Contextualization
My first project this year focuses on the culture of Japan. I wanted to look at what contemporary life is like and how the modern culture has changed from the past but also how it still holds ties to its rich history. My history focuses more on daily life and religion and my art looks mmore into the music scene and the creativity of the booming industry of post WWII Japan. I explained the purpose and value of modern Japanese philosophy through a magazine article, and showed off the music style through my own songs based on the Japanese music of the 80's.
History
For History, I dived into the ideals and core values of the Japanese religion, Shinto. I wanted to assess how such a belief system is so intertwined with Japanese culture and what benefits can be drawn from it? To exemplify my findings, I created a tabloid magazine style article explaining what Shinto is, and why we should implement its values more into our daily lives. I utilized the thinking skill by placing the Shinto religion in context in its place in Japanese society and how it can shape our lives. By understanding the circumstances surrounding the existence and application of Shinto, we can contextualize how it works and more importantly, why it works. A pdf file of the article is attached.
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File Size: | 1931 kb |
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Art
For my Art portion, I created two original songs based largely on the Japanese music style of the Japanese funk and jazz scene of the 70's 80's known as City Pop. I focused on a few artists in particular, such as Tatsuro Yamashita who is known as the grandfather of City Pop, and Tomo Fujita who is one of the greatest living guitar teachers in the world and a talented funk guitarist. I recorded videos of myself playing my own versions of each of these. One song is a jazz Yamashita influenced work and the other is based more on funk and rhythm guitar in Tomo Fujita style. The songs I listened to by both artists I put into context by understanding the culture and life of Japan at the time of their release.
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