How Mediated Sports have Transformed Japan from a HardWorking to a HardPlaying Nation

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How Mediated Sports have Transformed Japan
from a Hard-Workingto a Hard-PlayingNation
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Empires of Leisure
a Concept, a Panel, a Paper
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Todd Joseph Miles Holden

• Professor
• Department of Multi-Cultural Studies
• Graduate School of International Cultural Studies
  (GSICS)
• Tohoku University
• Sendai, Japan

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Paper prepared for the 5th International
Crossroads in Cultural Studies ConferenceHosted
by the Institute of Communications Research,the
University of Illinois at Urbana-ChampaignJune
25 28, 2004

• Panel Empires of LeisureDate Sunday,
  1000-1130 a.m.

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What this is Not

• In a December 24, 1990, article in Time
  magazine, Carl Bernstein employed the The
  Leisure Empire title to talk about the
  globalization of American entertainment
• He identified the usual suspects
• Disneyland in Tokyo
• American pop music in Brazil
• American novels on the Italian best-seller list
• But the title advanced by this panel and in this
  paper means something completely different

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In the Beginning Indicators

• The first game of the finals between the Lakers
  and the Pistons was the most-watched show of
  that week, beating out competitors like CSI and
  the season finale of The Sopranos.
• (Martin Miller, Laker Loathing, LA Times.com,
  June 12, 2004. url http//www.latimes.com/featur
  es/lifestyle/la-et-miller12jun12,1,6116997.story?c
  ollla-home-style)

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of Something more thana Sports Culture

• This paper, though, concerns something even
  deeper than a society in which sports is the lead
  form of entertainment.
• It is the apparatus that both lays the foundation
  for, then fuels the phenomenon

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About this Paper

• Conceptualizes the term Empire of Leisure
• Presents Japan as a prime exemplar of such an
  empire
• Focuses on three central elements of this Empire
• Sports
• TV
• Consumers

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Within the Context of the Crossroads Conference

• Asks the Question
• What is the meaning of an Empire of Leisure in a
  time of crisis
• The fact that it exists
• The way that it operates
• The manner in which it is sustained
• The results that are engendered

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Within the Context of the Crossroads Conference

• Also asks
• To what degree does an Empire of Leisure
• reflect,
• offer comment on, and
• help us understand
• the time of crisis

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3 Basic Questions

• Why Sports?
• Why TV?
• Why Consumers?

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Why Sports?

• Because athletics is one of the major components
  of leisure in contemporary society. Comprised of
• Actors who fill markets AS leisure-related goods
• Actors who help create markets for
  leisure-related goods
• Actors who assist in the sale and consumption of
  other kinds of goods and services
• Outlets for (vicarious) participation in sports
• What could be called audience engagement
• Staged events and organized activities that are
  consumed by audiences
• What amounts to leisure qua leisure

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Why TV?

• It is the most pervasive medium in the focal
  context
• It is the medium through which leisure messages
  are communicated, and by which leisure is
  experienced
• It is through TVs multiple genres i.e.
  advertising, sports events, news, wide shows
  that the empire is re/produced

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Why Audiences?

• It is the non-participant (the viewer, the
  purchaser) who helps elevate athletic exploits,
  players, events and goods at the forefront of
  contemporary society.
• They are the social group that infuses an empire
  of leisure with an economic base
• They are the social group who receive and respond
  to political, cultural and moral messages flowing
  through the mediated sports
• It is their activities which serves to re/produce
  the working details the form and particularly
  the content -- of empires of leisure

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The Triumvirate of Athletics, Media and Consumers

• The intellectual, institutional, economic, and
  social cornerstones upon which the empire of
  leisure is founded

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The Concept

• Empires of Leisure
• Install diversion and play at the core of
  everyday existence
• Are consumer-driven
• Are consumption-oriented
• Are mediated
• Most often, leisure is communicated and/or
  experienced through forms such as TV, Movies,
  Internet, Cell phone
• In important ways are socially, politically,
  economically, historically, and/or morally
  re/productive

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The Importance of Context

• No two contexts, obviously, are the same
• They have their own histories and rhythms, values
  and practices
• Institutionalized, embodied, codified and visible
  as economic, political, moral, social and
  cultural
• Leading to empires of various shapes and
  behaviors

