« Invitation to Submit Chapter Proposals for Edited Volume on US-Japan Relations | Main | Japan Zoominar @ UC San Diego: "Innovating Insurance for a Disrupted World" with Albert Chu »
March 21, 2024
u:japan lectures - Timo Thelen: "Living with ever-changing currents: Following an ama diving community over one decade"
From: u:japan lectures : Department of East Asian Studies : University of Vienna <ujapanlectures.ostasien@univie.ac.at>
Date: 2024/03/08
Dear SSJ-Forum member,
The Department of East Asian Studies - Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna would like to draw your attention to the upcoming hybrid u:japan lecture:
Timo Thelen:
"Living with ever-changing currents: Following an ama diving community over one decade"
Date and time: Thursday, March 14, 2024, 18:00~19:30 (CET, UTC/GMT +1h)
Location: Onsite @ Campus of the University of Vienna Department of East Asian Studies, Japanese Studies room JAP 1 (2K-EG-21), University Campus
Hof 2.4, Spitalgasse 2, 1090 Vienna, Austria
https://japanologie.univie.ac.
Online: Join the lecture via Zoom (no registration necessary):
https://univienna.zoom.us/j/
Meeting-ID: 644 8537 4691 | PW: 128282
The Zoom Meeting will be open from 17:45 (CET).
Abstract: This lecture by Timo Thelen (Kanazawa University, Japan) will focus on Japanese ama (professional free-diving women) who are well-known from various documentaries and movies, most prominently from James Bond: You Only Live Twice (1967), or also from the NHK Morning Drama Series Amachan (2013). While their popular image as exoticized "pseudo-mermaids" is still spread in the media, ama divers are, in reality, hard-working and often remotely living people from the Japanese countryside, facing themselves with the profound impacts of a modern world and trying to arrange their lives in a steady negotiation of old and new, local and global, human and environment. This lecture will reflect on Timo Thelen's fieldwork on the ama diving community of Hegura Island / Wajima City spanning from 2014 to 2023.
During this period, the ama community, on the one hand, struggled with an aging population, unsteady prices for their catches, and declining resources. But, on the other hand, they also experienced attempts of revitalization and support from the regional government and researchers, such as the designation of their fishery practices as immaterial cultural heritage or the establishment of the abalone festival - a commercial event centered on their catches. Beyond the popular mystifications, this lecture aims to present a more accurate and nuanced portrayal of the ama community, how they experienced substantial changes and how they reacted to them.
For more information on the speaker, the lecture and future events at u:japan, please follow the link below:
https://japanologie.univie.ac.
We look forward to your participation!
Christopher Kummer, Florian Purkarthofer, Elisabeth Semmler, Astrid Unger und Ralf Windhab
PS: If you missed a lecture or want to review, head to our recorded lectures section:
https://japanologie.univie.ac.
u:japan lectures
Department of East Asian Studies / Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna
E-mail: ujapanlectures.ostasien@
Kindly sponsored by the Toshiba International Foundation:
https://www.toshibafoundation.
The Department of East Asian Studies - Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna would like to draw your attention to the upcoming hybrid u:japan lecture:
Timo Thelen:
"Living with ever-changing currents: Following an ama diving community over one decade"
Date and time: Thursday, March 14, 2024, 18:00~19:30 (CET, UTC/GMT +1h)
Location: Onsite @ Campus of the University of Vienna Department of East Asian Studies, Japanese Studies room JAP 1 (2K-EG-21), University Campus
Hof 2.4, Spitalgasse 2, 1090 Vienna, Austria
https://japanologie.univie.ac.
Online: Join the lecture via Zoom (no registration necessary):
https://univienna.zoom.us/j/
Meeting-ID: 644 8537 4691 | PW: 128282
The Zoom Meeting will be open from 17:45 (CET).
Abstract: This lecture by Timo Thelen (Kanazawa University, Japan) will focus on Japanese ama (professional free-diving women) who are well-known from various documentaries and movies, most prominently from James Bond: You Only Live Twice (1967), or also from the NHK Morning Drama Series Amachan (2013). While their popular image as exoticized "pseudo-mermaids" is still spread in the media, ama divers are, in reality, hard-working and often remotely living people from the Japanese countryside, facing themselves with the profound impacts of a modern world and trying to arrange their lives in a steady negotiation of old and new, local and global, human and environment. This lecture will reflect on Timo Thelen's fieldwork on the ama diving community of Hegura Island / Wajima City spanning from 2014 to 2023.
During this period, the ama community, on the one hand, struggled with an aging population, unsteady prices for their catches, and declining resources. But, on the other hand, they also experienced attempts of revitalization and support from the regional government and researchers, such as the designation of their fishery practices as immaterial cultural heritage or the establishment of the abalone festival - a commercial event centered on their catches. Beyond the popular mystifications, this lecture aims to present a more accurate and nuanced portrayal of the ama community, how they experienced substantial changes and how they reacted to them.
For more information on the speaker, the lecture and future events at u:japan, please follow the link below:
https://japanologie.univie.ac.
We look forward to your participation!
Christopher Kummer, Florian Purkarthofer, Elisabeth Semmler, Astrid Unger und Ralf Windhab
PS: If you missed a lecture or want to review, head to our recorded lectures section:
https://japanologie.univie.ac.
u:japan lectures
Department of East Asian Studies / Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna
E-mail: ujapanlectures.ostasien@
Kindly sponsored by the Toshiba International Foundation:
https://www.toshibafoundation.
Approved by ssjmod at 02:30 PM