managed to get back into bullet journaling thanks to a 5-year-long break from social media, but is now itching to start posting journaling content again)

(Scared I’ll fall back into crippling perfectionism)

thanks for the question! my answer may be a little disappointing. the answer is, i very, very rarely post my bullet journal online. you can see just how much i reblog other people's journals versus my own by scanning the tags. this is partly because i extremely value privacy and am too paranoid to post a final page (even though i think that is the prettiest stage) and because i don't find my pages all that interesting before that point. i tried posting clean (without a schedule/personal information) spreads on instagram a while ago, but i fell into the same frustration of feeling like i was posting the same thing over and over while also too uncomfortable to post something beyond that.

in a lot of ways, recognizing other people's journaling styles as theirs and not true to my vision of a bullet journal helped - but the main way i keep the pressure off is to think of it as an extended to-do list/diary combo and not dress it up as a grander concept. the way i have made my bujo my own is to allow myself to mess up, frankly. i write in pen, and while i hate having to scribble out misspellings, i've come to terms with it as a living document. part of my struggle with extremely aestheticized pages is that it feels like making gorgeous dollhouses that no one can live in - i feel like nothing i write will live up to the frame. distilling my practice down to really simple things i like (color combinations, neat pens, lots of check boxes) helped me focus on it as a tool for my own work as well as a place i can record my life without writing long, prose entries about my day (a journaling practice i never stuck with for long).

i still struggle with the aesthetic value, especially when colleagues comment, 'omg your handwriting is so nice!' or "i could never make something that pretty!' but ultimately, as long as i can read my handwriting and feel organized, i'm alright. my main advice is to start small and see where you grow. having an audience is less fulfilling than making yourself excited to return to the practice.

tl;dr: try to find what excites you about bullet journaling and what draws you to the practice functionally. thinking of the book as something that lives and breathes through your life changes (like you do!) helps, but if you need to keep all or some of it private to learn what works for you, then do so! no one else is using your journal, after all.

[sea-otter148]

It would appear that as of right now Russian Orthodoxy is having a moment among the far right, and it isn't hard to see why.

Remember all those Greco-Roman statue pic people that had names like "Caesar Sol Invictus" or "RETVRN TO TRADITION" or whatever? They're all Orthodox Christians now, posting snazzy edits of Orthodox saints and monasteries, reading Death To The World, making an effort to make Orthodoxy look cool by adding a punk or fashwave aesthetic to digital proselytizing.

Orthodox Christianity is reliant on a strict adherence to tradition and an amount of religious fervor and conservatism on par with, or even exceeding, protestant evangelical churches. Within the Russian Orthodox Church both inside and outside Russia is also a cult of personality dedicated to Vladimir Putin, a paradoxical idolatry from this supposedly godly religion. When you consider, for instance, St. Gabriel of Georgia, who in 1965 burned two portraits of Lenin and Stalin during an International Workers Day parade in his home country of Georgia as a protest against idolatry, it seems like holiness and standing up to idol worship goes only one way. Substituting one idol for another in the name of Christ is apparently okay as long as this idol isn't someone I disagree with. This is especially the problem with the church's leadership, who follow this same cult of personality up to the top, Patriarch Kirill.

This cult of personality makes it easier for the Orthodox Church to be an instrument of the Kremlin, where normally it would follow Christ's politics which are not of this world. But it seems Jesus is too woke for them, so they turn to someone else. Also, have you met an Orthodox Christian who wasn't a raging fascist? I haven't.

The "orthobro" subculture is especially prevalent online, where the far right got its start thanks to GamerGate, the test drive for social media as a propaganda generator. However the orthobros don't just have a chip on their shoulder for "wokeness," but also anyone who follows the same politics as them, but not the same religion. It is a heresy, or a worldly temptation to fall to a nebulously defined "nihilism" instead of "doing the good work of Christ." This is part of how right wingers are not just experiencing an "us vs. them" situation, but also an "us vs. us" situation as well.

So, it follows that there must be a call to action for people, regardless of religion, to recognize fascism in their groups and outside their groups when they see it. If there is some form of cherry-picking, mangling of words, aestheticization of the religion into something cool and hip, or oddly conservative viewpoints that go beyond just the conservative end of the religious spectrum, alarm bells should go off for a fascist infiltration of the religion. Once they have recognized it, they should excommunicate the fascist if necessary, or shun them from their lives, and not even entertain the possibility of a debate.

[plotholes-and-spellingerrors]

I really enjoy this analysis, and I agree with the premise: taking this image at face value, the guy who posted it absolutely would not want any of the real-world policies necessary to lead to that world for everyone.

I don't read the original tweet as a literal statement, though. That basic interaction - that reactionary ideology is just pictures - is getting at something deeper. Because I, too, could compose an image of my imagined ideal future, right? Anyone can. But when h0mmelette says of some reactionaries that their ideology is pictures, I read it by way of Walter Benjamin when he says that fascism is the aestheticization of politics. And I think it's worth engaging with the original post on its own terms to try to understand what vittorio is saying, so that we know what we're up against.

So I'm going to look at the individual elements as representing a vibe, not representing a material policy outcome. I'll break them down individually, and then I'll bring it together into an overall statement.

Here's what I think he's saying with the individual elements.

Spaceship: I have a vague idea of a high science/high tech future. I think that "the future should look like the future".

Italian supercar: This is personal aspiration. Supercars, and especially Italian supercars, are a well-established cultural signifier of wealth and opulence: rappers sit in Ferraris and Lambos while they wear gold chains and sexy women in bikinis fawn all over them in music videos, so that's the life I want, too. I invest in crypto and talk about "fiat currency" a lot. I want to be rich while other people are poor. If I am not rich, it's because there's a conspiracy to keep me from being rich. If other people are not rich, it's because they're undeserving.

