Toyo Eiwa University Repository / 東洋英和女学院大学学術リポジトリ
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The Wartime Activities of Fusae Ichikawa : A Reappraisal
Get PDFⅢ体制的価値の導入と婦選活動の新展開、以降を収録departmental bulletin pape
A Study of the "Powerspots" : An Examination of the Social Background and a Preliminary Survey
Get PDFThe “Powerspots”, known as the sacred places to heal or activate visitors, has come into fashion in recent years. The aim of this paper is to define what the “Powerspots” are based on sociological approach.
In the view of sociology of religion, the “Powerspots” are located as a popularized form of modern spirituality. Especially Ehara’s TV program, a Japanese TV program in which he counseled guests spiritually, had decisive impact to make spirituality popular. Even though affirmative handlings of paranormal phenomenon in mass media have long history in Japan, after Ehara’s fad people have accepted a word of spirituality and collaborated to expand it. Publications entitled “Powerspots” have increased from then. Popularized spirituality has transformed as materialism and created spiritual markets.
Sociological studies have explained the appearance of spirituality in postmodern society and proliferation of popularized spirituality in Japan, but only a few empirical studies has been done on the receptiveness. In the present study a preliminary survey was conducted on the “Powerspots” for future research. Openended questionnaire results have revealed that (1) while they have knowledge of collecting information about “Powerspots” from the media as well as from other people, the “Powerspots” have been discovered or re-innovated by themselves; (2) although the aims of visit are diverse, in common, they all want to make a distance from daily life; and (3) their attitudes to the “Powerspots” is not only determined by belief, but evaluation of the fashion or society.departmental bulletin pape
New Perspectives on Media and Social Change : An Approach from Discourse Analysis
Get PDFThe purpose of this study is to consider the relationship between media discourse and socialchange. I examine them in theoretical aspect, and then I would like to provide new analytical framework. First, I review some discussions in media studies and sociology to analyze social change. Although the effects of mass media on social and cultural change have been discussed within mass communication theory, it has been considered that it is difficult to measure them strictly. Recently, the approach of discourse analysis has become increasingly important in media studies. But the focus on media discourse has shown a lack of interest in macro factors. It is also pointed out that social change theory in sociology raises many theoretical questions. Second, I suggest new perspectives in the study of discourse analysis, including the conversationalization of discourse and global discourse that articulates micro discourse and the macro structure of society. By the concept of the conversationalization of discourse, Fairclough suggested important implicationsfor the ideology of conversation and social change towards entertainment. On the other hand, Machin & Van Leeuwen have focused on globalization as discourse, analyzing the three aspects of genre, language, and image from the perspective of style and format. As a result, the following results were obtained: 1) Global media formats enter localities through a number of routes. Local media may copy global formats. 2) Media genre formats and technologies are increasingly globalized and homogenized. Such genres, formats, and technologies are not neutral containers of content. They carry meaning and value themselves. 3) In the above discussion, it is important that social change is traced to consumer capitalism. Finally, I concluded that that the accumulation of case studies in the context of Japanese society is important.departmental bulletin pape
Empirical study, on parenting stress, child-rearing support and house-keeping ability in residents of Aoba-ku, Yokohama city
Get PDFThis paper presents the results of an empirical study on child rearing conducted in Aoba-ku, Yokohama city. Among parents residing in this ward, a negative correlation between employment status and parenting stress was observed. The results also indicated that parents who received some child-rearing support had lower parenting stress and were happier with child rearing. In this study, the most frequent supporters were maternal grandparents. Thus, it is important that policy making regarding family issues take into account parenting support and child-rearing stress.
It has been discussed that the causes of parenting stress would not be unique and there might be complex relations among the components. In this paper, we discuss the difficulties faced by parents with low house-keeping ability in performing child-care and the resulting parenting stress experienced by the family. Furthermore, the empirical results indicate that the support most frequently required by parents is with house-keeping, not child rearing itself.departmental bulletin pape
Research on the Changing Life Courses of Toyo Eiwa University Graduates
Get PDFIn 2010 a research project was conducted to find out more information about Toyo Eiwa University students’ lives after graduation. The purpose was to obtain information that could be used to make changes in the university’s career education programs and curriculum which would better support students’ efforts to find suitable employment. A questionnaire was used for gathering data, in which graduates responded to items about both career and employment changes, as well as changes in
their personal lives such as marriage and having children.
