Japanese TV Drama Research Articles

Analyzing drama metadata through machine learning to gain insights into social information dissemination patterns.

TV drama, through synchronization with social phenomena, allows the audience to resonate with the characters and desire to watch the next episode. In particular, drama ratings can be the criterion for advertisers to invest in ad placement and a predictor of subsequent economic efficiency in the surrounding areas. To identify the dissemination patterns of social information about dramas, this study used machine learning to predict drama ratings and the contribution of various drama metadata, including broadcast year, broadcast season, TV stations, day of the week, broadcast time slot, genre, screenwriters, status as an original work or sequel, actors and facial features on posters. A total of 800 Japanese TV dramas broadcast during prime time between 2003 and 2020 were collected for analysis. Four machine learning classifiers, including naïve Bayes, artificial neural network, support vector machine, and random forest, were used to combine the metadata. With facial features, the accuracy of the random forest model increased from 75.80% to 77.10%, which shows that poster information can improve the accuracy of the overall predicted ratings. Using only posters to predict ratings with a convolutional neural network still obtained an accuracy rate of 71.70%. More insights about the correlations between drama metadata and social information dissemination patterns were explored.

The Shifting Sub-text of Japanese Gendered Language

Sociolinguists (e.g., Holmes, 2008; Meyerhof, 2011) generally describe Japanese as a language with gender-exclusive elements. Personal pronouns, sentence-ending particles and lexicon used exclusively by one gender have been cataloged in English by researchers such as Ide (1979), Shibamoto (1985), and McGloin (1991). While there has been some research showing that Japanese women’s language use today is much more diverse than these earlier descriptions suggested (e.g., studies in Okamoto and Shibamoto Smith, 2004) and that some young Japanese girls use masculine pronouns to refer to themselves (Miyazaki, 2010), prescriptive rules for Japanese use still maintain gender-exclusive elements today. In addition, characters in Japanese movies and TV dramas not only adhere to but also popularize these norms (Nakamura, 2012). Thus, Japanese etiquette rules and media texts promote the perpetuation of gender-exclusive language use, particularly by females. However, in the past three decades, Japanese society has made significant shifts towards gender equality in the legal code, the workplace and education. I therefore decided to investigate how Japanese women use and view their language in the context of these changes. I draw data from three focus groups which I conducted in 2013 and 2019, and which comprised female university students who went through the Japanese school system after the Japan Teachers’ Union adopted a policy of gender equality. The goal was to determine whether Japanese women’s language use is shifting over time. The study suggests that Japanese women are slowly changing the gendered nature of Japanese, using very few of the traditional elements of onna kotoba (women’s language), and slowly adopting such traditionally masculine features as the use of omae and kimi as second-person pronouns, omitting bikago honorifics, and employing masculine lexical items such as umai, ku, hara, and kuso, which were until recently considered taboo for females to use. Although these trends are not yet evident in most public contexts, the language use and views of the participants in this study suggest that the shift in Japanese usage is steadily ongoing and forms a sub-text of Japanese language use.

1980년대 『오싱』 붐과 한국 사회 - 순응과 저항의 여성 서사를 호명한 한국 독자 -

Understanding what is in Japanese literature that has become a bestseller in Korea and how it has been read is reevaluating the aspects of Korean society that accepts the literature in addition to the significance of translation. This study would examine the social discourses and individuals’ desires implied in Korean society in the 1980s through the Oshin boom. The year when the Korean version of Oshin was published is 1984, which was an extraordinary publication that ‘translated’ the Japanese TV drama scenario into a novel. For a few years since then, Oshin has been settled as a bestseller in the Korean book market. Oshin was full of points of contact with desires pursued by Korean society. The life success story, in which a domestic help became the owner of a supermarket chain store was a combination of the gender element of women's entry into society with the capital element of overcoming poverty and acquiring wealth. In addition, it was also an excellent combination to express a desire for change in Korean society in the 1980s. Oshin, who adapts herself and resists patriarchy, resembled the reality of women in Korean society much. In that Oshin drew out numerous discourses of Korean society, such as discrimination of women, the shadow of labor environment, and pursuit of wealth and management ethics, it was like a self-portrait of Korean society.