Roman-esque architecture: This is a white supremacist dog-whistle. We need to retvrn. Western Civilization produced the objectively best architecture in the world until the post-modern cultural bolsheviks tried to destroy our civilization with their bauhaus.

Roman soldier: This is a white supremacist dog-whistle. Rome was the superior civilization; I have fetishiszed specific, poorly-understood aspects of their culture. I crave a patriarchal, highly-militarized society where I, a man, am owed a beautiful sex-maid who bears me many children, all of whom are totally obedient to me. I believe that I know what's best about how society should function and that therefore I should be involved in the political process, but I also believe that anyone who disagrees with me is inherently evil and stupid and deserved to be barred from the political process.

Mediterranean climate: I want to live somewhere beautiful. I have never once considered the implications of how that could be achieved or what that might mean for anyone else. I deserve this and that is all that matters. It is unjust and cruel that the world does not conform to my wants.

Obviously, I can't be inside this guy's head and know that these are his exact thoughts. I am editorializing, and synthesizing the commentary expressed by many people online. But, overall, I think that these are fairly accurate assumptions.

And I think the important thing to realize is that when he says that this is the future he wants, he does not mean for everyone! He's saying: "my political ideology is whatever leads to this for me". This guy doesn't want to live in a better world, he wants to live in a theme park.

You could, absolutely, argue as ariaste does that the real-world policies that would lead to this world for everyone are very left-wing (and that they would absolutely fly in the face of this guy's actual politics). I think that ariaste does a great job on that side of it.

But I argue that this future could also be achieved, for a very small group of people, under world-wide authoritarianism. The reason you don't see a lot of tech billionaires worried about climate change is that while a lot of people will die as a result of unchecked climate change, not everyone will die. And the people who survive are the ones who have all the money and resources. If the Mediterranean becomes a hostile desert, that's fine, the wealthy will just move their villas to balmy, sunny England. So what if major farming regions become inhospitable? The wealthy can just pipe in water, or buy land in areas that are becoming more conducive to farming. The goal for these people is not that everyone lives well, only that they live well.

That spaceship in the picture could well be a slave transport. I know that traditionally in sci-fi the slave transports always look dirty and evil on the outside to show the audience that they're bad, but realistically, if you live in a theme park world, full of sleek, futuristic-looking technology, why would you want an evil, slimy, rusty cargo ship ruining your view? Much better to have a transporter that so easily fits into your society's aesthetic that it fades into the background so that you don't even have to contemplate the implications of its presence. There's a reason that in aristocratic manors, the servants have their own entrance around the back, and very likely even their own staircases and passages to their living quarters and work areas. The goal is to render totally invisible the daily machinery that maintains the nobility's life of ease.

As a leftist, it's very much my impulse to look at any depiction of the future and think to myself, "are these things desirable? How would they improve everyone's life? How could such improvement be achieved?", but I think it's important to remember that fundamentally, when a reactionary depicts a future, they're only ever imagining it for themselves. Everyone else be damned.

Anyway, thanks for reading.

[formaianhassignment]

Digital Citizenship and Health Education: Body Modification on Visual Social Media

As social media grows into a dominant force, digital citizenship has transformed to include unique challenges, especially for creators in the digital space. Two crucial issues—sexualized labor and algorithmic visibility—shape how influencers and content creators navigate online platforms. These topics are part of the broader discourse on digital citizenship, encompassing ethical, social, and political aspects of online engagement.

One of the critical components of influencer culture is sexualized labor, which refers to the ways in which individuals, especially women, utilize their appearances to capture attention and monetize their online presence. Drenten et al. (2019) explore how platforms like Instagram promote a "porn chic" aesthetic, where users often adhere to heteronormative beauty standards to gain visibility and engagement(Drenten, Gurrieri & Tyler 2019). This aestheticization creates a commodification of attention, where "likes" and engagement translate directly into financial gain. This self-branding aligns with the "attention economy," where visibility is highly monetized, particularly for those who can conform to these dominant aesthetics (Senft 2013)

The pressure to maintain an aesthetically appealing, sexualized persona can lead to "aesthetic labor," a term used by Marwick (2013) to describe the efforts influencers invest in looking appealing and relatable to their audiences. This labor often leads to identity dissonance and mental health challenges, as influencers grapple with the discrepancy between their online persona and offline reality . The mental toll of managing this dissonance highlights the psychological costs embedded in today’s digital citizenship.

Alongside the demands of sexualized labor, creators must contend with algorithmic visibility. Platforms like Instagram and TikTok are governed by algorithms that control what content gets amplified and what remains hidden. Duffy and Meisner (2022) illustrate how marginalized creators—particularly those from LGBTQ+ communities or creators of color—often experience "algorithmic invisibility"​(Duffy & Meisner 2022). Their content may be deprioritized or even penalized due to implicit biases within platform moderation practices. As a viewer, I’ve noticed how certain types of content flood my feed, often from accounts that fit “trendy” aesthetics. Meanwhile, friends who post content centered on social issues or activism struggle to gain traction, even when they have large followings. Platforms maintain "black-box" algorithms that creators and users alike cannot fully understand, creating an environment of uncertainty and perceived bias (Gillespie 2018).

Such algorithmic (in)visibility challenges the ideals of digital citizenship, which advocates for inclusivity and equitable participation. Creators often engage in "visibility labor" to bypass these limitations, modifying their content to fit platform norms or engaging in online communities to share strategies for improving reach (Bishop 2021). This extra work reflects broader concerns about transparency and fairness within social media platforms, as only certain types of content or creators gain reliable exposure.

