----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Noakes" <noakes_m@hotmail.com>
To: <bikkamu@yahoo.co.jp>; <carrotglace@mindspring.com>;
<ffml@anifics.com>
Sent: Friday, July 05, 2002 10:05 AM
Subject: [FFML] Re: Essay on Self-Insertions.

Hiya!

Haven't posted anything in awhgile, so I thought I'd add to this,

even

though since I've sold my computer, I'm syuck using painfully

overprices

internet caffes with tiny keyboards that cause far too many spelling
mistakes... gomen.

    I see that. X_X  Sorry to hear about your situation.  Internet
coffee
houses tend to suck at just about everything they try.  Their coffee
is
nothing to write home about either.

Not much to say or add, but I thought I'd throw in a few comments...

 What I concentrate on are the characterization and
cultural things.  I often get told "you don't know what
the hell you're talking about... I read all the books in
the library on Japan...so you can't know more than me."
Or "my 50-60 year old Japanese neighbor told me..."  Come
on now.  First... how much is modern day America like
America 10 or 20 years ago?   Well.. Japan is a living
society so stuff does change.  So that middle age to

I'd also add that just about anyrthing you read about Japan is

terribly

Tokyo-centric.  Much to the annoyance of the rest of Japan (and

especially

the Kansai region), foreigners seem to think that Tokyo _is_

Japan... which

it isn't.  Just like any nation, it isn't uniform--the way people

act, and

think, and the dialect they use, varies wildly across the country.

Down in

my end, the dialect they use (sanuki-ben) is virtually

unintelligible to

Tokyo-ites.  So, at the end of the day, those wonderful books you

might read

about Japan, like, say, Culture Shock:Japan, are in my opinion

virtually

useless.  They're a decent starting point, but they're far from

giving a

'true' impression of the country... just like any single book about

England

or Canada or America would never even assume that it could capture

the full

cultural diversity of these countries.

 This is not a problem confined to Japan.  Most foreigners think the
United
States is New York City and Los Angeles.  Period.  They know little of
and
care even less about the rest of the U.S.  Often, what they do know of
this
country is gleaned from our television shows - hardly an accurate
barometer
of the American culture as a whole.

 Yes, it's true of Japan the same as the US when it comes to regional
differences in actions, thinking and dialect.  The point is well taken
but I fail to see its relevance to fanfiction writing.  From a writing
perspective, so much takes place in or around Tokyo that doing
research
on any other region is a pointless exercise unless one simply wants to
better understand the differences or is introducing a new character
from
one of those regions.  Those Tokyo-centric publications and
productions
seen outside Japan do represent the form of Japan most fanfiction
writers see.  Even the major Japanese entertainment industry
(including
Manga and Anime) most often centers on and releases productions based
on
the Tokyo 'style'.


    - Greg






             .---Anime/Manga Fanfiction Mailing List----.
             | Administrators - ffml-admins@anifics.com |
             | Unsubscribing - ffml-request@anifics.com |
             |     Put 'unsubscribe' in the subject     |
             `---- http://ffml.anifics.com/faq.txt -----'