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- Title
SONG MONUMENTS IN OKINAWA: Intersections of Sound, Place and Memory.
- Authors
Gillan, Matt
- Abstract
Okinawa has one of Japan's most thriving traditional music cultures, and songs are an important way that Okinawans understand and construct their island community. Most Okinawan songs have strong regional connections within Okinawa, either through lyrics that sing of local topography, events, or people, or because the melody is believed to have originated in a particular village. From the mid-20th Century on, many villages began constructing 'song monuments' (Japanese kahi) commemorating songs, composers, or lyrics, in order to create a tangible focus for what was essentially an intangible cultural entity. These monuments usually involve a substantial financial investment, either from local government or private donations, and are often placed in prominent spatial positions within the village. These song monuments are extremely popular among Okinawan music aficionados, and several guidebooks have been published to guide people to these sites. In recent years, bus tours have been organised to transport groups of aficionados en masse to these sites, and since 2015, a Facebook page has enabled the sharing of photographs and information relating to song monuments. The song monument phenomenon is particularly interesting for the way that it acts as a site for the simultaneous construction of connections between sound (the songs that performers sing), geographical space (the locations to which songs are connected) and community (the interpersonal links that are formed as people engage with song monuments). In this article I draw on my own experience visiting song monuments as part of the Okinawan music community, in order to analyse their social importance in modern Okinawa. I consider the song monument phenomenon in the context of domestic tourism, as well as a widespread culture of pilgrimage in Japan.
- Subjects
OKINAWA Island (Japan); JAPANESE music; MUSIC &; culture; HISTORY
- Publication
Shima, 2017, Vol 11, Issue 2, p20
- ISSN
1834-6049
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.21463/shima.11.2.05