The intersection of sexualized labor and algorithmic bias underscores the complexities of digital citizenship in the current media landscape. The pressures to conform to aesthetic templates and the risks of algorithmic invisibility highlight an uneven digital environment, especially for marginalized creators. Acknowledging and addressing these inequalities is essential for fostering a more inclusive online space. Digital citizenship today thus involves not only self-expression but also advocacy for greater transparency and fairness in platform governance, challenging creators and users alike to push for systemic changes in digital media.

References:

Bishop, S 2021, “Influencer Management Tools: Algorithmic Cultures, Brand Safety, and Bias,” Social Media + Society, vol. 7, no. 1, p. 205630512110030, viewed <https://doi.org/10.1177/20563051211003066>.

Duffy, BE & Meisner, C 2022, “Platform governance at the margins: Social media creators’ experiences with algorithmic (in)visibility,” Media Culture & Society, vol. 45, no. 2, pp. 285–304, viewed <https://doi.org/10.1177/01634437221111923>.

Gillespie, T 2018, Custodians of the Internet: Platforms, Content Moderation, and the Hidden Decisions that Shape Social Media, Yale University Press.

Marwick, AE 2013, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity, and Branding in the Social Media Age.

Senft, TM 2013, “Microcelebrity and the Branded Self,” Microcelebrity. In a Companion to New Media Dynamics, pp. 346–354, viewed <https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118321607.ch22>.

[thinkinglookingdoingspring2023b]

Maia Matsushita - Magazine Review

I've always found The New Yorker magazines to catch my eye, both on the streets and online. I feel like they have established a certain branding to their magazines that make their magazines recognizable, and I have also noticed they are aestheticized quite a bit as well (I see vendors selling New Yorker cover art at Union Square sometimes). I think their spreads all have a certain cleanliness to them, as they are usually articles written with black text against a white background, with images to accommodate.

I also tend to like Japanese magazine spreads a lot, however, this is more of a chic/minimalist layout that is easy to read. I think it also has a clear theme, and the use of the picture and font color is very complimentary. The way that this is laid out also makes the product seem luxurious, especially with the capital serif font on the right. Overall, I like how they distinguished between a pictorial page and a text page, as I feel like the two pages work together to create one cohesive spread.

[tea-ink-pages]

the i suppose “re-” aestheticization of books and literature in recent years feels like a recycle or reworking of booklr aesthetics, but somehow became *very much more mainstream, especially with the resurgence of annotating books, aesthetic-like photos in bookshops and the like. while some is in part bc of newer pockets of the online book community, i’m fundamentally curious to see how reader-led trends or aesthetics will evolve across the book internet (a la booklr, booktwt, booktube, etc) post these trends and in turn be reflected in mainstream reading culture...

[imanes]

tbh i found ur post about societally conceived notions of love & how to love & stuff to be very interesting. the part about the hibiscus tea rly got me too bc like ... i like to take carefully planned pics of stuff and i knowwwwww that at least half of my enjoyment comes out of living that whole carefully curated insta branding life ... but i’m not sure if that’s all there is to it? it’s just so weird to have to analyse if ur enjoyment of things is truly for YOU, or where it came from.

tbh i’m a bit shocked that so many people resonate with that post bc i wrote it for myself (not that i mind the fact that ppl find it meaningful but had i known it i’d have worded it a bit more carefully lol) but yeah i think a healthy dose of introspection is required to analyse the way one interacts with the world, especially considering the insidious nature capitalism and the aestheticization of lifestyle and symbolic projection. i think that the aesthetic movement as an art style is interesting and i think it’s also important to find beauty and joy around you. i don’t believe that immortalizing fleeting moments is a sign of ethical decay. but i also believe that we aren’t critical enough with the way that we engineer these images and with their ultimate goal. we all engage with our surroundings differently and i don’t mean to sound like we should all live ascetic lifestyles and stop taking pictures or documenting moments. but engaging meaningfully with the world cannot happen on the kind of superficial level that rests on perpetual aestheticization and romanticization. i’m probably not making any sense but what i mean is that it’s all a slippery slope and it’s good to stop and smell the proverbial roses without wanting to create and publish something out of it to contribute to a heightened social status on silly online apps, just to prove yourself that you can thrive off of just letting it be as well

[ninagodridge]

Societal Standards in a Social Media World

For my first blog post I want to speak to aestheticism, especially how it has shaped society and how I perceive photography at times, additionally how it manifests in my art. Now in a time where social media is so prevalent in how one identifies and individualizes amongst the many “ Accounts”.

Note: I will be using quotation marks for this post as a means to differentiate between “ Filters” instantly applied to through smartphone technology and filters, the individual lenses one can apply to one’s camera, and “Millennial terminology”. 

This revolution in cell phones has altered immensely since the 1990’s with the invention of the smartphone; where everything was instantaneous. I would consider this period of time, and up until now, instant gratification. I went from the owner of an Orange Verizon Envy, to a Blackberry Bold 9000 and then the trifecta, the iPhone 2. Each device died with stories attached and millions of images stored for a later day. My personal favorite was my iPhone 5, it got me through the last year of high school and sophomore year of Dean College. When I switched phones that school year, my friend Lauren had a hockey stick and purposed we shamed it up to relieve stress.  

What was left of that iPhone 5 was a reminder of how much smart phones had become another limb of our human. By having so many access in one hand, elements of the past was lost, though the camera industry was thriving exceedingly with the digital age, in my opinion, film might have started to become less of a mode to capture images and more as an aesthetic. One might argue differently, and I will agree now film has become easier to capture one’s natural beauty in modeling selections; that is a point that I will get to eventually. 

Digital is greatly consumed in our time with all devices we own as one human or household. Growing up all my baby photos were captured on a Nikon point-and-shoot film camera. Each image snapped went through the printing process and was printed twice. One for the album, and one for the boxes. In middle school, we had an album of CD-ROMs of all the photos we had taken over the years on our digital camera. The internet content at this time correlated highly with people editing and distorting images that were originally shot either DSLR or Digital. 