TV 드라마에서의 인명 사용에 관한 한일언어 비교연구 -풀 네임을 중심으로-

This study aims to clarify the use of person names, in particular that of full names, in modern Korean and Japanese. A person name is often the first appellation for many people, which is given when they are born or even before their birth, as a label to uniquely identify themselves within the social community they belong to. It is perhaps the most essential form of identification of individuals, the use of which is indispensable to establishing and maintaining everyday human interactions. Researches on person address terms have so far overwhelmingly focused on personal pronouns and kinship terms, and the use of person names, particularly of full names, have been neglected in the current Korean-Japanese cultural and linguistic literature. The present study fills a gap of previous studies, and explores the use of full names in Korean and Japanese. Based on an analysis of data drawn from three series of Japanese TV dramas and their remake versions of Korean dramas, it characterises Korean being “full name oriented” and Japanese being “family name oriented”. Furthermore, it proposes two functions, ‘formal identification’ and ‘emphasis of emotions’, for full names. Significantly, Japanese lacks the ‘emphasis of emotions’ function and it is a main cause for an extremely low frequency rate of full names in Japanese.

Contesting and advocating gender ideologies

Previous scholars have identified sarariman (salaried men), who prioritise work over family, as the ideal of hegemonic masculinity in Japan. This study focuses on sarariman characters’ language use in the workplace as depicted in the 2015 Japanese TV drama Age Harassment. Employing the concepts of stance and hegemonic masculinities, the study demonstrates that, in this mediatised representation, the sarariman characters draw on diverse gender ideologies to display masculine identities. Using online commentary, the study also explores audience members’ responses to the drama’s depiction of masculinities. The study’s analysis of these two types of data suggests that despite increasing social acceptance of more diverse masculinities, the stereotypical sarariman remains to some extent the hegemonic ideal in contemporary Japan.

Pemakaian Kata Sapaan (Taishoushi) di Dunia Kerja Perhotelan: Analisis Percakapan Drama TV dan Film Jepang

Address term (taishoushi) is a word or a group of words used to refer to the interlocutor. Address terms used in hotels, especially five star western hotels, have special characteristic in addressing guests and also other employees. There are many factors which make speaker uses various kinds of address terms. This research aims to describe those factors. The object of this research is address term used as a term of address, that is address term used to appoint interlocutor which it cannot become an utterance without other words. In other word, term of address is a part of an uttered sentence. This research data were collected from Japanese TV dramas and movie about working life in five-star hotels in Tokyo. Those are Hotelier (2007), Hotel Concierge (2015), and The Uchouten Hotel (2006). The data were collected by conducting note-taking technique to transcript the dialogue where the address term belongs to. Then, the data were classified based on speech components: setting and scene, participant, and end. In analyzing the data, there are some factors to be considered. Those are interlocutor’s response, act, key, and norms. Factors in classifying participants are distance, including uchi (in-group) and soto (out-group), power, and gender. Based on the participant’s relation, some social factors to determine address term are power, social distance, and gender. Situational factors may also make a speaker switches the code in using address term.

North Pillow Brings Bad Luck: Construction of Ideologies of English in a Japanese TV Drama, Massan

ABSTRACT This article examines how ideologies of English are constructed and reproduced through the use of English by various television characters. It analyzes the form, content, and context in an NHK morning drama Massan, focusing on the construction of incompetence. Similar to previous studies, the contrast between characters based on their English skills are represented through various semiotic processes. However, unlike other studies where the individuals lacking English competence are represented as stupid and objects of ridicule, one of the main supporting characters of Massan uses ‘bad English’ but has a strong, positive role in the drama. The mismatch between the character’s speech and her character in the drama seems to blur the negative aspect of incompetence in English, and possibly mollifies the viewers’ own English inferiority complex. The juxtaposition of a strong supporting character with a lack of English creates a space for this alternative positive interpretation. However, such positive representation does not negate the power of English itself; rather, it appears to heighten the division among Japanese people based on their English skills.

Introduction to Special Issue: Language, Nationalism, Love, and Gender Roles in the Japanese Morning TV Drama Massan

Japan is undergoing significant demographic changes, including a diversification of the population. The number of foreign residents has more than doubled in the past two decades, from about 1.1 mil...

Constructing fluid relationships through language: A study of address terms in a Japanese drama and its pedagogical implications

AbstractThis study investigates address practices among family members in a Japanese TV drama. It qualitatively analyses not only a speaker’s culturally normative use of address terms but also his/her deviations from the norm, including the use of terms that are atypical in Japanese communication. The study sheds light on dynamic aspects of interaction in Japanese in which the speaker creates meaning and constructs fluid relationships with other interlocutors through the use of address terms. The pedagogical implications of these findings are discussed, along with the value of using telecinematic discourse in teaching, to give learners of Japanese a socio-pragmatic understanding of address practices.

