Otaku, Tribes and Subcultures of Japan

Thanks are due to Tokyo-based photographer, director and writer Irwin Wong for producing this fascinating book on contemporary subcultures of Japan (or some of them). He appreciates that the seemingly outlandish behavior of others throws an interrogative light on our own less exotic lifestyles. If people get so much fulfilment out of dressing up and conducting themselves in such extreme, and generally harmless, ways, why don’t more of us do it? Besides making the pictures, Wong also interviews many of the subjects at some length. This is a part to treasure in the book, as it goes places that an Instagram feed or a more mainstream social anthropologist report might not go. Wong did not take what people said without contextualizing it: “I interviewed each subject and supplemented that knowledge with research into the background of each subculture by reading newspaper articles or academic papers.” So you can have the cake and eat it in terms of intimate encounters with the weirdos and yet also take the more Olympian view of an analyst. Wong notes that, “the one thread connecting all these disparate subcultures is the utter devotion their proponents show to their lifestyle. Whether spending over 50 million yen on customizing a truck or building a full-size army vehicle from scratch in a truck, the otaku, or super- nerd, pursues their hobby to a point beyond all common sense and reason.” He doesn’t flinch at this but wonders whether the rest of us are brave enough to show the world what we really love. “The people in this book are the nails of Japanese society that refuse to be hammered down,” he writes, referring back to a Japanese phrase that suggests those that stick out – those with flair and difference – will get beaten down. All hail the otaku!