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Abstract
This study focuses on a comparison of the three most popular sakariba (entertainment districts) in Tokyo of the late 1920s and 1930s to highlight the new role of leisure in everyday life as Japan industrialized and urbanized. The comparison of Asakusa, Ginza and Shinjuku shows that even as Japan became a mass society, leisure practices and patterns became stratified and diversified. This stratification and diversification reflected class, age and cultural tastes. The three sakariba developed distinctive characters and attractions for consumers, raising challenges to mass culture critics’ assumption that the rise of mass culture and commodity culture would lead to homogenization of taste and recreational products and a lack of consumer choice.
Acknowledgements
The author is grateful for support from the Japanese Studies department at the University of Sydney to present an early version of this article at the Fourth Japanese History Workshop Australia at Murdoch University in December 2011. Comments from Michael Lewis and two anonymous referees provided helpful suggestions for improving the paper.
Notes
1 1Gonda, Minshū gorakuron, 42; Gonda, ‘Rōdōsha gorakuron’, 255.
2 2Sakai, Tōkyō sakariba, preface.
3 3For a summary of the linguistic meanings and historical development of sakariba, see Linhart, ‘Sakariba’, 198–201.
4 4The editors of a volume of essays on Japanese leisure noted the neglect. Linhart and Frühstück, The Culture of Japan, 1, 15. Linhart's earlier 1986 article on postwar sakariba noted the almost total lack of attention to sakariba; Linhart, ‘Sakariba’, 198.
5 5Maeda, Text and the City; Unno, Modan toshi Tōkyō.
6 6Yoshimi, ‘Insight’, 4.
7 7Seidensticker, Low City, High City; Seidensticker, Tokyo Rising.
8 8For example, Michael Lewis's translation of Soeda Azembō’s memoir introduces us to enka songs and Asakusa, Lewis, A Life Adrift; Alisa Freedman's cultural history of mass transport provides a vivid picture of Shinjuku Station and its environs, Freedman, Tokyo in Transit; Elise K. Tipton focuses on Ginza in ‘“Cruising Ginza”’ . Miriam Silverberg's study of ‘erotic grotesque nonsense’ includes a long section on Asakusa entertainments, Silverberg, Erotic Grotesque Nonsense; E. Taylor Atkins focuses on jazz in Blue Nippon. In Japanese, see, for example, Kamiyama, Asakusa no hyakunen; Masui, Asakusa opera monogatari.
9 9Yoshimi, Toshi.
10 10Linhart considered that ‘new centres had only local importance before the war’ compared to Ginza and Asakusa. Linhart, ‘Sakariba’, 201.
11 11For example, Easton, et al., Disorder and Discipline, ‘Introduction’.
12 12For examples of European critics, see Storey, Cultural Theory, 8, 62. Japanese critics will be discussed later.
13 13Martin, Interpreting Everyday Culture, 4.
14 14Sakai, Tōkyō sakariba, preface.
15 15Katō, ‘Service-Industry Business Complexes’, 381.
16 16Seidensticker, Low City, High City, 207.
17 17Quoted in Lippit, Topographies, 116; Silverberg, Erotic Grotesque Nonsense, 184.
18 18Waley, Tokyo Now and Then, 176–183; Seidensticker, Low City, High City, 70–73.
19 19Waley, Tokyo Now and Then, 184.
20 20This is Nishizawa Sô’s view; Lewis, A Life Adrift, xxxv, n. 31. Lewis does not entirely agree with Nishizawa.
21 21Quoted in Kawabata, The Scarlet Gang, 30.
22 22The Poketto daiTōkyō annai of 1930 reiterated Azembō’s description of Asakusa as a ‘marketplace of humanity’ (ningen no ichiba), unpaginated introductory section, ‘Asakusa no futatsu no kao’.
23 23Ishikado, ‘Asakusa keizaigaku’, 245.
24 24Gonda, Minshū gorakuron, 99.
25 25Donald Richie's description in Kawabata, The Scarlet Gang, xxx.
26 26Kawabata, The Scarlet Gang, xxix.
27 27Lippit, Topographies, 126–129.
28 28Seidensticker, Tokyo Rising, 68, 117. There were movie theatres to the west and east of Ginza, but not in Ginza proper.
29 29Silverberg, Erotic Grotesque Nonsense, 180.
30 30Maeda, Text and the City, 146–152.
31 31Edo-Tokyo Museum, ‘Feature of this Month: Enoken’.
32 32Masui, Asakusa opera monogatari, 194.
33 33Kamiyama, Asakusa no hyakunen, 158–159.