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The Importance of Context

• In the case of a society like Japan, the
  emergence of a leisure empire constitutes a major
  societal change
• No more than 60 years ago this society was in
  physical, emotional and moral ruin
• Not 50 years ago it was struggling to right
  itself economically
• Not 40 years ago it was entering a cycle of rapid
  economic growth
• Only 30 years ago did it begin experiencing high
  levels of consumption and an increase in leisure
  time
• Even 20 years ago its sararimen were still
  routinely putting in grueling 18 hour, 6-day work
  weeks
• Only in the past 10 years has the work week been
  shortened and leisure time has begun to increase
  meaningfully
• In short, Japan is a society which has known work
  rather than pleasure, self-sacrifice rather than
  self-expression and selfishness

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Implications

• The mediated content of leisure empires are far
  from neutral. In the case of Japan, they are more
  than statements about a (playful,
  consumption-oriented, or free) way of life.
• Moreover, the messages empires mediations convey
  are nation-centered.
• The preponderance of leisure content emphasizes
  Japans contemporary place in the world of
  nations
• It concentrates on competition between Japanese
  athletes and those from other countries
• Or it emphasizes the exploits of domestic
  athletic exports in foreign lands
• IN SHORT Much of Japans televisual sports
  content is a form of cultural nationalism that
  has moved Japan beyond the status of empire of
  leisure, to de facto empire.

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Concept Components
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An Empire of Leisure

• Installs a particular lifestyle at its core
• One of relaxation, disposable time, disposable
  income
• The Empire
• Is consumer-based (empires audience)
• Also refers to and defines a limited set of
  activities which is also a way of life
• Leisure, is (by definition) culture
• Daily activity is wrapped up in the consumption
  and practice of entertainment options
• Multiple
• Many of them are media-based

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The Media Prerequisite

• An empire of leisure places media at its core
• Thus, experience is mediated
• Communication through consumable machines is
  primary
• Forms of communication include
• Inter-personal
• Extra-personal
• Group
• Mass
• Among the media most favored include
• Television
• PCs
• Cell phones
• Fax Machines
• Film production
• Video recording/rental

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One MeasureTelevision Viewing

• According to a 2003 poll, Japan ranks Number 2
  globally in terms of TV hours watched per day.
• Who is ranked First? Bosnia

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TV Viewing Comparative Stats

• Bosnia 287 minutes
• Mexico 265 minutes
• Japan 261 minutes
• United States 255 minutes
• Source 2002 Une Année de Télévision dans Le
  Monde analyse les paysages télévisuels et les
  programmes préférés de 1.4 milliard de
  téléspectateurs dans 72 territoires
  audiovisuals,
• Mediametrie, URL http//www.mediametrie.fr/show.p
  hp?rubriquecommuniquestype2id746

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Empires of Leisure?

• Of course, the nations ahead of Japan and America
  would hardly qualify as nations of leisure
• Neither empires in the sense of economy or
  polity
• Nor leisure-based in the sense of free time
  over and above time devoted to employment,
  education, running a business, household chores,
  and sleeping
• So for conceptualizations sake, something beyond
  mere TV viewing hours is required

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A Media Rich Environment

• For instance, compared to other nations, Japan
  has
• The Third-most number of TVs per capita
• Behind China and the U.S.
• The Second-most number of PCs
• Behind the U.S.
• The Third-most mobile cellular phones
• Behind the U.S. and China
• The First-most number of Fax Machines

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Other Measures Required

• An Empire of Leisure depends on more than
  media-richness, though.
• For instance
• economic dimensions
• political dimensions

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The Economic Dimension

• Underlying media and its consumption is a certain
  economic milieu and consumer capability.
• For instance, Japan is
• Considered the second-most-technologically-powerfu
  l economy in the world after the U.S.
• Listed as the third-largest economy after the
  U.S. and China
• The largest aid donor in the world
• Second (to U.S.) in per-capita national income
  (2002)
• Third (to U.S. and Canada) in purchasing power by
  volume per capita (2002)
• Third in budget expenditures
• Fifth in budget revenues
• Tenth in business efficiency