There became different layers to taking/editing photos in this age of digital with the instant gratification of having “Apps” immediately altering the image in the moment you snap it. Applications like VSCO, Huji, and other instantaneous filtered image “platforms” give the already desired aesthetic. The more I scroll through my instagram feed I am always tallying up the images where clearly it was taken on a smartphone and edited to look like film photography, or actual film photos that can be scanned for the ability to share online. 

With instant gratification, simplistically has been lost between capturing moments. Selfies are more common, group photos are a hassle, and Christmas card photos are sent online than through the mail. Recently I received in the mail from a high school friend, tangible photos of us throughout the years. It made me happy and I taped them to my wall of photography to admire. 

Society Standards change, how people consume the world is different, and how we photograph now is revolutionary, but deceitful. Film photography has shaped and inspired, and is continuously used by the modeling industry to rightfully capture the beauty of a human. Even if you took the photo on your smartphone, applied “ Grain” on the VSCO app, you are feeding into the achieved aesthetic that is film photography. Let’s say you go out of your way to get a simple 35mm camera to buy into the hype, you are taking away the instant gratification process, which actually gives you a moment to wonder, 

“ Just how much time and money will I have to add just to see these images?”

That is where consumption of money and societal status come into order and there is a reckoning within the smart age of photography. You can “ follow “ people on Instagram, VSCO, Tumblr and all other social media platforms where you see this aesthetic achievement unfold into what an individual wants to portray within this online world. 

You can take the person off the internet. You can remove the smartphones and online accounts, and hand them a camera. Film or not, what are they going to tell the world through their images? What aesthetic would they try to achieve? If anything, how would this change in capturing images alter there views of individualism?

[nehabhandhari]

How to Get an Affordable Bed in a Bag Online

Our bed is one of the main constants in our life, if you think about it. It’s always there whether we’re feeling sad, or whether we’re beaming with joy. It’s always there to absorb our tears if we’re heartbroken, and to give us a place where we can jump with happiness. After a long day of tiring calls, endless emails and bright screens, we can always go there to unwind from the noise of the everyday. Our bedrooms become an expression of ourselves. Choosing the right bedsheets, pillow covers and matching  comforters shouldn’t be a burden on our head when it comes to our bedrooms. A Bed in a Bag is a simple ensemble that keeps our shopping time and our stress levels to a minimum while keeping in mind the décor of your room.

What’s in the Bag

The Bed in a Bag usually consists of a bedsheet, two pillow covers and a matching comforter. There are some that include dohars and small window treatments which will complement the entire look of the room. The comforter usually has a reversible design which can be perceived as a completely different comforter. You will have the luxury of having one bed set, with two comforter designs.

Why Buy a Bed in a Bag?

Buying a Bed in a Bag takes out the stress of either spending too much time in a store or on an online shopping site, trying to find the right bedsheet pieces that will match all the others you have in your home. There are too many decisions we have to make to find matching comforters regarding colour, proper size, right designs and so on. Building the perfect bed set has almost become an art form. It can become overwhelming, which will take the joy out of decorating the best room in your house

A Bed in a Bag is a one-stop shopping option. It offers a practical solution to your purchases. With these affordable Bed in a Bag sets, you don’t need to vex about finding matching and coordinating items for your bedroom. These sets will contain all the basic linens you need to outfit a bare mattress, taking into account the right sizes, the right colours and the right textures and patterns.

Lastly, buying all the items that go on our bed separately can become unnecessarily expensive. There’s a separate expense for bedsheets and pillow cases, then dohars, then comforters, the top sheets. Hence, a Bed in a Bag offers a cheaper solution.

Why Choose a Cotton Bed In A Bag

The best bed in a bag sets are always made of cotton. Cotton is the most ideal material to have on your bed. It is a natural fibre and is especially used to make products of cloth. It is also a very breathable material, hence it will help keep moisture away from your body. This will prevent you from feeling suffocated under the blanket. Cotton also helps in absorbing heat from your body and allows you to stay cool and dry. 

Cotton also helps with insulation. Along with protecting you from the heat during the summers, it will also keep you warm during winters due to its thermal insulation. It helps in retaining your body heat and keeping you warm at night. Additionally, it is hypoallergenic, and will prevent your skin from getting any allergic reactions or rashes. You can have a peaceful sleep knowing that you and your loved ones with sensitive skin will be protected. 

This material is also very strong and durable as it has a high tensile strength. It can be washed in high temperatures and will have a good hold up when it is repeatedly washed. It also has exquisite water retention, so you can wash your bedsheets knowing that the colour will not fade easily. Cotton is also economic and not as expensive as other materials used to make luxury comforters and blankets.

The designs in our bedrooms are a reflection of ourselves. It showcases our individual tastes and preferences and brings out our sense of aestheticism. With the convenience of a Bed in a Bag, you don’t need to worry about styling and decorating your bedroom to the tee, as these sets do that for you without putting a dent in your wallet. With a array of beautiful designs and patterns, you can find one that makes you feel most at peace in your home.