The Positive Politeness in Japanese and Korean TV Dramas

The Positive Politeness in Japanese and Korean TV Dramas

From Localization to Glocalization: Contriving Korean Pop Culture to Meet Glocal Demands

Hallyu (the Korean Wave) has been around the world since the late 1990s. Over the period of twenty years, Hallyu has evolved from a regional entertainment pop to a global cultural content. The evolution of Hallyu, like any other evolutions, has involved a long process of localization and globalization. Both K-pop and K-dramas, the two major pillars of the Hallyu revolution, are foreign imports. K-pop has mostly been influenced by European and American dance music since the early 1990s, whereas K-dramas have been heavily influenced by Japanese trendy TV dramas in the past, particularly during the 1980s. However, the localization of K-pop and K-dramas by Korean artists, writers, and producers demonstrated their adept rearrangement skills that ushered in a new era of a domestic pop culture boom that had been on the verge of destruction due to Hollywood films, Japanese pop culture contents, and the financial crisis that swept through the nation since 1997. K-pop and K-dramas have successfully gained domestic fame to propagate its commercial influence in Asia, Europe, Latin America, and North America. The collection of papers gathered in this Forum Kritika on Hallyu Studies presents their analyses on the process of localizing and globalizing Hallyu, or what I call glocalization. Briefly, glocalization denotes a successful localization of foreign products so much so that original inventors of the products want to import the local variations instead of their originals. Americans buying a massive number of Japanese cars, for example, is a good case of glocalizaiton. Hallyu’s glocalization success indicates that the domestic Korean demand for high quality pop culture has induced new types of competition that required importing global pop content, simultaneously requiring them to contrive to produce better quality pop content than the originals for re-exporting to foreign markets, given the enormous investments that cannot be recouped from a small Korean market.

TV드라마 현대물에서 무협 원형(原型)의 적용: 일본 TV드라마 <홀리랜드>의 사례를 중심으로

TV드라마 현대물에서 무협 원형(原型)의 적용: 일본 TV드라마 <홀리랜드>의 사례를 중심으로

융합적 장애학의 시각을 통해 본 중도 시각장애인의 장애 자부심 구축 -일본 TV드라마 "챌린지드"를 중심으로-

융합적 장애학의 시각을 통해 본 중도 시각장애인의 장애 자부심 구축 -일본 TV드라마 "챌린지드"를 중심으로-

Predicting Empirical Patterns in Viewing Japanese TV Dramas Using Case-Based Decision Theory

AbstractThis article empirically analyzes consumer behavior of viewing TV dramas using case-based decision theory. The theory addresses an economic situation with structural ignorance, where states of the world are not naturally given nor simply formulated for a decision-maker. Under this theory, consumers make decisions based on subjective evaluations of previous purchases for similar goods. Our empirical analysis is concerned with viewing decisions on getsuku, the Japanese TV dramas broadcast at 9 pm Monday by the Fuji Television Network. The regularity of the schedule and the long-sustaining popularity of the program enable us to easily collect consumer data. Then, we conduct a web survey of individual audiences on subjective evaluations of previously watched dramas. For our empirical analysis, we utilize a simple linear model of the case-based model that allows the incorporation of flexible inference techniques. Our results demonstrate better performance of the case-based models than models based on traditional expected utility theory regarding both statistical model selection and one-step-ahead prediction. We also reveal that the successful performance of the case-based model in our analysis depends on the availability of individual subjective evaluations and that it is difficult to replace the individual-specific information using demographic information and aggregate data.