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Work Time

• Most importantly, work time has steadily
  decreased over the years.
• From a society dubbed an economic empire in the
  mid-1980s
• where work, alone, was the measure of success
• Now work time is on the decline
• A 2004 survey indicates that in the last decade,
  work time has declined across all industries, on
  average, 17.9 hours
• or roughly 3.58 hours per day, given a 5 day work
  week.
• -- Japan in Figures, 2004
• Statistic Bureau
• Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs,
  Posts and Telecommnuications
• http//www.stat.go.jp/english/data/figures/pdf/200
  4f.pdf

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And Leisure Time

• Concomitantly, leisure time has steadily
  increased over the years.
• A 2001 Survey found that as compared to 1996
  both males and females spent far less time on
  secondary activities such as work and more
  time on tertiary activities (free-time
  activities).
• - Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs,
  Posts and Telecommnuications
• - http//www.stat.go.jp/english/data/shakai/2001/
  jikan/yoyakuj.htmA

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Leisure Hours

• In short Over the past 3 decades
• work hours have decreased by nearly an hour a day
  for both men and women
• leisure time has increased for both nearly an
  hour
• The disparity between the two in terms of leisure
  time is decreasing, though only marginally

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Contemporary Japanese Time Use

• Not only is leisure increasing
• The primary leisure activity (consuming media) is
  third among all human activities
• At 2.24 hours/day
• It trails only
• Sleep 7.32 hours/day
• Work 4.34 hours/day
• Note other surveys place TV consumption, itself,
  at over 3.30 hours/day
• I.e. well in excess of the leisure figures listed
  above

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The Political Dimension

• Political climate is also an important measure
• Beyond media availability, for instance, is the
  content that flows through media
• The lack of restrictions in expression, for
  instance, or access to communication tools is
  important
• So, too, the assistance by government in
  monitoring work conditions
• Enabling a minimum wage (and beyond)
• Policing payment schemes
• Ensuring minimum levels of health care so that
  workers have the physical ability to make use of
  any leisure time
• Ensuring that there is leisure time available for
  workers that they are not overworked
• So, too, must a political climate ensure the
  freedom to pursue leisure activities as one sees
  fit

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Conceptualizing EmpireKey Strata

• 3 Strata
• Leisure Supra-structure
• Leisure Infra-structure
• Leisure Consumer

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Conceptualizing Empire the Leisure
Supra-structure

• Within the Leisure Supra-structure, 2 dimensions
• Political Dimension the philosophy, practices
  encouraging leisure production and consumption
• Economic Dimension the outlook and apparatus
  aimed at producing, delivering and consuming
  leisure

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Conceptualizing Empire the Leisure
Infra-structure

• Within the Leisure Infra-structure, 2 aspects
• Means/Sites of Leisure Consumption
• Included here is media
• Means/Goods of Leisure Production

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Conceptualizing Empire the Leisure Consumer
Stratum

• Within the Leisure Consumer Stratum, key factors
  include
• Time (opportunities to consume)
• Disposable Income (ability to consume)
• Access to media technology
• Activities engaged in (actual kinds of
  consumption)

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Styles of Discourse Infotainment

• Within the milieu is a kind of communication
  approach -- a rhythm of that lifespace which
  assists this leisure consumption
• In contemporary televisual communication this is
  often referred to as infotainment

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Styles of Discourse Infotainment

• In Japan, infotainment is a genre-spanning
  discourse (what Holden and Ergul 2004 and Ergul
  2004 have called a supra-discourse)
• it underpins consciousness
• provides a logic for and style of organizing and
  presenting mediated communication.

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Content a melding of popular, information and
entertainment

• Popular culture has always provided much of the
  stuff for leisure consumption
• Now, however, these are melded with the
  supra-discourse
• the popular is loaded into and located in
  everything from advertising to quiz shows to news
  to wide-, wake up and variety shows
• this is particularly true of athletes and their
  sports, as I have shown in other research (Holden
  2002, 2003).

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Content a balance of indigenous and exogenous
elements

• Under contemporary conditions, globalization
  ensures that the stuff of leisure consumption may
  not all be indigenous
• Usually we think of exogenous material as that
  which is imported that enters the focal context
  from outside
• However, in the case of Japanese sports and
  athletes, it is often the case that indigenous
  material (local athletes and teams) become
  exogenous (through their play outside the
  country). They are re-imported by local media for
  consumption by local viewers and fans.