The graduates’ responses to the questionnaire were analyzed. Five main
points drawn from this analysis are discussed in this article. They include information about graduates’ changing attitudes toward employment while still university students, their current employment and job satisfaction, the percentage of graduates who had changed jobs or quit and the reasons for this, and the effects that marriage and raising children tended to have on their employment statusdepartmental bulletin pape
The Return of the Buddha : On the Origins of the Buddha Images in Gandhara
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Uses and Gratifications of Video Sharing Websites : Impact of YouTube on Television and Other Media Preference
Get PDFInternet video sharing websites such as YouTube have some possibilities to change the way of choosing or using traditional media. This study investigates uses and gratifica-tions of YouTube and its impact on media preference, especially television.
The questionnaire survey was conducted on 447 undergraduates. Factor analysis iden-tified four gratifications (convenience, information, reproducibility, communication) and three content types (home video, entertainment program, social information).
All users were divided into three groups (high-gratifications, partial-gratifications, low-gratifications) by cluster analysis. Partial-gratifications users watched entertain-ment program limitedly with convenience and reproducibility gratifications, and they were less interactive online.
But this study found no evidence that YouTube generated negative impact on watching television and other media preference. YouTube users spent more time on television or other media than non-users. High-gratifications and partial-gratifications users spent more time on television and had higher television affinity than low-gratifications users. YouTube may play complementary role in Japanese youth at present.journal articl
The Ancient Mesopotamian Ritual for Making Divine Statues: Some Aspects of Philological and Comparative Studies
Get PDFThis paper deals with some problems in the study of Mesopotamian cuneiform texts regarding the “mouth-washing” (mı¯s pî: in Akkadian) ritual. These texts describe how to make or restore a divine statue and dedicate it to a shrine. In 1931, E. Ebeling interpreted these texts by arguing that the ritual process could be compared with a birth process. This has been a dominant theme in the discussion of the ritual since then. This theory is based especially on a reading of line 23 of the Babylonian version. Although some signs have been broken away, E. Ebeling restored the word “buginnu” (trough) from the context. He interpreted that the buginnu placed on a brick belonging to a birth goddess represented a womb and that river water poured into the buginnu represented semen. It meant that the divine image should be born as a “child” through the ritual. E. Ebeling’s theory was accepted and further developed by T. Jacobsen
(1987). P. J. Borden (1998) inherited T. Jacobsen’s theory and added new ideas. In 1998, however, A. Berlejung rejected E. Ebeling’s theory because his interpretation of buginnu as womb could not be proven from other examples. Despite this, E. Ebeling’s interpretation was still being quoted by M. Dick in 2005. Thus, once an interpretation of rituals is made, it is often accepted without challenge or question for a long time. Moreover, a scholar’s cultural and religious background can affect the study of ritual texts. The excavations in Mesopotamia and the decipherment of cuneiform were begun by scholars from the West. By noticing some similarities between the Bible and the cuneiform texts, these scholars, mainly with backgrounds in Biblical Studies, engaged themselves in philological studies of cuneiform texts (Assyriology). They had difficulty accepting the “pagan” mouth-washing ritual, something is criticized in the Bible. Recently, however, as an attempt to familiarize people with the ritual, M. Dick pointed out the similarity between this ritual and the Eucharist, which is explained by the theory of transubstantiation. However, we now know that there are many more similar rituals in the world, including the “Kaigenshiki”
(the opening of the eyes ceremony) for Buddhist statues in Japan. Such rituals appear to be scarcely known to many Assyriologists. Therefore, for a more comprehensive and perhaps accurate understanding of cuneiform texts, comparative studies from broader perspectives are required.departmental bulletin pape
Human Beings and Nature Considered through Picture Books, Songs, and Poems about Catastrophes
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