放送前の情報のみを用いたテレビドラマの視聴率予測

本稿では，テレビドラマを対象とし，放送局や時間帯といった基本的な情報に加え，出演する役者や関わったスタッフ，そして役者の話題性を用いた視聴率の予測を行う．ドラマの映像や音声は用いず，放送前に得られる情報のみから視聴率を予測すること，そして視聴率に影響を与える要因を明らかにすることが目的である．我々の作成した678本のドラマからなるデータセットに対して，サポートベクター回帰とランダムフォレストの二つのモデルを適用し，初回視聴率の予測を行った．実際の視聴率と予測した視聴率との相関はr=0.843と高い値，平均絶対誤差は1.93%と小さいことを確認した．また，ドラマに関わる各要素のうち，特に視聴率に強く影響する要因とその影響の度合いを明らかにすると共に，本手法がうまく働く場合と働かない場合に関して具体的なドラマ名を挙げた考察を行った．

Predicting Empirical Patterns in Viewing Japanese TV Dramas Using Case-Based Decision Theory

This article empirically analyzes consumer behavior of viewing TV dramas using case-based decision theory. The theory addresses an economic situation with structural ignorance, where states of the world are not naturally given nor simply formulated for a decision-maker. Under this theory, consumers make decisions based on subjective evaluations of previous purchases for similar goods. Our empirical analysis is concerned with viewing decisions on getsuku, the Japanese TV dramas broadcast at 9pm Monday by the Fuji Television Network. The regularity of the schedule and the long-sustaining popularity of the program enable us to easily collect consumer data. Then, we conduct a web survey of individual audiences on subjective evaluations of previously watched dramas. For our empirical analysis, we utilize a simple linear model of the case-based model that allows the incorporation of flexible inference techniques. Our results demonstrate better performance of the case-based models than models based on traditional expected utility theory regarding both statistical model selection and one-step-ahead prediction. We also reveal that the successful performance of the case-based model in our analysis depends on the availability of individual subjective evaluations and that it is difficult to replace the individual-specific information using demographic information and aggregate data.

A disability study on views on the disabled shown at the Japanese TV drama and its Korean remake

A disability study on views on the disabled shown at the Japanese TV drama and its Korean remake

THE UNCIVIC POP CULTURE?

Based on a discourse analysis of the fan-audience discussions found in the National Taiwan University and Soochow University Bulletin Board Systems, this case study discovers that the Taiwanese youth in fact draw on Japanese TV dramas as a springboard for reflexive discussions of their own social and political conditions in post-authoritarian Taiwan. The Japanomania fan discourse played a crucial role in Taiwan's democratization and nationhood-building in the 1990s. This paper argues that fan discussion networks are ‘pre-political’ because they create social conditions and alternative discourses that could prepare media users for potential social changes. I contend that foreign media are not necessarily the most immediate oppressors and could become the source of subversive symbols and new meanings for local resistance. Further research is called for to illuminate the shaping of identity by the global media in non-Western contexts.

A Study of Linguistic Politeness in Japanese

This paper re-examines theories of linguistic politeness in Japanese, and holds that linguistic politeness is a very complicated issue influenced by multiple factors in different layers including general face wants of participants, the participants’ societal positions and social relationships, social norm that the interactants share, the interactants’ discernment or interpretation of the social rules, immediate context of the interaction, and possible strategies for the interactants to choose under the constrains of the other simultaneously functioning factors. Based on the data collected from recent Japanese TV dramas, this study maintains that, as a general principle, Brown and Levinson’s (1978, 1987) theory of face does apply to Japanese language and culture and forms the base of politeness. Similarly as in any other culture, facework in successful communication in Japanese is a result of choice by an interlocutor in accordance with normative polite practices. What makes linguistic politeness in Japanese unique is not that Japanese speakers need to act appropriately according to their social norm, but that their discernment (wakimae) and recognition of the social position and relationship (tachiba) of the participants, which form the second layer of the determining factors of politeness, make speakers of Japanese always attend to and try to fulfil the other participant’s face want including both positive and negative face, and, at the same time, maintain their own positive face but rarely claim their own negative face especially when an interactant has less power and in a lower social position in an interaction. The data also suggest a model of face-redressing strategies co-occurring with face threatening acts (FTA) in Japanese.

Local vs. Foreign Television Drama: Niche Analysis of a South Korean Audience's Use of Korean, American and Japanese Dramas

The present study explored the reception and consumption processes of a Korean audience’s viewing of local and international television dramas. Findings indicated that the influential factors on the level of viewing in regards to Korean, American, and Japanese TV dramas among Korean viewers differed. In particular, a significant difference was found in terms of perceived drama characteristics. Applying niche theory, the present study also examined the audience’s motivation for watching these television dramas. Results demonstrated that Korean TV dramas possessed the broadest niche breadth and were the most competitive. In a comparison of the perceived characteristics of TV dramas, American drama earned competitive superiority for most characteristics. The implications from the results were discussed in terms of cultural discount and proximity.