Patrick W Galbraith
Biographic Data
| ID | 274741 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Patrick W Galbraith |
| GIVEN NAMES | Patrick W |
| FAMILY NAME | Galbraith |
| SIGNATURE | GALBRAITH P W |
| AFFILIATIONS | Senshu University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1085-4558 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 26 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 35 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 23 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Mutating Hyperfemininity in Bishōjo -Inspired Art: On Sugary Symbiote
Introduction “With most people, you cannot tell just from looking at them that they are fighting a silent, unseen battle”, says Sugary Symbiote, a Black, disabled, and sapphic artist in the United States. “That is what a lot of my illustrations represent. The girl is surrounded by cute things that make her happy, but she still feels alone and sad” (Sugary Symbiote). Central to her work is the bishōjo, or “cute girl”, drawn from manga, anime, and …
The Larme incident: On femme idols speaking out in contemporary Japan
Stim culture: Outlining anime's appeal to the autistic community
This article explores how anime contributes to the creation of a culture that attracts autistic individuals and supports their lives. We identify three aspects that may explain why it becomes a special interest that is both deeply personal and widely shared: visual tactility, or animation stimming; layers, or moving through estranged worlds; and unmasking, or emerging neurocultures and languages. Tentatively presenting anime as ‘stim culture,’ we…
Scandal in Japan: Transgression, performance and ritual
The ethics of imaginary violence, part 3: Early animated pornography in Japan
Part three of a series on the ethics of imaginary violence in contemporary Japan, this article turns from manga, anime and games broadly to more explicitly pornographic texts. Concretely, it zooms in on Cream Lemon, the longest running and most influential pornographic anime series in the 1980s. Positioned as both a part of and apart from 'the lolicon boom', Cream Lemon is a rich resource that has yet to be widely explored in English-language sch…
Idology in Transcultural Perspective: Anthropological Investigations of Popular Idolatry
Idology in Transcultural Perspective: Anthropological Investigations of Popular Idolatry
Idol Economics: Television, Affective and Virtual Models in Japan
The Ethics of Affect: Lines and Life in a Tokyo Neighborhood
Based on ongoing fieldwork in the Akihabara neighborhood of Tokyo, specifically a targeted subproject from 2014 to 2015, this book explores how and to what effect lines are drawn by producers, players and critics of bishōjo games. Focusing on interactions with manga/anime-style characters, these adult computer games often feature explicit sex acts. Noting that the bishōjo, or “cute girl characters,” in these games can appear quite young, legal ac…
Erotic Comics in Japan: An Introduction to Eromanga
Comics and cartoons from Japan, or manga and anime, are an increasingly common feature of visual and popular culture around the world. While it is often observed that these media forms appeal to broad and diverse demographics, including many adults, eroticism continues to unsettle critics and has even triggered legal action in some jurisdictions. It is more urgent than ever to engage in productive discussion, which begins with being informed abou…
Akb48
Since its formation as a girl group in 2005, AKB48 has become a phenomenal success and institution in Japan. Having originally recruited fans with photocopied fliers and daily performances in the Akihabara area of Tokyo, AKB48 now saturates Japan. Its members—nearly 800 of them, including five sister groups and four so-called “rival groups” across Japan, as well as six sister groups in other Asian cities—appear in print, broadcast, online, and so…
Otaku and the Struggle for Imagination in Japan
"In this ethnographic study of Otaku-- a loose category referring to intense fans of Japanese animation, games, and comics-- conducted in Akihabara, the electronics-turned-pop-culture neighborhood of Tokyo, author Patrick Galbraith traces the evolving relationships of mostly male-fans with imagined female characters. The term otaku, he argues, is frequently pathologized, to mean alienated or introverted persons - usually male - who have difficult…
Japan's Emerging Emotional Tech
‘Idols’ in Japan, Asia and the world
