Mistura for the Fans: Performing Mixed-Race Japanese Brazilianness in Japan

Abstract

In this article, I examine fans’ consumption of mixed-race Japanese Brazilian female bodies in Japan. The article does this by examining two case-study representations of Japanese Brazilian female bodies: Miss Nikkei in Karen Tei Yamashita's mixed-media collection of essays and short stories, Circle K Cycles (2001); and performances by the Japanese idol group Linda Sansei (2013 debut). I argue that although the Japanese Brazilian population has largely been represented as minor characters in Japanese history, literature, and culture, the degree of consumption by fans belies this and points to the multiplicity of Japanese Brazilian identities. Moreover, the gendered, feminized body in these texts becomes a stereotyped, Orientalized, and fetishized Japanese body that is oftentimes juxtaposed to a sexualized, racialized Brazilian body. While this could distance fans and disavow the mixed-race Japanese Brazilian female body, Miss Nikkei and Linda Sansei perform gender and race in ways that demand recognition of their bodies as different to preconceived stereotypes. Fans consume the commodification of these new identitarian representations in a way that allows the mixed-race Japanese Brazilian female to attain social mobility, disavowing traditional categorizations as lower socio-economic class dekasegi, or foreign labourers.

Keywords:

• Japanese Brazilians
• mixed race
• performativity
• gender
• racialization
• sexualization
• boutique multiculturalism
• cosmopolitanism
• globalism

Notes

[1] Karen Tei Yamashita uses mistura as a juxtaposition to ‘pure Japanese’ in her collection. Mistura accompanies the Brazilian staple of rice and beans. Moreover, she links this concept to the Japanese term okazu, or the side dishes that accompany rice (literally ‘the numerous’).

[2] An Afro-Brazilian woman from the state of Bahia in Brazil that is typically included in carnaval cotingents.

[3] As such, they are easily replaceable. On 2 December 2014, the group's Facebook page announced that Naomi, would be ‘graduating’. Her replacement, Yukaren became an official member on 11 May 2015 after being an intern for seven months.

[4] I conducted fieldwork in Japan in July 2015, attending Japanese and Brazilian public festivals in Tokyo, Gunma, Hyōgo, and Saitama. While I did not interact with the audience members or fans personally, I observed a public fan event and the public performance of Linda Sansei on 19 July 2015 at Brasil Festival 2015 in Tokyo's Yoyogi Park. This festival was produced by Câmara Comércio Brasileira no Japão (Council of Brazilian Commerce in Japan).

[5] The popularity of this word in Japan has increased since the 1987 release of the Blue Hearts’ ‘Linda Linda’ song and the 2005 film Linda Linda Linda. Kōmoto Hiroto, ‘Linda Linda,’ The Blue Hearts, © 1987 by Meldac. Mukai Kôsuke, Miyashita Wakako, and Yamashita Nobuhiro, Linda Linda Linda, directed by Yamashita Nobuhiro (2005, San Francisco, CA: Viz Pictures, 2007), DVD.

[6] Lyrics printed with permission from the author, Natsumi Tadano.

[7] Oftentimes this information is provided at these live performances. For example, at the Festival Brasil 2015, the sponsors handed out pamphlets with the festival's itinerary and facts about Brazil. Câmara de Comércio Brasileira no Japão, Brasil (July 2015).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend [FT-229665-15].