Description: Analyzes how Japanese dramas have portrayed gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, and disability, revealing the cultural logics that shape who is included, how, and to what extent.
Brief description: Douglas Slaymaker is associate professor of Japanese at the University of Kentucky.
Review Quotes:
"Issues related to diversity and inclusion in Japan are complicated by the country's cultural, societal, and political traditions. Despite this, Kuwahara provides readers with a salient critique of the complex ways Japanese television portrays race, ethnicity, gender, and disability - as well as the way they all intersect within society today. Her insightful textual analyses are well-informed and fill an important gap in the scholarship related to media representations of cultural diversity around the globe." --Christopher P. Campbell, Editor of The Routledge Companion to Media and Race, USA
"Popular culture does not exist in a vacuum, nor does it simply reflect culture. This book is a perfect demonstration of that. Through vividly detailed recaps of Japanese television series grappling with representations of race, gender, sexuality, and ability, Kuwahara's insight invites comparison leaving the reader with deeper insight into their own culture's handling of identity, diversity, and inclusion and the power popular culture texts have in shaping attitudes and promoting progress." --Callie Clare, co-author of 'An Introduction to Popular Culture in the US: People, Politics, and Power'