This chapter focuses on discourse about idols as representative of Japanese music and media, and ultimately of "Japan" itself. It discusses idols across three sections, which deal with three aspects of idols. First, idols are part of a system of media and commodities that generates desire. Second, because idols appeal to fans, they are increasingly important to production and advertising agencies looking to court audiences and consumers in fragme…
Akihabara
This chapter demonstrates how promoting otaku as part of Cool Japan coincided with policing "weird otaku" on the streets of Akihabara in the mid-2000s. Akihabara is an area located in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward. Well known for stores selling home appliances, personal electronics, and computers, Akihabara was, for much of the second half of the twentieth century, called the "Electric Town". The redevelopment of Akihabara, also known as the Crossfield Pr…
‘National idols’
In 2014, all top five bestselling singles on the Oricon charts were held by AKB48, an idol group consisting of more than 100 women in their teens and twenties. Given their success, it is perhaps not surprising that the members of AKB48 are often described as ‘national idols’. Not everyone, however, agrees with this designation. In fact, producers’ proposal to have an AKB48 spin-off called ‘Japan48’ perform at the Tokyo Olympics in 2020 sparked a …
RapeLay and the return of the sex wars in Japan
This article considers responses to RapeLay (2006), an adult computer game that allows the player to rape virtual women. RapeLay sparked controversy when it circulated globally and this filtered back into debates in Japan, which at times explicitly retrod the ground of feminist critiques of pornography in North America from the late 1970s into the 1980s. The return of ‘the sex wars’ in Japan in the new millennium confronts us with a fundamental q…
Media Convergence in Japan
The Japanese media system is in a state of flux as a result of shifts in the digital economy, new audience metrics and declining print and broadcast revenues. This volume examines issues of media consolidation, participatory culture and franchising in contemporary Japan, and explores how the Japanese media system is adapting to change in light of its tendency toward prioritizing domestic markets, restricting access and co-opting fan movements. Th…
Otaku sexuality in Japan
This chapter explores ‘ otaku ’ sexuality in Japan. According to the Kojien Japanese dictionary, otaku are ‘People who are interested in a particular genre or object, are extraordinarily knowledgeable about it, but are lacking in social common sense’. In Japan, manga and anime have in the postwar period become vibrant cultural forms with mass appeal. In the 1960s, Tezuka Osamu’s Astro Boy was the star of a manga and anime series, had been recorde…
Maid Cafés: The Affect of Fictional Characters in Akihabara, Japan
Maid cafés are establishments where waitresses wear costumes and talk to customers. Inspired by dating simulation games, maid cafés first appeared in the late 1990s in Akihabara, Japan, an area where dating simulation games were sold and players gathered. Maid cafés extended relations with fictional characters from media to physical reality, allowing players to interact with fictional characters in human form, while at the same time interacting w…
Introduction: The Mirror of Idols and Celebrity
On 9 June 2011, news of nuclear contamination in earthquake-stricken Japan took a backseat to the AKB48 General Election in the mass media. The third election of its kind for the all-girl idol group formed in 2005, it was a massive promotion and marketing blitz. In addition to fan-club members, anyone who had purchased their 21st single, "Everyday, Kachūsha," could vote. In a week, it sold 1,334,000 copies, a new record for a single sold in Japan…
Idols: The Image of Desire in Japanese Consumer Capitalism
On 22 November 2010, fans across Japan rushed to purchase Tomochin!!, a collection of photographs of Itano Tomomi, a member of the popular female idol group AKB48. Of the 148 pages in the book, 64 were manga; drawings of Itano and a fictional story about her accounted for 43 percent of a photo book bearing her nickname and presenting her to fans. While the reaction was not entirely positive, it is interesting that such a conflation of images coul…
Idols and Celebrity in Japanese Media Culture
This is the most complete and compelling account of idols and celebrity in Japanese media culture to date. Engaging with the study of media, gender and celebrity, and sensitive to history and the cont
Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl's Culture in Japan