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Media Re-import Effects

• As a phenomenon, media re-imports are
• Pervasive
• Powerful
• Re-imports
• Constitute a daily, non-stop set of
  representations
• Across the panoply of TV genres (primarily)
• Reflect a unified discourse
• Offer windows into subterranean topics
  (culturally relevant societal myths), such as
• Cultural and political identity
• Individual capacity
• Gender identity
• Nationalism

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Some Examples

• Staged Events
• Late Evening News
• Hodo Station
• News 23 Chikushi in New York
• Late Night Sports
• Suporuto!
• Morning Shows
• Mezamashi Telebi

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1. Staged Events

• Japan is home to made-for TV Events which help
  build its physical and intellectual status as an
  Empire of Leisure
• Examples
• Marathons
• World Cup Volleyball
• Asian basketball Championships
• NFL pre-season matches
• NBA and NHL regular season matches
• Soccer (invitational) Club Championship
• And many more

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An Example of Staging Volleyball

• Japan played host to FIVAs Olympic Qualifying
  Tournament
• The First Round (automatic placement)
• The Second Round (for the remaining slots)
• Both mens and womens divisions held round-robin
  tournaments

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Volleyball a made-for-TV event

• The Japanese team played each day
• In a packed arena
• Other matches were played in virtual empty gyms
• Last match of the day
• Broadcast on TV
• The pre-match opening included a pop song
  written for the event and performed by a J-Pop
  group, NEWS.
• Commercial breaks included staged interviews with
  celebrities who urged gambare Nippon (fight
  hard Japan!)
• Breaks between sets included musical interludes
  in which the performers urged the crowd to scream
  for their team (Nippon clap, clap, clap
  Nippon clap, clap, clap)
• The final days in which the women succeeded in
  qualifying included so-called Hero Interviews
  with each player in front of the adoring audience
  in the gym and also on TV.
• This was followed by the players and coaches
  making the rounds of all the (nation-wide)
  evening sports shows and morning wide shows for
  the next 2 days.

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2. Late Evening Newsa. The Hodo Station
On their home page they list the Sports Station
as a separate site within their website. Its
own graphic is centered on the web page
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A Week of Sports NewsHodo Station (Information
Station) Monday-Friday 2154 - 2324
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Emphasizing Nation

• This week is typical of ALL nationally-televised
  news shows in Japan
• a steady diet of
• national teams
• For instance, Olympic volleyball, World Cup
  soccer
• International performers
• Interviews with overseas soccer players
• Daily capsule summaries of Japanese baseball
  players in (American) baseball or (European)
  soccer leagues

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Japans Womens Soccer Success

• In qualifying action, Japan were grouped with
  Viet Nam, North Korea and China.
• Hodo Station visited their training camp and
  showed segments on their preparations.

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Japans Womens Soccer Success

• When the tournament began, they emphasized the
  7-0 pounding of Viet Nam

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Japans Womens Soccer Success

• Then the stunning 3-0 victory over bitter rival
  North Korea.
• Japan had lost seven straight to North Korea
• There has been an acrimonious history based on
  North Korea kidnapping Japanese citizens, as well
  as sending a test missile over the Japanese
  peninsula

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Japans Womens Soccer Success
These were NOT images shown on most news stations

• For the media, the 1-0 loss to China in the Final
  was an afterthought.
• The fact that Japan had qualified for the
  Olympics was all that mattered.
• The frame was of National Success

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The Daily Major League Capsules

• I have reported this extensively in other
  research (Holden 2002, 2003, forthcoming).
• A news convention has become the summary of the
  key Japanese performers in American baseball.
• Thus, there is a daily 5 to 10 second clip of
  Hideki Matsui (Yankees), Kazuo Matsui (Mets),
  Ichiro Suzuki (Mariners)
• And, depending on the day, summaries also of
  pitchers Hideo Nomo (Dodgers), Kazuhisa Ishii
  (Dodgers), Shingo Takatsu (White Sox), Akinori
  Ohtsuka (Padres), Tomokazu Ohka (Montreal)