[waraupiero]

some thoughts on politics after :re 162

this is going to be really unfocused because i have class in like an hour and a half and i still need to eat lmao but i’m really wondering about the press coverage for all of what’s happening right now and the political reaction towards it, on both international and domestic levels. when the dragon devours tokyo, we see that there are clearly press recording and reporting the events that are unfolding. on top of that, there are going to be people posting about this on their personal social media. so there’s definitely waves being made about this.

there’s definitely going to be global attention paid to this. outside of all the mass media that’s being released from tokyo, geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) capabilities from world governments are going to pick up on this large sprawling body clamping itself over tokyo.

then there is the ghoulification of humans. there’s no way to keep that quiet either, judging from the panels in 162 it’s reached epidemic levels, and the people are surely aware or made aware of it, as is the central government. although this isn’t something that can necessarily be captured by GEOINT, mass online media and also foreign officials and intelligence informants will definitely expose it to the rest of the world.

i think the predictability of the responses depends on if the world in tokyo ghoul follows our current historical timeline, or if it is a completely alternate universe. i’m inclined to believe the former, since references to franz kafka and dazai osamu seem to indicate that we share the same historical figures, who have similar cultural significances. thus i’m going to continue in assumption that the relationships between particular nations and the temperament of certain nations are going to be more or less the same as those in our universe.

to begin, it would be interesting to see how the ‘supernations’ like the united states and russia react. i think one could reasonably assume that the u.s. would extend some kind of aid (the u.s. is usually eager to appear benevolent and virtuous/righteous, however it does have significant issues with national budget and historical issues with involvement in foreign nations’ affairs, so that might affect how much it reacts), whereas russia would be kind of a wildcard given its history with japan (there’s still some land contention between the two nations). i think the same could be said of china and korea. they may see this as a chance to stir up some trouble whilst the japanese are distracted, and potentially gain some resources or power out of it.

regardless whether japan receives aid from the u.s. (and probably western europe) or harassment from its old foes, japan is going to come out weaker on the international stage because of this. first of all, fending off the dragon and ghoulification is going to already take a significant drain on japan’s resources (even if russia, korea, and china do not cause trouble), and having the u.s. intervene is going to cost in terms of its authority/sovereignty, and the japan will ‘owe’ the u.s. (though, maybe that won’t matter in times of national crisis like this). but, no matter the sort of influence outside governments are going to exert upon japan, it’s going to likely weaken the japanese government’s structure and cause it to either break apart (due to an inability to focus on all tasks at hand) or to weaken/compromise its central control (becoming dependent on other nations, needing to share its facilities & confidential information with other nations, and fracturing its integrity as foreigners take over more  of its structure).

domestic politics-wise, japan’s probably already a mess. the anti-ghoul sentiment has been strong in the days leading up to the dragon incident (thank you bureau director washuu kichimura), and so the public is probably not going to react well to the news that the ccg is working together with ghouls. also, by extension the japanese government will be working with ghouls -- given its partnership with the ccg, and also bolstered by the fact that the prime minister supplied tsukiyama mirumo with metal detectors. but can we expect the public to go along with the government’s decision to work with ghouls in this time of need? or are there going to be protests and demonstrations? will there be a rise in anti-ghoul terrorism? how is the ghoulification process going to impact public demonstrations?

will the knowledge of this incident inspire the domestic politics of other nations to change? so that they may perhaps nip this sort of phenomenon in the bud before it (potentially) bursts within their borders? i can see how more authoritarian nations like russia and china would crack down on ghoul populations to prevent this sort of thing. i wouldn’t be surprised if the u.s. did it too, given the u.s.’s track record in dealing with ‘potentially dangerous’ citizens.

maybe instead of inspiring other nations to help japan, it’s going to bring on more isolationist policies to match with domestic politics featuring rigorous internal controls and detention institutions. it may also cause a rise in violence and crime, especially for nations whose citizens have access to guns. then comes the question of whether ghouls are worth being protected from a paranoid and violent human population (you and i may think so, but perhaps not an unsympathetic human government).

i wonder how this is turning out for the ghouls in tokyo as well. likely it’s going to cause some membership shift amongst the two main ghoul organisations, goat and the clowns? i’m not sure how many would suspect or know the dragon incident to be the handiwork of the clowns. depending on the level of public ghoul knowledge of the events, membership changes could shift either way. or maybe some ghouls will simply renounce organisation to hide.

speaking of the clowns, i’m still wondering what their agenda is. is it total ghoul domination over humanity?? or just general chaos, if itori’s statement of ‘it is us clowns who will have the last laugh’ is to be taken as their manifesto?? the clowns are certainly a political actor, but i’m having trouble even assigning a point to their terrorism. very interested in finding more about it. ishida seems to hint that furuta’s motivations are selfish, but i wonder if it just fits into the wider political agenda for the clowns, and that’s why he gets away with it? or if the clowns are just an apolitical association? if so, why fuck with politics?

unless this isn’t about politics at all and is all about aestheticism and philosophy instead. which would be an interesting angle for a ghoul organisation, considering that both goat and aogiri did have political agendas.

and how are the newly made ghouls going to fit into the current political landscape? we now have a completely new and, most importantly, large demographic. how are existing ghouls going to act towards them? accept them?? will they have a choice other than that? and will humans still view them as humans -- after all it’s presumable that some remaining humans would still recognise them as friends and family -- or will they exterminate them as ghouls/threats?

the influx of ghouls is also going to effect the ecosystem a lot. it looks like ghouls are going to soon outnumber humans ... where will the food come from then (and what will happen to the production of human food? the food industry is an indispensable part of international and domestic economics, this goes without saying really)? they could eat other ghouls, but that would make for a very bleak world ... the food chain may just become an ouroboros. it’s worrying. i’m very much anticipating how this is going to be handled.

i wonder how much of an explanation/exploration we’re going to get when it comes to the political implications after chapter 162. everything is a mess™ right now so these concerns are probably not at the top of everyone’s priorities. the ghouls and the ccg are working hard to get through the current mess they’re in, with humans turning into ghouls and furuta & v agents running amok and dragons before anything else. nevertheless it’s intriguing to ponder, so if people want to talk about feel free to hit me up!

[itsizzymccormac]

To further my understanding I would like to look deeper into the British Punk subculture. In my previous post I discussed designer Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren however I would explore other parts of the movement such as Punk music, film and ideologies.

