Liner Notes: Aesthetics of Capitalism and Resistanace in Contemporary Japanese Music

Abstract

This dissertation hypothesizes that capitalism can be understood as an aesthetic through an examination and comparison of three music life worlds in contemporary Japan: traditional, popular, and underground. Through ethnographic fieldwork-based immersion in each musical world for nearly four years, the research presented here concludes that capitalism’s alienating aesthetic is naturally counteracted by aesthetics of community-based resistance, which blur and re-organize the generic boundaries typically associated with these three musics. By conceptualizing capitalism -- and socio-economics on whole – as an aesthetic, this dissertation ultimately claims an activist stance, showing by way of these rather dramatic case studies the self-destructive nature of capitalistic enterprise, and its effects on musical styles and performance, as well as community and identity in Japan and beyond.