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A Typical Capsule

• Typically, the capsules
• Show footage of the offensive or defensive
  highlight for each player that day
• A line report also appears
• how many hits for the day out of how many at-bats
• The players current batting average
• Less often there is a sound bite a post-game
  interview with the player
• Only in the final frame is there a superimposed
  image of the score of the game
• Offered as an afterthought

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A Typical Capsule

• Ichiro moved from the lead-off to the third
  position. He got a double. His batting average is
  at .330
• Matsui Hideki 7 straight games now he has not
  been on base his batting average has once again
  fallen from .300 to .280 in that span.
• Matsui Kazuo 4 strike-outs in one game. The
  first time this has ever happened to him. His
  average now at .262
• Shingo Takatsu the reliever in his first year
  with the Chicago White Sox, pitched a scoreless
  9th inning, for his second save. He has 3 wins to
  go with his 2 saves and his ERA is at a very low
  1.11

In each case, the result of the games is
reported, if at all, in a superimposed inset
above the footage. It is often not commented upon
by the newsreader.
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The Exceptional Case

• Nomo versus Matsui 6/19/04
• When these 2 squared off for the first time
  (never having done so in Japan) it was big news.
• Not only was the game broadcast in Japan live via
  satellite, it also was the top story in the
  evening sports reports.
• The story line was that Matsui homered off Nomo
  in his first at-bat.
• Nomo, himself homered, the first time 2 rival
  Japanese had done that in one U.S. game
• Nomo struck out Matsui the other 2 at-bats
• Still, Nomo lost
• In this case the action was told as an unfolding
  story.

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Contrasted with the Domestic Game

• This stands in contrast with the reports from
  Japan on the Japanese game
• In this case, game reports are told in
  story-form. Inning by inning, we view the lead
  changes, the key hits, the momentum-changing
  errors and managerial decisions
• Every game, in short, has a frame
• After all the reports are finished, the domestic
  standings are shown on-screen (unlike the
  American game)

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Soccer The Same Pattern

• Foreign soccer tends to focus on Japanese player
  highlights
• Although, there is also a tendency to spotlight
  key plays from Italy, England and Spain
  (primarily)
• Often (but not always) announcing the
  world-renowned players (and their country of
  origin)
• Domestic action is more often story-line, frame
  and standings.

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2. Late Evening Newsb. News 23

• June 14th, 2004. News 23 (Nyuzu tsu suri )
  includes an extended segment with their
  editor-in-chief and lead anchor, Chikuchi
  Tetsuya, reporting from New York.

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An Example

• Following a week in which he covered the G8
  Summit in Georgia and the Reagan funeral in
  Washington, he visited New York to interview
  Hideki Matsui, the left fielder for the baseball
  team, New York Yankees.
• The Matsui segment included
• riding on the subway to the stadium
• showing (and purchasing) Matsui goods from
  vendors
• fan Interviews about Matsui
• entering the stadium grounds and having a brief
  chat with Tomo Ohtsuka, the San Diego Padre
  pitcher who would (possibly) be playing in the
  game against the Yankees
• some game highlights of both Ohtsuka and Matsui
• and then an extended interview with Matsui on a
  roof garden in N.Y. City after the game

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The Fan Segment

• My Mom just loves him. Of all the Yanks hes her
  favorite
• -- A twenty year old male fan standing next to a
  quiet older woman
• I like him too. I mean hes just so
  fundamentally sound. Of all the players, he can
  do more things right.
• -- the same 20 year old fan
• IN SHORT this segment serves as a reflection of
  respect for Matsui, the Japanese import, in the
  estimation of fans.
• It is one interpretation available for the
  audience back home

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The Ohtsuka Segment

• Common (for interviews with Japanese players)
  because the American lifestyle was discussed
• Basically how easy was it to live and play in
  America
• In Ohtsukas case, the pitching mound suited him
  better than in Japan he also found American life
  easy to handle from food to living conditions
  to people
• A contrast, perhaps, to views asserted for so
  many years by Japanese that only Japan is
  hospitable for them to live comfortably.

