Blossay Preliminary Notes

Idea: the “Woman” as the base for monsters and horror in Japanese folklore and media (possibly attributed to sexism and objectification of women)

General notes regarding examples:

Folklore

• Futakuchi onna: mouth on back of head; stingy husband wouldn’t feed her; possibly let a stepchild die of starvation
• Rokurokubi: neck stretches while sleeping; disease; yokai
• Nukekubi: head detaches when body is asleep; like astral-projecting
• Yama uba: eats children; seduces people by dancing; lives in mountains; Jynx
• Onibaba: shriveled old cannibal woman; tore out daughter’s fetus’ liver by accident and went mad
• Yuki onna: leaves people frosty corpses; maybe a soul who died in a snowstorm; no feet; sometimes succubus-like and drains people of life
• Okiku: tricked into losing one of the ten important plates; gets thrown into a well after refusing advances of guy
• Oiwa: gets face scarred by poison cream and accidentally stabs herself
• Botan Dourou: a ghost girl seduces a guy several times and he dies
• Ohaguro bettari: woman with only a blackened mouth on her face

Urban Legend

• Teke teke: half body; carries scythe and cuts people in half
• Hanako: WWII girl haunting bathrooms; 3rd floor 3rd stall 3 knocks
• Kuchisake onna: slit mouth; chases children; asks “am I pretty”

Modern Media (I plan to look into the progression of themes in Japanese horror)

• Sadako: from Ringu; hair in face; comes out of well
• Kayoko: from Ju-on; bloody; murdered and murderer; clicks

Sources so far

http://hyakumonogatari.com/

http://www.sacred-texts.com/shi/kwaidan/index.htm

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/japanese_folklore_and_mythology

http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/japanlove.html

Myths and Legends of Japan, F. Hadland Davis

Kawaii + Me

I have a lot of mixed feelings about the "kawaii" culture now, as I did as a child as well.  As a young child, I resented cutesy toys and dolls, preferring dinosaurs and Star Wars figurines.  I loved stuffed animals, but only because I loved animals more than people at that point.  To this day, the pastel colors and infantile toys make me grimace, and I remember receiving a Hello Kitty clock when I was kid and hating it.  

Ironically, I still own this clock today, but at this point, I've had it so long that I don't even acknowledge the colors or Hello Kitty figure.  It does amuse me that such items that I was expected to like as a little girl - the original demographic - are now so popular to adults in Japan.  I respect the individualistic rebellion against traditional, stifling social norms in Japan, but the aesthetic itself frankly doesn't appeal to me as a fashion statement.  On the other hand, I will shamefully admit that sometimes I enjoy cutesy animes or anime moments (and I still have stuffed animals, like Aika-san), so I can't denounce the kawaii altogether.