One of the most credible filmmakers on London scenes in Wolfgang Build, documenting the scene through the documentary- Punk in London (which I would like to watch as part of my research.) Another film to reference is jubilee by Derek Jarman that take the Queen and places her in a strange environment. The symbolism of hierarchy and the Royal family is one closely connected to the Punk movement due to the Queens Silver Jubilee celebrations and the protests about the amount of money spent on the event. During the 1970s Britain was in a period of economic demand and high unemployment rates so caused anger due to the public money being spent on such an event. I think this is still relevant especially in 2020. We have seen many royal ‘scandals’ in which lots of public money has been spent n such events such as Royal Weddings, Jubilees and coronations. Although this may be deemed as an important part of Britain, is it fair to spend the working people's paychecks on such events?

I think Vivienne Westwood is a strong portrait of the punk movement, who has moved into a consumeristic capitalist fashion industry which diverges against her original beliefs. It is hard to tell what Vivienne herself wants but the Punk message is unclear, however, the aesthetic still lives on season too season. Although Vivienne Westwood is a very popular designer she is very interesting and her brand and her identity is something I would like to question further.

Another important part of the Punk subculture is to reference there anti-establishment attitudes, which helped push forwards indecent record labels, venue and distributors This ‘Anti’ attitude and strong looks gave off ideas of anger, aggression and rebellion, which are somewhat true but I think are slightly misinterpreted. From my research I think the Punk movement was made up of a lot of young clever people, to have your own opinion is quite a brave thing to do, even if it goes against the societal norms. Along with thatchy stood up for ideas that are 2020 are still being pushed and becoming more important - such as animal rights consequently linked with vegetarianism and veganism. Also, there was a part of the Punk movement, which was straight edge which involved abstaining from alcohol, tobacco and recreational drugs. In my personal opinion I think the punks were very ahead of there time, it interesting to see how the problems they were facing also feed into today's society.

This was useful to my research as it gave me a better understanding of a different subculture that shares similar ideas as Aestheticism and lets me questions the ideas of rebellion? I think it perhaps would be interesting to compare the feminist movement of the 1880s to Punk movement and how rebellion is conveyed.

BBC News. 2020. Punks Of '77: Still Angry After All These Years?. [online] Available at: <https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17397222> [Accessed 13 March 2020].

British Film Institute. 2020. A Brief History Of Punk Cinema. [online] Available at: <https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/features/brief-history-punk-cinema> [Accessed 13 March 2020].

En.wikipedia.org. 2020. Punk Ideologies. [online] Available at: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punk_ideologies> [Accessed 13 March 2020].

[rikka-zine]

Teaching Global Science Fiction in Tokyo: An Interview with Dr. Pau Pitarch Fernandez (part 1)

We are welcoming Dr. Pau Pitarch Fernandez from Spain, who is an associate professor at Waseda University in Tokyo. He is one of the members of Kappa Bunko: Literatura Japonesa which provides resources to know Japanese literature in Spanish. He has published articles about Japanese SF awards on it. In 2018 autumn, he started to teach Global Science Fiction. We admire him for the challenge and had a chance to interview with him: How did a scholar of Japanese literature start a global SF course? What did they read?

His website: https://paupitarch.net/

1. Introduction

ーーCould you introduce yourself a little?

PPF    My name is Pau Pitarch Fernandez. I teach Japanese Literature at Waseda University. I did my B.A. in Spain, then an M.A. in Japanese Literature here in Japan at the University of Tokyo, and later I went to Columbia University in the United States for my PhD. I taught in the US for a couple of years, until I was hired by Waseda University in 2017. My main field of expertise is modern Japanese literature, especially early 20th century.

[[MORE]]

ーーTaisho era?

PPF    Right. My dissertation was about something they used to call “Genius Theory,” which is the idea that artistic creativity comes from some form of mental abnormality. This is the idea of the “mad genius” basically. I looked into how it was used by writers in the Taisho era, and how they deployed it to create their own personas as artists and a space for themselves in their contemporary literary world. I wrote on Akutagawa (Ryunosuke), Tanizaki (Jun'ichiro) and Satou Haruo. The medical and psychological sources that they used, the kind of discourses around Tensai (genius), etc.  I am still working on that, and trying to expand it into a wider look at a new idea of authorship. I am looking at biographies of other artists written in that era. I am also looking into the gendered dimension of this idea of “Genius” through the works of Okamoto Kanoko. I'm hoping it will make it more interesting.

So my research has nothing to do with science fiction directly, but I have always been a reader and wanted to teach a class on science fiction. I would love to incorporate it into my research as well.

ーーWhat was the first contact with you to Science Fiction?

PPF    It was probably an animated series called Ulysses 31. I think it was a French and Japanese co-production. It was shown in Spain in..., it (the projection) must have been 1980 - 1981 or something like that. [It was actually 1982-83.] It is a version of the Odyssey in space. Ulysses is going back home, but you know, in the 31st century. He is with his son Telemachos, and a robot, and they go on all sort of adventures.

And of course, Star Wars. That was big when I was a child. Star Trek, later. We had the original series on TV. And Isaac Asimov. I remember reading his YA fiction, the Lucky Starr books.

ーーHow about Spanish SF?

PPF    I have not actually read much of it. When I was growing up, it wasn’t really visible. I am sure that people were writing science fiction, but if you went to a bookstore, there wasn’t much science fiction or just a tiny section. If you went to the science fiction section, it was all translations and I don’t remember having science fiction originally written in Spanish. I mean, there was stuff that you could read “as science fiction,” but as for straight-up genre literature, there is none that I was aware of back then.

The one exception is this very famous novel by Manuel de Pedrolo, written in Catalan. The novel is called Typescript of the Second Origin (Mecanoscrit del segon origen). It is like a post-apocalyptic tale. I forget what's happened in the story exactly... something like an alien invasion. Only a boy and a girl survive, but the rest of humankind has been wiped out.