Journal Article Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl’s Culture in Japan Get access Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl’s Culture in Japan, by Deborah Shamoon. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2012, 181 pp., $27.00 (ISBN 978-0-8248-3638-2) Patrick W. GALBRAITH Patrick W. GALBRAITH Duke University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Social Science Japan Journal, Volume 16, Issue 1, Winter…
Otaku Consumers
‘They [ otaku ] despise physical contact and love media, technical communication, and the realm of reproduction and simulation in general. They are enthusiastic collectors and manipulators of useless artifacts and information. They are underground, but they are not opposed to the system. They change, manipulate, and subvert ready-made products, but at the same time they are the apotheosis of consumerism and an ideal workforce for contemporary Jap…
Fujoshi: Fantasy Play and Transgressive Intimacy among 'Rotten Girls' in Contemporary Japan
This article is a theoretical and ethnographic inquiry into intimate communication and friendship among young women in contemporary Japan. The group I am considering consumes, produces, and reproduces mainstream manga (Japanese comics) and anime (Japanese animation), similar to the phenomenon of fan fiction and fan art in the United States and Europe, with a focus on imagining unintended romance and relationships between male characters, much lik…
Maid Cafés: The Affect of Fictional Characters in Akihabara, Japan
Maid cafés are establishments where waitresses wear costumes and talk to customers. Inspired by dating simulation games, maid cafés first appeared in the late 1990s in Akihabara, Japan, an area where dating simulation games were sold and players gathered. Maid cafés extended relations with fictional characters from media to physical reality, allowing players to interact with fictional characters in human form, while at the same time interacting w…
Japan's Emerging Emotional Tech
RapeLay and the return of the sex wars in Japan
This article considers responses to RapeLay (2006), an adult computer game that allows the player to rape virtual women. RapeLay sparked controversy when it circulated globally and this filtered back into debates in Japan, which at times explicitly retrod the ground of feminist critiques of pornography in North America from the late 1970s into the 1980s. The return of ‘the sex wars’ in Japan in the new millennium confronts us with a fundamental q…
The ethics of imaginary violence, part 3: Early animated pornography in Japan
Part three of a series on the ethics of imaginary violence in contemporary Japan, this article turns from manga, anime and games broadly to more explicitly pornographic texts. Concretely, it zooms in on Cream Lemon, the longest running and most influential pornographic anime series in the 1980s. Positioned as both a part of and apart from 'the lolicon boom', Cream Lemon is a rich resource that has yet to be widely explored in English-language sch…
Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl's Culture in Japan
Journal Article Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl’s Culture in Japan Get access Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl’s Culture in Japan, by Deborah Shamoon. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2012, 181 pp., $27.00 (ISBN 978-0-8248-3638-2) Patrick W. GALBRAITH Patrick W. GALBRAITH Duke University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Social Science Japan Journal, Volume 16, Issue 1, Winter…
Otaku Consumers
‘They [ otaku ] despise physical contact and love media, technical communication, and the realm of reproduction and simulation in general. They are enthusiastic collectors and manipulators of useless artifacts and information. They are underground, but they are not opposed to the system. They change, manipulate, and subvert ready-made products, but at the same time they are the apotheosis of consumerism and an ideal workforce for contemporary Jap…
Fujoshi: Fantasy Play and Transgressive Intimacy among 'Rotten Girls' in Contemporary Japan
This article is a theoretical and ethnographic inquiry into intimate communication and friendship among young women in contemporary Japan. The group I am considering consumes, produces, and reproduces mainstream manga (Japanese comics) and anime (Japanese animation), similar to the phenomenon of fan fiction and fan art in the United States and Europe, with a focus on imagining unintended romance and relationships between male characters, much lik…
Introduction: The Mirror of Idols and Celebrity