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The Matsui Segment

• In an extended, roof-garden interview (with the
  Empire State Building in the background), Matsui
  answered questions about life in the Majors and
  also in America.
• One important point that Matsui made is that
  there is no player that he wishes he could be or
  that he would model himself after
• only certain parts of various players that he
  respects and thinks those are strong (good)
  qualities.
• Viewed in historical context, such a comment
  amounts to a revelation
• Japanese, known in the past to be self-effacing,
  would not generally express such implicit
  confidence.
• It is subtle, but Matsui is basically saying
  Im me. Happy to be who I am. In no need of
  modeling myself after anyone else.
• This is a quite confidence now the dominant
  perspective among all Japanese sports imports.

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4. Late Night Sports Suporuto!

• A show that runs every day of the week (Monday
  Sunday)
• Shows at Mid-night
• Has daily, fixed corners
• Yakyuu (Japanese baseball)
• MLB
• F-1
• (Domestic) Soccer (Division 1 and 2)
• Regular Corner NBA corner, European Soccer
• And features, based on the events
• NBA finals, Golf, K-1
• Additionally
• Periodic reports from an embedded journalist in
  New York, with profiles on the Matsuis
  (primarily).
• Interviews with soccer and baseball players
• Profiles of Japanese Womens Volleyball

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Examples from theSuporuto! Web Site

• The top page
• The Weekly News Schedule
• The Volleyball Interviews
• Sugiyama
• Narita
• Takehita
• Takahashi
• A Nakata (soccer) Interview

67
Suporuto!s Nihon-centric Focus

• June 21, 2004 F-1 Extra!
• First 20 minutes devoted to an F-1 Race in which
  a Japanese finished in 3rd place
• First top-3 finish by a Japanese in 14 years
• A curve-by-curve accounting of how he moved
  through the field
• Images of fans waving Japanese flags
• Interviews with the driver (in English, with
  subtitles) about how it feels to be the first
  Japanese to be on the podium in 14 years
• Interviews with the sponsors Bridgestone (tires)
  and Honda (engine)
• Bridgestone is a loaded signifier because of
  recent corporate malfeasance
• The Honda pit chief broke down and cried, saying
  Its the culmination of years of effort. And we
  couldnt have succeeded without the support of
  the Japanese people.

68
5. The Morning ShowsMezamashi Terebi (Alarm
Clock Television)525800 a.m.
69
Capsules Repeated

• A different day, a different station.
• The very same capsule summaries are repeated.
• Baseball and soccer
• In baseball, the players daily line and key
  plays (hits, fielding, errors, outs) are
  detailed.
• In soccer, the goals, assists, shots on goals
  and/or substitutions (in which the player came
  onto or off the pitch) are shown
• Only in exceptional cases are foreign highlights
  shown
• Barry Bonds 72nd home run
• Ken Griffeys 500th home run
• Euro 2004 goals in crucial matches

70
Occasional Departures from Nation

• Growing indicators of an interest in the world of
  sport and leisure, in general
• Example Euro 2004.
• A fascination with a major tournament without
  Japanese players is a major break from the
  general pattern of sports coverage in TV media.
• It suggests that more than political-cultural
  empire, there is a leisure empire effect at work
  

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Nihon-Centrism Redux

• Still, such a focus is still not predominant
• At most, there tends to be snippets of foreign
  action NBA Finals or a Super Bowl or World
  Series
• And the reality is if Tiger Woods wins a
  tournament, thats 20 seconds of news if Shige
  Maruyama is in contention and ends up in 4th (as
  he did in the U.S. Open), thats 3 minutes of air
  time.

72
Analysis Interpretations

• An analysis of the Empire of Leisure phenomenon
  can easily draw on the writings or ideas by
• The Frankfurt School
• Douglas Kellners Media Culture (1995)
• Media Frames
• Bourdieus notion of Habitas (1980)
• Barthes mythologies (1957)

73
The Frankfurt SchoolApplicable Tenets

• The notion of a universalized, commercialized,
  mass culture
• Technological rationality
• Messages of Consumerism
• Emphasis on short-term gratification by a
  consuming audience
• The myth of classlessness
• Here in the performance and consumption of these
  cultural products
• All inspired, stoked and reproduced by a Culture
  Industry

74
Kellner Media CultureApplicable Tenets

• The notion that we live in a culture in which
  the media dominate leisure and culture.
  (199535).
• The media
• Have replaced forms of high culture
• Have become the dominant form of socialization
• Are arbiters of taste, values and thought
• Present new models of identification
• Transmit images of style, fashion and behavior
• (1995 17)

