CJS Thursday Lecture Series | Becoming Marimo: The Curious Case of a Charismatic Alga and Imagined Indigeneity
Jon L Pitt, Assistant Professor of Japanese Environmental Humanities, University of California, Irvine
Please note: This lecture will be held in person in room 110 Weiser Hall and virtually via Zoom. This webinar is free and open to the public, but registration is required. Once you've registered, the joining information will be sent to your email. Register for the Zoom webinar at:
https://myumi.ch/Qekgy
Hokkaidō’s Lake Akan is home to world famous algae: spherical-shaped growths of Aegagropila linnaei known in Japanese as marimo (and sometimes called “moss balls” in English), which have been given the status of “Special Natural Moment” by the Japanese government. Due in part to a well-known story that has long been erroneously promoted as a folktale belonging to the indigenous Ainu community of northern Japan, marimo have become a charismatic species and are sold as “pets” in Japan and abroad. My presentation traces the history of this “fakelore” and the ways in which the Ainu community around Lake Akan have nevertheless embraced the marimo in the name of cultural efflorescence.
Jon L Pitt is Assistant Professor of Japanese Environmental Humanities at the University of California, Irvine. He earned his Ph.D. in Japanese from the University of California, Berkeley. His current book project, Becoming Botanical: Rethinking the Human through Plant Life in Modern Japan, looks to bring insights from Critical Plant Studies into the study of modern Japanese literature and cinema. His he also the translator of poet Itō Hiromi’s Tree Spirits Grass Spirits (Kodama kusadama), which is forthcoming in 2023 via Nightboat Books, and the host of the environmental humanities podcast Nature : Mono, the first season of which is dedicated to the theme of “Oceanic Japan.”
This lecture is made possible with the generous support of the U.S. Department of Education Title VI grant.
If there is anything we can do to make this event accessible to you, please contact us. Please be aware that advance notice is necessary as some accommodations may require more time for the university to arrange.
Hokkaidō’s Lake Akan is home to world famous algae: spherical-shaped growths of Aegagropila linnaei known in Japanese as marimo (and sometimes called “moss balls” in English), which have been given the status of “Special Natural Moment” by the Japanese government. Due in part to a well-known story that has long been erroneously promoted as a folktale belonging to the indigenous Ainu community of northern Japan, marimo have become a charismatic species and are sold as “pets” in Japan and abroad. My presentation traces the history of this “fakelore” and the ways in which the Ainu community around Lake Akan have nevertheless embraced the marimo in the name of cultural efflorescence.
Jon L Pitt is Assistant Professor of Japanese Environmental Humanities at the University of California, Irvine. He earned his Ph.D. in Japanese from the University of California, Berkeley. His current book project, Becoming Botanical: Rethinking the Human through Plant Life in Modern Japan, looks to bring insights from Critical Plant Studies into the study of modern Japanese literature and cinema. His he also the translator of poet Itō Hiromi’s Tree Spirits Grass Spirits (Kodama kusadama), which is forthcoming in 2023 via Nightboat Books, and the host of the environmental humanities podcast Nature : Mono, the first season of which is dedicated to the theme of “Oceanic Japan.”
This lecture is made possible with the generous support of the U.S. Department of Education Title VI grant.
If there is anything we can do to make this event accessible to you, please contact us. Please be aware that advance notice is necessary as some accommodations may require more time for the university to arrange.
| Building: | Weiser Hall |
|---|---|
| Event Type: | Lecture / Discussion |
| Tags: | Natural Sciences |
| Source: | Happening @ Michigan from Center for Japanese Studies, International Institute, Asian Languages and Cultures |