ーーWhen was it published?

PPF    I think it must have been the late 70s. [It was actually 1974.] We read it more as YA fiction, but when I think about it, that was straight-up science fiction. But I never thought of that in the same category as Asimov or Star Wars. It is only lately that I have been trying to search online to see who is writing science fiction in Spanish and Catalan, and read them. Not when I was a child.

ーーI know Hispacon is held every year and there is an award called Premios Ignotus, "Spanish Hugo awards". I got surprised Murakami Haruki's novel won it a few years ago and I remember a Tsutsui Yasutaka's story was nominated. 

PPF    Oh, which one? 

ーー“Salmonella Men on Planet Porno”.

PPF    That's Tsutsui’s. Sorry, I meant Murakami's.

ーーI can't remember exactly. Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World? (It was wrong. Googled and found that the answer was 1Q84.)

PPF    Murakami has been very popular since 2005, the year Norwegian Wood was published in Spain. It became a huge hit. 

ーーHe is popular everywhere in the world.

PPF    And his works have often science fictional elements.

ーーWhat made you decide to learn Asian studies?

PPF    In my BA, I studied Comparative Literature, but in Spain at that time, Comparative Literature meant basically Western European literature. I don't think we had any courses even on Russian literature or anything like that. It was only English, French, German, Italian and Spanish.

So I did a year abroad in Germany, at the Free University of Berlin. There I took a class on Aestheticism. We read Huysmans, Baudelaire, Wilde and other British Aestheticists. All the European classics. But the professor also decided to include Kinkakuji by Yukio Mishima in the syllabus.  Even though he could not read Japanese, and nobody in the class had anything to do with Japan. But he just said, you know, "Let's try and read it, and see what comes out!" 

So I read Kinkakuji in a French translation that I found second-hand somewhere. Just because it was cheaper than the other translations, so I read it in French. And it was just so different from everything I had read before. It felt really new and it awakened my curiosity. I started reading more about Japanese history, more about Buddhism, more about all the elements that appeared in the novel. At that point I could read English. I was comfortable with German too because I studied there. So I thought "Alright, I can do this." I told myself I would learn Japanese to read Kinkakuji in the original. At that point, I was also briefly interested in learning other languages like Arabic or Turkish, but eventually I settled on Japanese. 

Then I went back to Spain, I started learning Japanese at a language school and somehow very quickly I started getting opportunities to use it. It just seemed like there were not that many people in Spain who knew Japanese. There was a lot of interest though. So there were opportunities if you knew just a bit to do stuff with it. I thought maybe I should make this my professional career. 

Around that time is when East Asian Studies actually opened in Spanish universities. It’s when in the first BAs of East Asian Studies started. I think it was 2003 or thereabouts. So I went back to college to get that degree and I received a Monbushou (Currently it is called Monkashou, Ministry of Education, Science and Culture of Japan.) scholarship to study at the University of Tokyo. After that I got a PhD fellowship for Columbia University. And now I had this chance to come back to Tokyo and I am really happy about it.

ーーWere Mishima and Tanizaki's works not too difficult? Their writing is very beautiful but decorative. It seems tough even for native Japanese speakers.  

PPF    (Not really.) I think maybe because I had done some work previously in European literature of the 19th century on Decadentism and Aestheticism. I read the same Western authors that Satou Haruo and Tanizaki and Akutagawa did. I think I kind of get the mental aesthetic world in which they grew up from the Western side. I feel it is easier for me to follow their references and texts, because I am very familiar with late 19th-century European aesthetics.

ーーAt the same age, but the different part of the world.

PPF    Yeah. I remember when I started at the university of Tokyo, I had never taken any Classical Japanese.  I wanted to teach myself to read it, so I got a classmate to help me read “On Aesthetic Life”（「美的生活を論ず」） by Chogyu Takayama, which is written in Classical Japanese, and we worked through it together. And she was very familiar with Classical Japanese because her specialty was Waka (Japanese poetry). She could understand the language perfectly, but it was difficult for her to follow the logic. I could understand the logic much better, but I could not decipher the grammar. "What is this shi here? Why is there a mu here?" So once she explained the grammar, I could understand it quite well, because I could tell "Oh, he is using this idea of Nietzsche’s. This sounds like Schopenhauer. This idea is from whatever like Matthew Arnold or something." So once we worked together, we could cover both sides and everything made it sense.

ーーIt’ a perfect collaboration.

PPF    Yeah. Maybe that is what allowed me to work on these authors. It would have been way more difficult if I had chosen something like Waka or even Contemporary literature. There I would not have any advantage. My advantage is that I knew the 19th-century European cultural world fairly well, and that gave me the background that made Meiji and Taisho literature a little more understandable.

2. About Eastern Asian Science Fiction

PPF    Now there is a lot of interesting Chinese SF. You have probably seen a lot of translations on Clarkesworld. They have some kind of partnership and basically publish at least one Chinese SF on every issue. There is also an anthology of South Korean SF coming out. It is called Readymade Bodhisattva. I don’t know much about the Korean SF world, but I’d say it must be one of the first anthologies of translated Korean SF.

ーーI will check it later! By the way, I just got to know Korean SF Society was founded just in last May. (May 11, 2018)  Don't you think it was very recent? They attend to Worldcons and a Chinese Science Fiction convention for promoting their own culture to the world. They are going to run an SF convention this month (November 2018). Of course, small conventions seemed to be held before, but this one seems larger. One of the members  who I plan to interview with wrote that SF in written form had been in obscurity. Probably films or mainstream literature which contains fantastic elements are not regarded as science fiction.