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Media Frames The Power of Directivity and
Selectivity

• In my work on advertising I distinguish between
• directivity (the ability to move viewers toward
  particular values, ideas, practices or away from
  others)
• And
• selectivity (the tendency to single out
  particular elements or angles of viewing)
• This agenda-setting is similar to Framing
  Research
• A line that began with Goffman
• And was adapted by News Researchers, such as
  Gitlin (1980), Entman (1991), and Gamson (1992)

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Bourdieus Habitas (1980)

• Defined
• systems of durable, transposable dispositions
• structured structures predisposed to function as
  structuring structures
• principles which generate and organize practices
  and representations that can be objectively
  adapted to their outcomes
• The structures of habitas are products of history
• Which produce history
• They are the basis of the perception and
  appreciation of all subsequent experiences
• Similar in this way, then, to Frames
• Also quite amenable with Barthes notion of
  Mythologies

77
Barthes Mythologies (1957/1972)

• News stories/media products communicate in code
• The code are significations that reach to (and
  emanate from) the deepest values underlying a
  society
• Thus, the news frames tend to encode messages
  that pertain to the implicit, long-standing
  question of Japans competence
• A remnant of the Pacific War demise and
  reconstruction in the shadow of U.S. stewardship
• The frame, as well, of Japanese ability to live
  in a world beyond insular shores
• The Nihonjinron claim that Japanese are
  different than (unique from) the rest of humanity

78
Codes and Empire

• Such codes help build empire
• As in the case of the constant national frame
• But also an empire in which consumer-citizens
  engage in leisure part and parcel of their
  consuming it
• Such codes can also unbuild or reconfigure empire
• As in the case of a media frame that identifies
  an old boys network or the stratified
  seniority system (for attack)
• This was the case of the widely-publicized story
  (in news, morning and wide show genres) of
  Naoko Takahashi being left off the Olympic
  marathon team.
• An Olympic gold medalist in 2000, a world record
  holder, she had not run in the minimum required
  races for the year.
• This decision orning almost all TV genres)
• The case also of the recent decision to downsize
  professional baseball
• Concern about the destruction of their national
  game for the sake of money

79
Conclusions

• Contemporary Japan is at least three interrelated
  elements
• A consumtopia an everyday space saturated
  with goods and services an environment whose
  lifestyle is predicated on the production and
  consumption of things
• A mediated world in which what is increasingly
  consumed is information and the technologies that
  produce it
• The information is both manifestation of and spur
  to leisure its aggregation forming an empire of
  leisure in which play, competition, and
  physical performance has been elevated to a
  status superior to nearly all other activities in
  society.

80
Medias Role

• To transmit messages of leisure and consumption
  to audience members
• In doing so, it works
• to provide a frame for everyday existence
• a habitas for daily life
• a structural logic of mythic values by which
  surrounding life is decoded and understood
• Some but not all of this is nationalism (cultural
  or political)
• The rest of it are messages of play versus work

81
At the Same Time

• We have observed
• Not simply media frames
• Not only the existence of a cultural industry
• Not only a pervasiveness of media
• But an ubiquity and expression of leisure
• interest by audiences
• their (political) ability to pursue leisure
• their (economic) availability to pursue it
• their experience of it via a range of media

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Serious Implications

• Leisure -- the emphasis on play -- means that
• Sports are centered in daily life
• Sports are not only
• A means of consumption
• Outlets for competition
• Modes of entertainment
• Streams of revenue
• Sports also serve as vehicles for centering
  nation and communicating group identification

83
The Rise of (a new) Japanese Empire

• This form of cultural nationalism has moved
  Japan
• Beyond the status of empire of leisure
• To de facto empire

84
Juxtaposed or Read in Conjunction with Cultural
Studies

• The Empire of Leisure (in the Japanese
  incarnation)
• Is a cultural structure
• Sustained via economic, political and moral
  structures and practices
• Fails to acknowledge a time of crisis
• And even if/when crisis is recognized, it is most
  often done in the supra-ordinate discursive style
  of infotainment
• Its results are culturally, morally, politically
  and economically reproductive, rather than
  disjunctive or contestational