T.J.M. Holden

Professor, Mediated Sociology

Department of Multi-Cultural Societies

Graduate School of International Cultural Studies

Tohoku University

Sendai, Japan

Frame This:

How Japanese media use sport to How Japanese media use sport to support cultural messages about support cultural messages about nation and gendernation and gender

Disclaimer

Even more than usual, I have to state that this is a work in progress.

Which is a self-assured, if not disingenuous, way of saying that I have no idea what my data is saying.

Well, actually, I have an idea, which I will tell you about.

First I will tell you what I thought I was going to talk about, then talk about what I have been observing.

DisclaimerDisclaimer

Some of this has to do with gender – the construction of it, the uses to which it is put – through sports/media;

But more of it has to do with other interesting processes Some related to nationalism Some related to community Some related to intimacy

Most related to how media – and in particular television – in Japan, communicates with its audience.

To Begin: About Frames

As most of you probably know, “Frame” is a serviceable concept in communication studies.

Because this is so, it has become popular over the years, associated with the analysis of: organizational structure (Tuchman 1978); elites (Gitlin 1980); hegemony (Hallin 1987); social process (Carragee and Roefs 2004).

To Begin: About Frames in Japan

Looking at Japan, and then sports reporting in Japan, we can easily discern frames in reporting.

Content analyzing these frames through a social-anthropological lens, we can say that they can be traced to and are rooted in cultural history.

To Begin: About Frames in Japan

In particular, media frames have tended to focus on issues of Japan’s global positioning.

(Japan’s Women’s Team will appear in the Athens’ Olympics tournament)

To Begin: About Frames in Japan

Mirroring its uneven history of isolation and imperialism, Japanese sports reports are self-consciously focused on matters of:

Increasing globalityRelations with the “outside”Reflections on the who and

what “inside”

To Begin: About Frames in Japan

Success in the “larger world”Acceptance by the world’s othersThe meaning of “Japaneseness”

And, of course… Nationalism

Where Gender Enters the Picture

Where Gender Enters the Picture

It is typical in media-sport studies to run down the list of “usual suspects”.

Beyond nation/alism, gender is invariably included on that list.

And certainly, in Japanese media-sport reports, such frames can be found.

Gendered Frames: Diminished Power

The first and most obvious of this is how images of power gets mediated…For instance, and as we’ve already seen

in Ms. Ito’s presentation, kawaii (or cute) ji (lettering) and icons, as well as pink script are employed when women speak.

This is a trope widely used in enka (folk singing) and also karaoke, therefore has historico-cultural support in other media

So, too, does the color convention assist in gender labeling and gender definition

Gendered Frames: Diminished Power

Beyond this, women are often presented in Beyond this, women are often presented in ways that can be seen as minimizing or ways that can be seen as minimizing or diminishing them.diminishing them. For instance, the women’s volleyball team is For instance, the women’s volleyball team is

generally referred to by the name of the coach generally referred to by the name of the coach (and nation): “Yanagimoto Japan”(and nation): “Yanagimoto Japan”

This follows the convention of men’s soccer which This follows the convention of men’s soccer which was called “Okada Japan” in 1998 and “Trossier was called “Okada Japan” in 1998 and “Trossier Japan” in 2002. Japan” in 2002.

Still, female identity is lost in the process, as their Still, female identity is lost in the process, as their existence is placed beneath that of their male coachexistence is placed beneath that of their male coach

Which happens less with Mens teams where the Which happens less with Mens teams where the players are spotlighted for interviews and treated as if players are spotlighted for interviews and treated as if they have strong, independent, distinct personalities.they have strong, independent, distinct personalities.

Differential Depictions of Men and Women?

Differential Depictions of Men and Women?

One obvious question is whether men and women are framed differently.

Following the “frame-as-reflection-of cultural-history” thesis, one might venture the following…

Men as Lone Wolves?

And Women as Group-oriented?

Credence to This ViewpointCredence to This Viewpoint In fact, this view can find large support in daily

Japanese media coverage.

But some of this has to do with the kinds of sports that Japanese women and men excel in. Often for women it is team sports such as

volleyball, soccer, softball, basketball, and field hockey.

In the case of the run-up to the last Olympics, it seemed to be only team sports in which women were succeeding.

Although individual women ultimately fared better in their events than the women’s teams

And it was the men’s gymnastic team that caught the imagination of the nation.