34 34Silverberg, Erotic Grotesque Nonsense, xv. Her definitions of the three words/concepts follow.
36 36Ichinose, Asakusa sōmatō, 76.
35 35‘Shin Tōkyō kōshinkyoku’ was a hit song in 1930. Lyrics by Saijō Yaso.
37 37Lefebvre, Critique, 35.
38 38Ōya, ‘Kanrakugai gojūnenshi’, 31–32.
39 39Kawabata, The Scarlet Gang, 129.
40 40Ibid., 134.
42 42Abbreviation of quote in Seidensticker, Tokyo Rising, 114.
41 41Ishikado, ‘Asakusa keizaigaku’, 249–250.
43 43Sakai, Tōkyō sakariba, 4.
44 44Onoda, ‘Ginzatsū’, 702.
45 45Kon, Kōgengaku, 257.
46 46Yoshimi, Toshi no doramaturugī, 222.
47 47For a description of the new Ginza, see Seidensticker, Low City, High City, 59–62.
48 48For more details on the transformation of department stores, see Tipton, ‘The Department Store’.
49 49Tōkyō Hyakunenshi Henshū Iinkai, Tōkyō hyakunenshi, 78.
50 50Moeran, ‘The Birth’, 169, based on Hatsuda, Hyakkaten, 262–263.
51 51Hatsuda, Hyakkaten, 260.
52 52Ogawa, ‘Randebū’, 412–414.
53 53Gonda, Minshū gorakuron, 100.
54 54Sakai, Tōkyō sakariba, 25–26.
55 55Yoshimi makes performance the main integrating theme of his study of sakariba. Yoshimi, Toshi no doramaturugī.
56 56Onoda, ‘Ginzatsū’, 79–80.
57 57 Changing Japan Seen Through the Camera, 285.
58 58Ishikado, Ginza kaibōzu, 286.
59 59Ibid.
60 60Ibid.
61 61Kitazawa, ‘Shoppu gāru’, 172–173.
62 62Asahi Shinbunsha, Tōkyō no uta, 183.
63 63Murobushi, ‘Kafē shakaigaku’, 189.
64 64Gonda, Minshu gorakuron, 242, 247. Other than cafés, Gonda limited modern life to cinemas, dance halls, bars, and restaurants.
65 65Murobushi, ‘Kafē shakaigaku’, 190.
66 66Hori, ‘Gendai jokyūron’, 189.
67 67Murashima, ‘Kanraku no ōkyū’, 374.
68 68For photographs of cafés, see Fujimori, et al., Ushinawareta teito Tōkyō, 76–95. For more on café waitresses, see Silverberg, ‘The Café Waitress’, 208–225; Tipton, ‘Pink Collar Work’.
69 69Murashima, ‘Kanraku no ōkyū’, 319–320.
70 70Ishikado, Ginza kaibōzu, 286.
71 71Gonda, Minshu gorakuron, 243–244.
72 72For example, Kitagawa Kusahiko. Kitagawa, ‘Kafé’, 276–279.
73 73Lyrics translated in Freedman, Tokyo in Transit, 116.
74 74In 1930 land near Shinjuku cost only 15 percent of land costs in Nihonbashi. Allinson, Suburban Tokyo, 53.
75 75On the culture house boom, see Sand, House and Home.
76 76For a detailed description and analysis of the station and the social interactions therein, see Freedman, Tokyo in Transit, 139–143.
77 77Matsuzaki, ‘Shinjuku inshōki’, 350.
78 78Katō, ‘Service-Industry Business Complexes’.
79 79Ryūtanji, ‘Shinjuku suketchi’, 64.
80 80Sakata, ‘Seikatsu bunka’, 153–154.
81 81For photographs, see Hisayama, Isetan.
82 82Hisayama, Isetan, np.; also observed by Ryūtanji, ‘Shinjuku suketchi’, 66.
83 83Katō, et al., ‘Shin Tōkyō’, 269–270.
84 84Ibid., 271.
85 85Tōkyō Hyakunenshi Henshū Iinkai, Tōkyō hyakunenshi, 85; Hori, ‘Gendai jokyūron’, 189.
86 86 Showa Day by Day, 148.
87 87Freedman, ‘Street Nonsense’.
88 88Katō et al., ‘Shin Tōkyō’, 271.
89 89Keishichōshi Hensan Iinkai, Keishichōshi, 825–830. For more details on regulations and the moral reform movements supporting them, see Tipton, ‘Cleansing the Nation’.
90 90Verses 1, 2 and 4 of the 1929 song with lyrics by Saijō Yaso and music by Nakayama Shinpei. Asahi Shinbunsha, Tōkyō no uta, 167.