Coates, J. orcid.org/0000-0003-4326-1481 (2017) Gambling with the nation : heroines of the Japanese yakuza film, 1955–1975. Japanese Studies, 37 (3). pp. 353-369. ISSN 1037-1397
Abstract
A revamped period-drama film genre surfaced after the Allied occupation of Japan (1945–1952), featuring androgynous comic heroines who cross-dressed to perform male and female yakuza roles. By the late 1960s, they had been replaced by increasingly sexualized figures, and later by the ‘pink’ violence of the ‘girl boss’ sub-genre. Yet masculine themes in the ‘nihilistic’ yakuza films of the late 1960s and 1970s have been the focus of most scholarship on the genre, with scant attention paid to the female yakuza film. This article offers an iconographic reading of the heroines of the yakuza genre, arguing that the re-imagining of a postwar ‘Japaneseness’ was conducted as much through the yakuza genre’s heroines as its heroes. Through analysis of key visual motifs, narrative tropes, and star personae, the image of the female yakuza can be read as a commentary on social conditions in postwar Japan. We can see the rapid social and political changes of postwar Japan reflected and mediated through the changing image of the female yakuza heroine during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2017 Japanese Studies Association of Australia. This is an author-produced version of a paper subsequently published in Japanese Studies. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > School of East Asian Studies (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 03 Sep 2019 14:36 |
Last Modified: | 04 Sep 2019 03:25 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Taylor & Francis |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1080/10371397.2017.1373015 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:150347 |