Credence to This ViewpointCredence to This Viewpoint

Interestingly, although there has been some small success for men in the individualist sports of swimming and golf, many of the men identified as successful engage in team sports such as baseball and soccer

But, they are often singled out as individualsAnd even where women excel in individual

sports such as golf or tennis, they are often presented in group or dyadic (interactive) ways.

Credence to This ViewpointCredence to This Viewpoint

Such depictions (of female individuals) are often treated by media in ways that may neutralize their agency.

For instance, a golfer’s on-going feud with her father, the caddy, may be spotlighted.

A famous judo player, married to a professional baseball player, announces her pregnancy and declares: I have won gold under my maiden name, under my married name, and now I will win gold as a mother.

Two world-class swimmers are teammates, and rivals; yet, the focus on an extended story is their companionship and mutual support.

But somewhere along the line…

This idea breaks down.

The Limits of Cultural Stereotypes

It is possible to locate women alone, facing the world by themselves.

The Limits of Cultural Stereotypes

And men who are actively engaged.

Thus…

There seem to be other things going on with Media/Sports/Frames than “traditional” gender

What I have begun to think about – and what I want to talk about today – is how Media/Sports/Frames often play with or else employ gender in various, often unexpected ways to enhance overall, alternatively-framed communicative power.

Before Getting There…

I will briefly summarize some of the ways I have been looking at Sports and MediaBoth together and separatelyAs a way of better understanding where

I’m going…… which (to spoil the punchline) is

EMOTION

Media Effects

Framing Distortion Effects Accretion Magnification Amplification

In talking about how media treat “Sportsports” (Holden 2006a, b), I have developed concepts inductively. While they all differ in nature and probable effect, they might be collectively summarized under the rubric “Value Added Mediation”

Media Effects

Framing Distortion Effects Accretion Magnification Amplification

And although they take a specific form in Japan – in part because of their association with “Sportsports” -- these concepts likely have applicability in other media contexts, independent of sports reports.

Media Effects:Value-Added Mediation

In Japan, though, these effects have arisen because over the past decade, every night during baseball season, on every news station on Japanese television, a segment has been devoted to the performance of Japanese baseball players in the major leagues.

Media Effects:Value-Added Mediation

Each segment is treated in nearly identical ways: the player is lifted out of the game context and highlighted every at-bat is chronicled Post-game interviews are

reported, or (since there are now so

many Japanese players playing overseas), their daily “line” (i.e. number of hits out of number of at-bats, as well as their current batting average) is inscribed as superscript.

Foreign Sportsports:Individualist Frame

The focus, throughout, is not on the game; rather the individual Japanese player toiling in the game.

The Baseball Export Frame

The Soccer Export Frame

The identical process occurs in the case of Japan’s overseas soccer playerswith every arrival in a

foreign city detailed, every practice session, every meaningful kick or assist or goal, and every substitution in or out of a game.

In Japanese “Team” is Spelled with an イ

In the case of both baseball and soccer, these reports ALWAYS take precedence over the results of the match. Individuals lifted out of the collective

contestTo the degree that these players are

almost exclusively male, a (spurious) association is engendered between individual existential condition and male/ness.

In Japanese “Team” is Spelled with an イ

As I have shown elsewhere (Holden 2002), formatically, such reportage differs from that associated with the domestic game.

There, a story form concerning the battle between the two Japanese teams is favored over the feats of individual players.

Achievements tend only to be reported as part of the game story.

One result is that collectivities become the invisible filter for understanding sporting life INSIDE Japan.

More Value-Added Mediation

International EquivalenceGlobal PositioningNation CenteringBoundary Blurring/Status ShiftingForeign Gaze

The effects just described were identified as “concepts” The effects just described were identified as “concepts” meaning that they can be thought of as ways of assessing meaning that they can be thought of as ways of assessing media activity in other contexts (not simply Japan). The 5 media activity in other contexts (not simply Japan). The 5 listed here, though, seem to be mediated effects that are listed here, though, seem to be mediated effects that are exclusive to Japanese media.exclusive to Japanese media.

More Value-Added Mediation

Their contextual exclusivity is based on bounding factors such as:Japan’s historical geopolitical position Its relations with the west Its long-standing view of uniqueness and

national superiority It countervailing, long-standing sense of

cultural inferiority

Bindingness

These elements also “work” effectively as communications because of a specific Media-Society relation in Japan

Historically, Japanese TV has been said to be a national unifier (Yoshimi 2003) The claim is that TV helped standardize rituals

and enabled collective sharing of nation-oriented content

It has been asserted that this ideological power has declined with time.

