[BRIEF NOTE] Anime occidentalism
Nov. 1st, 2006 02:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldThanks to the auspices of ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
finfin, I and some others have been watching episodes from the Japanese anime Fullmetal Alchemist on a weekly basis. My one-word reaction to the plot? Ow.
One thing that struck me about the anime was what I might call its Occidentalism, its construction of a Europe-like environment that got the details right but mixed them up rather incongruously, with Hanseatic-looking cities in the shadows of Alpine mountains which border on burning hot deserts but are populated by people with English last names. I like it, don't get me wrong, but it made me wonder just how much of the Japan-related elements of popular culture that I've heard of has been similarly falsely constructed.
finfin, I and some others have been watching episodes from the Japanese anime Fullmetal Alchemist on a weekly basis. My one-word reaction to the plot? Ow.One thing that struck me about the anime was what I might call its Occidentalism, its construction of a Europe-like environment that got the details right but mixed them up rather incongruously, with Hanseatic-looking cities in the shadows of Alpine mountains which border on burning hot deserts but are populated by people with English last names. I like it, don't get me wrong, but it made me wonder just how much of the Japan-related elements of popular culture that I've heard of has been similarly falsely constructed.
