Science, Folklore, and Ecology of Knowledges in Aoyama’s Detective Conan Anime
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17533/udea.ikala.353637Keywords:
mass media, folklore, detective fiction, Japanese animation, Detective Conan, ecology of knowledgesAbstract
During the Anthropocene, science and folklore have been efficient explanatory models of the world. However, numerous studies suggest a convergence of both perspectives in contemporary mass media productions, being Japanese animation a clear example. The aim of the research presented here was to analyse how science and folklore are integrated and opposed in Aoyama’s Detective Conan, an anime where cases often happen in rural Japan and where folk references confront Conan’s detective reasoning. To reach this objective, a comprehensive qualitative and quantitative study of the presence of folklore in this work—through aspects such as characterisation or narratives—was conducted in 75 cases and over 155 episodes which include references to folklore in their background, plot, or characters. The analysis revealed that, when folklore and science interact, rational thinking is usually preferred over folk beliefs; characters are stereotyped according to their genre or origins; and, more importantly, supernatural beliefs can be included in detective fiction without being ridiculed by the most rational characters.
Downloads
References
Aoyama, G. (creator). (1994–…). Detective Conan. Yomiuri tv and tms Entertainment.
Borham-Puyal, M. (2020). Red Shoes, Witches and Creatures of the Forest: Dolores Redondo’s Baztan Trilogy as Contemporary Fairy Tale. In L. Brugué and A. Llompart (Eds.), Contemporary Fairy-Tale Magic: Subverting Gender and Genre (pp. 169–178). Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004418998_018
Hatfield, C. (2010). Indiscipline, or, The Condition of Comic Studies. Transatlantica. Revue d’études américaines / American Studies Journal, 1, pp. 1–18. https://doi.org/10.4000/transatlantica.4933
Hunter, J. (2020). Folklore, landscape and ecology: joining the dots. Time and Mind. The Journal of Archaeology, Consciousness and Culture, 13, 221–225. https://doi.org/10.1080/1751696X.2020.1824098
Kaya, H. M. (2013). The Soul of Japanese Culture: Kansai. Skylife. https://www.skylife.com/en/2013-07/the-soul-of-japanese-culture-kansai.
Kunio, Y. (1948). The Yanagita Kunio Guide to the Japanese Folk Tale. Indiana up.
Lander, E. (2000). Ciencias sociales: saberes coloniales y eurocéntricos. La colonialidad del saber: eurocentrismo y ciencias sociales – perspectivas latinoamericanas (pp. 11–41). clacso.
Martín-Párraga, J. (2020). From Fairy Tales to Slasher Films: Little Red Riding Hood and Wes Craven’s The Last House on the Left. In L. Brugué and A. Llompart (Eds.), Contemporary Fairy-Tale Magic: Subverting Gender and Genre (pp. 148–157). Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004418998_016
Massó Guijarro, E. (2020). Tropos (de)coloniales en la fantasía antropológica de Sánchez Piñol: reconocimiento-extrañamiento como bucle identitario. Un paseo entre las jaulas: ensayos sobre arte y literatura (pp. 229–252). Comares.
Miyashita, H. (2017). Common Motifs and Storylines between Japanese Folktales and Modern Manga and Anime [Master’s essay]. The State University of New York.
Ogáyar-Marín, F. J. and Ojeda-García, F. M. (2016). El mito en la modernidad a través del anime japonés. Revista Nuevas Tendencias en Antropología, 7, 111–132.
Pérez Riobó, A. and Chida, C. (2012). Yokai: monstruos y fantasmas en Japón. Satori.
Perrottet, T. (2011). Lake Geneva as Shelley and Byron knew it. New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/29/travel/lake-geneva-as-byron-and-shelley-knew-it.html?pagewanted=all.
Quintairos-Soliño, A. (2020a). Contemporary Japanese Folktales Represented in Anime: the Paradigmatic Case of InuYasha. In L. Brugué and A. Llompart (Eds.), Contemporary Fairy-Tale Magic: Subverting Gender and Genre (pp. 273–285). Brill. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004418998_027
Quintairos-Soliño, A. (2020b). Representation of the ‘Cultural Other’ in Japan: The Case of Detective Conan and InuYasha. Anuario de Investigación en Literatura Infantil y Juvenil, 18, 63–86. https://doi.org/10.35869/ailij.v0i18.2715
Samsuddin, S. (2019). Literary Ecology in Kongga Owose Folklore. Journal of Indonesian Language Education and Literary, 4(2), 24–30. https://doi.org/10.31327/jilel.v4i2.1131
Sari, I. A. L. and Putra, D. N. (2020). Narrative on Nature Conservation: A Comparative Study of the Folktales of Bali Aga and Ainu. Kemanusiaan: The Asian Journal of Humanities, 27(2), 59–78. https://doi.org/10.21315/kajh2020.27.2.4
Slaven, A. (2012). The Japanimated Folktale: Analysis Concerning the Use and Adaptation of Folktale Characteristics in Anime. [Master’s thesis]. Western Kentucky University.
Sousa Santos, B. de. (2014). Más allá del pensamiento abismal: de las líneas globales a una ecología de saberes. Epistemologías del Sur (Perspectivas). Ediciones Akal, pp. 21–66.
Wolf, E. R. (2023). Europa y la gente sin historia. Fondo de Cultura Económica.
Zipes, J. (2015). Introduction: Towards a Definition of the Literary Fairy Tale. In J. Zipes (Ed.), The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales (pp. xv–xxxv). Oxford up. https://doi.org/10.1093/acref/9780199689828.001.0001
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
Categories
License
Copyright (c) 2023 Íkala, Revista de Lenguaje y Cultura
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
