Week 4 Blog Post for Media in Japan

 

🥧Analysis on アンパンマン🥧

My nostalgic anime, “それいけ! アンパンマン” (Let’s Go! Anpanman)

“WHY does Anpanman share his Anpan head for others?”

Although I had been a big fan of Anpanman for a long time, I never had a chance to think about ‘WHY’ Anpanman would take off a piece of Anpan from his head and give it to others. It all started from this single questioning that came from my pure curiosity.

 

Anpan is a type of bread filled with red bean paste. This bread had been loved by the Japanese people as one of their most popular “wagashi(和菓子)” throughout the history.

Reminiscing my early childhood, I myself was a big fan of Anpanman who would always enjoy dancing along the enthusiastic rhythms of songs played in the anime. I saw him as a friendly, hopeful, generous, and sacrificing hero that feels happy when seeing others being healed and sheltered. However, I do remember that, from the lens of a little kid, I was often shocked and terrified by the fact that the character would cut out a piece from his Anpan head and easily give it to others.

The heroic figure sacrifices himself for the fulfillment of others’ needs and especially the poor and deprived. In order to find out WHY he made such heartwarming contribution, and also how he could gained & maintain popularity, we need to carefully observe Japan’s postwar political, historical, and cultural backgrounds.

It all traces back to 1969, when Anpanman looked quite different from the Anpanman that we come across nowadays. Except from the fact that he could fly, he was literally a ‘man’ whose job was to distribute Anpan to the poor and homeless children living in regionally conflicted areas. We see that Anpanman is flying above destroyed villages which implies for Japan’s contemporary postwar landscape memories, the dark times when the public were suffering from the traumas of WWII.

 Now as an adult, I am filled with nostalgia whenever I come across Anpanman products in Japanese convenience stores, markets, and malls. It brings back the memories that I used to dance along the songs that were played in the shows/animation.

 Yanase Takashi, the original cartoonist for Anpanman was forced to join the Japanese army to fight in the Sino Japan war during the WWII. At that time, soldiers were treated in inhumane ways that they would be barely provided with any food to sustain their lives. To make matters worse, Takashi lost his younger brother from war. This became the start of his antagonism towards cruelty of war and accompanied poverty. For these reasons, Takashi came to sympathize with and give hopes to the individuals. Thanks to his warm initiatives, the whole Japanese society was able to be healed from its wounds of the war time memories.

Here, we see one of the most important aspects of Japanese culture which was dealt within the class session; that Japanese media is state centric, homogeneous, and collective. In this sense, it is quite similar to the effects that happy and bright songs on TV shows after the 2011 Tohoku earthquake. They were repeatedly played with expectations to heal the public, bring back their energy and happiness, and gradually overcome the hard times.

For Japan, their most important interests were to bring social cohesion and harmony after the national traumatic event. This is never ‘weird’. The culture has its own reasons, needs and logics behind the curtains. Therefore, the symbolic act of Anpanman should not be viewed ‘weird’ nor awkward but rather rephrased as culturally ‘unique’, as there exists no good and bad. It is in this fashion that the sociocultural reasons should be thoroughly explored and fully appreciated before putting on our own tinted glasses.

The symbolistic scene itself of Anpanman ‘taking off his head’ accompanied massive controversies and complaints from the publishing industries as well as parents by its bizarreness. However, Takashi had no wills to compromise and continued to push his philosophy. He once stated, “in order to help others, one needs to be brave enough to get hurt, and endure pain. How can one fight for justice when having no willingness to sacrifice for others?”

Nowadays in a busy, individualistic society, it is hard to see the heart-warming aspects of life that comes from sacrificing of oneself and sharing. It is truly unfortunate that we first become suspicious when others offer unconditional kindness, attention, and love. In this dry, barren society, I sometimes wish that Anpanman would be flying through our sky, giving out Anpan with his warm smile.

۶(◍ ͒⚈ ͒◍)۶

 

References

http://dknews.dankook.ac.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=15106

https://alternativemindz.com/2013/06/history-of-anpanman/

https://www.cbr.com/anpanman-japan-superhero-history/