On 9 June 2011, news of nuclear contamination in earthquake-stricken Japan took a backseat to the AKB48 General Election in the mass media. The third election of its kind for the all-girl idol group formed in 2005, it was a massive promotion and marketing blitz. In addition to fan-club members, anyone who had purchased their 21st single, "Everyday, Kachūsha," could vote. In a week, it sold 1,334,000 copies, a new record for a single sold in Japan…
Idols: The Image of Desire in Japanese Consumer Capitalism
On 22 November 2010, fans across Japan rushed to purchase Tomochin!!, a collection of photographs of Itano Tomomi, a member of the popular female idol group AKB48. Of the 148 pages in the book, 64 were manga; drawings of Itano and a fictional story about her accounted for 43 percent of a photo book bearing her nickname and presenting her to fans. While the reaction was not entirely positive, it is interesting that such a conflation of images coul…
Idols and Celebrity in Japanese Media Culture
This is the most complete and compelling account of idols and celebrity in Japanese media culture to date. Engaging with the study of media, gender and celebrity, and sensitive to history and the cont
Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl's Culture in Japan
Journal Article Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl’s Culture in Japan Get access Passionate Friendship: The Aesthetics of Girl’s Culture in Japan, by Deborah Shamoon. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2012, 181 pp., $27.00 (ISBN 978-0-8248-3638-2) Patrick W. GALBRAITH Patrick W. GALBRAITH Duke University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Social Science Japan Journal, Volume 16, Issue 1, Winter…
Maid Cafés: The Affect of Fictional Characters in Akihabara, Japan
Maid cafés are establishments where waitresses wear costumes and talk to customers. Inspired by dating simulation games, maid cafés first appeared in the late 1990s in Akihabara, Japan, an area where dating simulation games were sold and players gathered. Maid cafés extended relations with fictional characters from media to physical reality, allowing players to interact with fictional characters in human form, while at the same time interacting w…
Otaku sexuality in Japan
This chapter explores ‘ otaku ’ sexuality in Japan. According to the Kojien Japanese dictionary, otaku are ‘People who are interested in a particular genre or object, are extraordinarily knowledgeable about it, but are lacking in social common sense’. In Japan, manga and anime have in the postwar period become vibrant cultural forms with mass appeal. In the 1960s, Tezuka Osamu’s Astro Boy was the star of a manga and anime series, had been recorde…
Media Convergence in Japan
The Japanese media system is in a state of flux as a result of shifts in the digital economy, new audience metrics and declining print and broadcast revenues. This volume examines issues of media consolidation, participatory culture and franchising in contemporary Japan, and explores how the Japanese media system is adapting to change in light of its tendency toward prioritizing domestic markets, restricting access and co-opting fan movements. Th…
RapeLay and the return of the sex wars in Japan
This article considers responses to RapeLay (2006), an adult computer game that allows the player to rape virtual women. RapeLay sparked controversy when it circulated globally and this filtered back into debates in Japan, which at times explicitly retrod the ground of feminist critiques of pornography in North America from the late 1970s into the 1980s. The return of ‘the sex wars’ in Japan in the new millennium confronts us with a fundamental q…
‘Idols’ in Japan, Asia and the world
This chapter focuses on discourse about idols as representative of Japanese music and media, and ultimately of "Japan" itself. It discusses idols across three sections, which deal with three aspects of idols. First, idols are part of a system of media and commodities that generates desire. Second, because idols appeal to fans, they are increasingly important to production and advertising agencies looking to court audiences and consumers in fragme…
Akihabara
This chapter demonstrates how promoting otaku as part of Cool Japan coincided with policing "weird otaku" on the streets of Akihabara in the mid-2000s. Akihabara is an area located in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward. Well known for stores selling home appliances, personal electronics, and computers, Akihabara was, for much of the second half of the twentieth century, called the "Electric Town". The redevelopment of Akihabara, also known as the Crossfield Pr…
