Otaku: resistance and conformity

Abstract

This essay outlines some of the artistic and theoretical developments of the 'otaku generation' with regard to Japanese identity in its historico-political context. It traces the way in which the otaku as a marginalised group, have been aesthetically commercialised in the art of Murakami Takashi and theoretically framed by Azuma Koki. A discussion of the theoretical/practical approach by Japanese performance company Gekidan Kaitaisha and its director Shimizu Shinjin, is used to demonstrate some ways of dismantling the effects of the global-media system from within this context and its otaku phenomenon. The premise rests upon the idea of releasing 'the body' from its instilled illusions, so that its own meaning may be found in relation to 'history'.