Tokyo Halloween on the Street

Abstract

Drawing on perspectives related to fashion and consumerist cultures on the one hand and anthropology and appropriation on the other hand, this paper addresses dressing up on the streets during the celebration of Halloween in Tokyo, Japan. By relating commercially marketed Halloween fun-dress to longtime existing Japanese, European, and American cultural practices, we aim to show how Americanized “poplore” culture in Japan after the 1970s interacts with and empowers local practices. Evidence is based on the authors’ personal observations of Halloween in Tokyo on October 31, 2015. We examined Halloween promotion in visual media and shopping culture, studied the costumes and dressing up, and participated in the evening of Halloween on October 31, 2015 by wearing zombie makeup on the streets.