[We were talking a little about the opinion that SF was not so popular in South Korea was surprising. Considering Korean films like Train to Busan, Snowpiercer and comics, animations, and video games. According to a person I get in touch with interview, Korean SF is very separated from mainstream literature and multimedia. For a long time, it has not been so visible.]

PPF    I think in Spain it has been kind of the same. Publishers are very conservative and they are not very willing to publishing something completely new. They seem to think, if I publish Isaac Asimov, some people will buy it. But if I publish someone nobody has heard of before.... then who knows?

It was the same with Japanese literature before 2005, actually. If you look at the translations they published, they were all clustered around single authors. For some reason Mishima Yukio became popular so you could find basically every novel by Mishima (in Spanish). And Kawabata Yasunari received a Nobel prize, so a lot of Kawabata's novels are available for Western readers. Ooe Kenzaburo, the same. But you did not find other authors around them, like, for instance, Shiga Naoya. As far as I know, his works have never been published as a separate volume in Spanish translation, which is insane in terms of his historical importance. There are 20 novels by Yasunari Kawabata. Why isn’t there a single one by Shiga?

But I think it is changing now. Because, you know, thanks to the internet and thanks to the advances in technology, it is much easier to run a small publishing house. Now there are a lot of small publishers and people are doing their own things. When I was growing up, it was all big publishing houses and they were very risk-averse and would rather publish just known authors. 

I think probably a similar thing happened with SF. I am sure that there were Spanish people writing SF for some smaller publishers, but they never made it to the libraries and the bookstores that I was looking at. I never had a sense that they were there. But in the same way, I had a sense of Japanese literature. After 2005, it changed a lot. For Japanese literature, it is being published at a much more lively pace. And for Spanish science fiction, as far as I can see from abroad, it has also changed a lot. There are some new magazines. Do you know the journal SuperSonic?

ーー(Agreed.) I bought it lektu.com.

PPF    They publish a lot of Spanish authors' original fiction. They deal with science fiction in a very natural way. Like science fiction in English, there is Spanish SF, English SF, Japanese and Chinese SF...  They all existed in different worlds when I was growing up. I am really happy that is possible now, but that all happened after I left Spain. So I missed all and I don't know the scene in specific. If you are expecting me to tell you about the scene in Spain, I am not the right person, I am sorry. I have not been a part of it. I can tell you what I listen to or read in Spanish but I don't actually know the people and the conventions. I am not sure when Hispacon started but I definitely did not know about it when I was young.

2’. About Eastern Asian SF: Japanese SF

ーーWhen did you start checking Japanese SF?

PPF    The first time was when I came to the University of Tokyo in 2006. I asked some classmates "What is some good Japanese SF?," because of course I was reading a lot of SF by then and wanted to read some Japanese SF. And somebody told me to try Legend of the Galactic Heroes. I remember I bought the first volume and read it, and I was like "What is this? It felt like very old..." I don't know... It wasn’t particularly interesting to me. Oh, I don't mean to say I don't like Yoshiki Tanaka in general. But at the first contact, it was not what I was looking for at that point. Since then, I have read other stuff from Tanaka, The Heroic Legend of Arslan and some short stories that I've really liked. But Legend of the Galactic Heroes, did not really grab me. I thought maybe Japanese SF was just not interesting for me. 

And then the next thing I read was Genocidal Organ by Project Itoh. I am not sure why. I could not tell you where I heard of it or who told me about it. I just remember seeing the book in the bookstore and buying it.  And I really loved it. Harmony, also. And The Empire of Corpses (屍者の帝国) is intriguing too.

After Genocidal Organ, then I started looking more into Japanese SF. "Okay, there is Japanese SF that is interesting for me. I should look for more."

After that, I read Tobi Hirotaka for instance. In a class at Columbia University, I had my students read “Autogenic Dreaming” because there is an English translation. And they (the students) were totally mind blown, like..."What is going on...?". But I think after discussing it in class, they got a bit of an idea. This was in a class called "Modern East Asian Humanities". It looks at 20th-century Japanese, Chinese, and Korean culture through literature. I was co-teaching it with a Korean specialist. He would bring Korean texts, I brought Japanese texts and we split the Chinese texts. He is a really cool, open-minded, exciting professor. I told him that I really wanted to do some SF. He said "Sure. That's great. Let's do some." And I brought “The Legend of the Paper Spaceship” by Yano Tetsu. It is in Speculative Japan.

ーーHow was it?

PPF    I think that the students were very confused... In the positive sense of confused. I think they were expecting maybe ... you know, you heard of Japanese SF, you expect giant robots...that kind of stuff. 

In that Yano Tetsu's story, there is a spaceship that has been lost and it is only known through a folk song. But I think there is more in it: about discrimination, social exclusion... There are some echoes of narratives about the origin of a society, and how some elements are put to the side even though they are a part of that society. As if in order for a society to survive, it would need to purge some part of itself like that.  "That woman is crazy. This guy is sick." That kind of exclusion. 

And “Autogenic Dreaming”, I found it interesting at first because it is a story about AI. There is no human being in the story. And the way it uses all these tropes of the genre, things like Moby Dick or Silence of the Lambs. I always wonder if Alice Wong is from Alice in Wonderland. There are all these references, and this way it talks about language as a kind of an uncontrollable force of connections and creativity. At the same time, there is a sense that there is some kind of danger in there. Maybe the danger is the idea that we can or must control this force. It is very ambiguous morally, like "Who is the good guy here?” Is there danger or violence here? Is this a virus or a Google-like-library? All that I find really interesting. I mean, everything written by Tobi Hirotaka, the way he talks about language, information, identity. That is really fascinating. I am really curious to see if I can incorporate it into my classes. 

Ten years ago, it would have been impossible to do a class on Japanese SF using only readings in English. But now thanks to Haikasoru and Kurodahan, there is so much material. I am really thankful for the work that they do.

(Continue to part 2)