The graduate students in the ITASIA Program at the University of Tokyo (http://itasia.iii.u-tokyo.ac.jp) have organized a conference on current research related to contemporary Japan. The conference includes 12 presenters on three panels that cover social movements and protest, national security, and media culture. If you are in Tokyo, please come and join us for this open and free conference to be held on November 23 at the University of Tokyo (Hongo).

ITASIA First Annual Conference - Japanese Contemporary Studies

Date: Friday, November 23, 2012
Time: 1:00-7:00 pm.
Venue: The University of Tokyo, Hongo Campus,
Fukutake Hall B2 Floor
(http://fukutake.iii.u-tokyo.ac.jp/english/access.html)
Admission: Free (open to the public)
Language: English

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First Panel - Social Movements and Protest (1:00
pm-3:00 pm)

Chair: Jordan Sand, Associate Professor, Georgetown University.
Discussant: Ikuo Gonoi, Associate Professor, Takachiho University.

Speakers:
Alexander Brown, PhD Candidate, Wollogong University, "Love No Nukes"
Elizabeth Marks, PhD Candidate, Rice University, "Gohoo
Hantai: Mass Media Outside the 'System' in Japan"
Takuro Higuchi, Sociologist, "Nuclear Energy, or 'The Enclosure of the Sun'"
Vinicius Furuie, PhD Student, University of Tokyo, "Dressed in Pink: Antinuclear Activism in Post-Fukushima Tokyo and the Re-modelling of an 'Old'
Social Movement"

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Second Panel - National Security (3:15 pm-4:45 pm)

Chair: Gregory W. Noble, Professor, The University of Tokyo
Discussant: Gregory W. Noble, Professor, The University of Tokyo

Speakers:
Yezi Yeo, PhD Student, University of Tokyo, "Military, P.R. and Media in the 21st Century"
Eitan Oren, PhD Student, University of Tokyo, "Individual Threat Perceptions in the Asian Barometer,
2003-2008: A Case Study of the North-Korean Threat in Japan"
Yuhi Ishido, International News Desk NA, Nippon Television Personnel Center Corp., "Cyber Security in Japan"

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Third Panel - Contemporary Japanese Media Culture
(5:00-7:00 pm)

Chair: Jason G. Karlin, Associate Professor, University of Tokyo

Speakers:
Igor Prusa, PhD Candidate, University of Tokyo, "The Logic of Political Media Scandals in Japan and the Case of Ozawa Ichiro"
Amanda Weiss, PhD Candidate, University of Tokyo, "The Question of War Guilt in the Film 'I Want To Be A Shellfish' (Watashi ha kai ni naritai, 1959; 2008)"
Tomomi Matsuhashi, PhD Student, University of Tokyo, "Japanese Women's Identity and Sexuality in Cell-Phone Novels"
Alexandra Hambleton, PhD Candidate, University of Tokyo, "Women's Sexuality and the Media in Contemporary
Japan: From the 1970s to Today"
Ece Öyken, PhD Student, University of Tokyo, "Omotesando and Nisantasi: Comparing the Districts Under the Light of a Fashion Event"

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Jason G. Karlin, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
University of Tokyo
Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies
7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku
Tokyo 113-0033 JAPAN

URL: http://individuals.iii.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~karlin/
Email: ukarlin[at]mail.ecc.u-tokyo.ac.jp