‘National idols’
In 2014, all top five bestselling singles on the Oricon charts were held by AKB48, an idol group consisting of more than 100 women in their teens and twenties. Given their success, it is perhaps not surprising that the members of AKB48 are often described as ‘national idols’. Not everyone, however, agrees with this designation. In fact, producers’ proposal to have an AKB48 spin-off called ‘Japan48’ perform at the Tokyo Olympics in 2020 sparked a …
Otaku and the Struggle for Imagination in Japan
"In this ethnographic study of Otaku-- a loose category referring to intense fans of Japanese animation, games, and comics-- conducted in Akihabara, the electronics-turned-pop-culture neighborhood of Tokyo, author Patrick Galbraith traces the evolving relationships of mostly male-fans with imagined female characters. The term otaku, he argues, is frequently pathologized, to mean alienated or introverted persons - usually male - who have difficult…
Japan's Emerging Emotional Tech
Erotic Comics in Japan: An Introduction to Eromanga
Comics and cartoons from Japan, or manga and anime, are an increasingly common feature of visual and popular culture around the world. While it is often observed that these media forms appeal to broad and diverse demographics, including many adults, eroticism continues to unsettle critics and has even triggered legal action in some jurisdictions. It is more urgent than ever to engage in productive discussion, which begins with being informed abou…
Akb48
Since its formation as a girl group in 2005, AKB48 has become a phenomenal success and institution in Japan. Having originally recruited fans with photocopied fliers and daily performances in the Akihabara area of Tokyo, AKB48 now saturates Japan. Its members—nearly 800 of them, including five sister groups and four so-called “rival groups” across Japan, as well as six sister groups in other Asian cities—appear in print, broadcast, online, and so…
Idology in Transcultural Perspective: Anthropological Investigations of Popular Idolatry
Idology in Transcultural Perspective: Anthropological Investigations of Popular Idolatry
Idol Economics: Television, Affective and Virtual Models in Japan
The Ethics of Affect: Lines and Life in a Tokyo Neighborhood
Based on ongoing fieldwork in the Akihabara neighborhood of Tokyo, specifically a targeted subproject from 2014 to 2015, this book explores how and to what effect lines are drawn by producers, players and critics of bishōjo games. Focusing on interactions with manga/anime-style characters, these adult computer games often feature explicit sex acts. Noting that the bishōjo, or “cute girl characters,” in these games can appear quite young, legal ac…
The ethics of imaginary violence, part 3: Early animated pornography in Japan
Part three of a series on the ethics of imaginary violence in contemporary Japan, this article turns from manga, anime and games broadly to more explicitly pornographic texts. Concretely, it zooms in on Cream Lemon, the longest running and most influential pornographic anime series in the 1980s. Positioned as both a part of and apart from 'the lolicon boom', Cream Lemon is a rich resource that has yet to be widely explored in English-language sch…
Stim culture: Outlining anime's appeal to the autistic community
This article explores how anime contributes to the creation of a culture that attracts autistic individuals and supports their lives. We identify three aspects that may explain why it becomes a special interest that is both deeply personal and widely shared: visual tactility, or animation stimming; layers, or moving through estranged worlds; and unmasking, or emerging neurocultures and languages. Tentatively presenting anime as ‘stim culture,’ we…
Scandal in Japan: Transgression, performance and ritual
Mutating Hyperfemininity in Bishōjo -Inspired Art: On Sugary Symbiote
Introduction “With most people, you cannot tell just from looking at them that they are fighting a silent, unseen battle”, says Sugary Symbiote, a Black, disabled, and sapphic artist in the United States. “That is what a lot of my illustrations represent. The girl is surrounded by cute things that make her happy, but she still feels alone and sad” (Sugary Symbiote). Central to her work is the bishōjo, or “cute girl”, drawn from manga, anime, and …
Japanese History and Culture (21 works) · Asian Culture and Media Studies (19 works) · Sociology (18 works) · Art (17 works) · Psychology (13 works) · Political science (10 works) · Aesthetics (9 works) · Media studies (9 works) · Business (7 works) · History (7 works)