Seminare, 2023, Tom 44, nr 2

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The Power of SweetNess? The Infantilisation Process of Japanese Youth. Kawaii and Otaku Subculture in the Perspective of Visual Anthropology
Sokołowski, Marek (Wyższe Seminaria Duchowne Towarzystwa Salezjańskiego, 2023)
This paper presents the original Japanese otaku youth subculture, initially associated with young boys, and the kawaii (cute/sweet) culture, whose close relationship with young girls has been underlined in social science studies. The contemporary kawaii culture has been present in Japanese aesthetics and popular culture for many years, supported by the government program “Cool Japan”. Both psychologists and sociologists observe that the adorable cuteness of the kawaii culture, encountered in commercials, animated films, comics, toys, street fashion, popular music and even a peculiar manner of speaking, causes and perpetuates infantilisation of the Japanese youth. There is a new generation who are afraid of entering adulthood. The ubiquitous presence of the kawaii culture in contemporary Japanese society has been interpreted using the methods of visual anthropology, defined by some scholars as visual ethnography.