Planetary Cartographies of Fukushima Japan

WiSER invites you to a lunchtime seminar by

Christophe Thouny

Planetary Cartographies of Fukushima Japan

The triple disaster of March 2011 (earthquake, tsunami and nuclear explosion) has durably affected Japan and its population. However the actual effect of the disaster is still unknown. On the one hand, March 2011 has revealed essential dysfunctionalities of postwar Japanese society, triggering hope for change and renewal. This hope, however, has fallen back on an expected and conventional narrative of a rupture and reconstruction, a narrative that erases many of the local traumas of everyday life in the name of reconstruction, national redevelopment and global competitiveness. Japan is now getting ready for the 2020 Olympics, a farcical attempt to capitalize on and repeat the successes of the high growth period. In this short presentation, I will attempt to map out the present positions regarding the March 2011 event,  and argue for the need to think Fukushima Japan as a planetary event rather than a Japanese tragedy. For Fukushima can happen anywhere, and nuclear fallouts know no national boundaries.

Monday, 9^th September 2019
1pm

WiSER Seminar Room,
6th Floor, Richard Ward Building,
East Campus, Wits University

Christophe Thouny is Associate Professor at Ritsumeikan University. His field of interest covers East Asian media and urban cultures, Japanese literature, intellectual history, ecocriticism and queer theory, and focuses in particular on the question of modern urban experiences. He is co-editor of Planetary Atmospheres and Urban Life After Fukushima (Palgrave Mcmillian, 2017), a collective volume on the cultural and urban politics of Fukushima Japan. Thouny is currently working on three research projects: a series of articles on the neoliberal city and environmentalism in contemporary Japanese popular culture; a monograph on literary cartographies of urban spaces in Meiji and Taisho Tokyo ; and lastly an anthology on postwar Japanese social critique in the work of Yoshimoto Takaaki.

All welcome.