Bindingness

I would disagree.

TV serves, even today, as a “binding mechanism” A communal unifier Which has particular resonance given Japan’s

deeply embedded, structuring principle, “uchi” [collective realm]

Effectively, the medium’s function is the circulation of cultural content throughout the nation, serving to unify the collectivity into a singular national community

The major “trope” – or better, frame – employed by TV to achieve this end is “emotion”.

Explaining Gendered Frames: Bindingness and Emotional Distance

Here let’s focus on gender as a way of better appreciating the concepts of bindingness and emotion

Bindingness – which is a measure of the success in forging a community – is often achieved via emotional connection.

Explaining Gendered Frames: Bindingness and Emotional Distance

In examples presented during this talk, this has the (seeming) effect of reproducing gender images

But in fact may have less to do with gender (that is distinction based on sexual characteristics) than with audience-subject proximity and, as a consequence, ultimately, national unity

We can refer to this as “emotio-gendered emotio-gendered framesframes”

Explaining Gendered Frames: Bindingness and Emotional Distance

The way that emotional connection is achieved is, in severable (but supporting) parts: Linguistic Historical Geographical National Cultural Communal

Emotio-Gendered Frames: The example of linguisitic tricks

The linguisitc: “chan” is a diminutive – or term of endearment – associated with the following female athletes: Ai Miyazato (golfer), Ai Fukuhara (table tennis),

Yokomine Sakura (golfer) It is used for no male athletes, save for the

golfer Maruyama Shigeki (which will be explained later)

It is not generally used for Japan’s female tennis players or swimmers or team players (volleyball, soccer, field hockey)

Emotio-Gendered Frames:Emotio-Gendered Frames: Explained via historico-cultural dimensions

The diminutive creates proximity. Most often it is linked to athletes (or other personalities)

introduced into the “national family” at an early age In the case of Ai Fukuhara when she was in grade

school; in the case of Ai Miyazato when she was in her mid-teens

The male exception, Maruyama, received his name when he was a rather rotund golfer, known for his sunny disposition. The image (of a jolly, cuddly, child-like personality)

was cultivated in an ad campaign – rather than everyday life; the name stuck long after the ad campaign – and his pudgy look – faded.

Explaining Gendered Frames: Bindingness through Emotional Proximity

The geographical dimensions of this labeling lie in the earlier discussion of “uchi”.

An essentialized, if not essentially contested – concept.

It assumes that all on the inside share a common set of understandings, history, values, ways of doing and seeing.

For sportsports, these gendered “chans”, are the cultural objects shared within the national community over time.

Making Emotions

Making Emotions

This is perhaps the largest category of value-added Mediation.

It operates independent of Sportsports

• Being a major trope in Japanese television (see Painter 1996, Ergul 2004, Holden and Ergul forthcoming)

• It also seems to serve as a central logic in the use of other media, such as cell phone (Holden 2005).

The Uses of Emotion

However, it is not only emotion that is used…

Rather: emotion wed to images – if not conceptions -- of gender

Aside from gender, this serves “bindingness”

And, hence, the re/production of national community.

Gender-Added Frames

For instance, of late, there have been a large number of women in sporting news in recent weeks: Ai Fukuhara playing ping-pong on a club

team in China Ai Miyazato challenges in an American

Ladies Masters golf event The International Volleyball World Grand

Prix featuring the Japanese women’s team

Gender-Added Frames

So, too, has there been a growing infatuation with the American golfing “sensation”, Michelle Wie: Seeking to qualify for a men’s tournament Also in Amateur match play competition

against men

Out of (Normal) Frame

Of note was this:On one night, a major story was

Michelle Wie’s embarking on Amateur match play against a field of men (and winning). The interview was with her, assessing her

performance And, unlike many stories involving women, was ONLY

with her. There were no other supporting or evaluative

statements.

A Reversal of Frames

But consider this:

On that same night, on the same station, there was an extended documentary-style profile of a male marathon runner. The frame was not about the runner’s

performances It centered on his relationship with his father

• A man who nurtured and supported the athlete since the death of his wife (the runner’s mother) when the boy was in elementary school.

Emotion-laden FramesEmotion-laden Frames: an example

The father was shown toiling in the kitchen while his son trained;

He was caught on camera demurring when the son asked him to attend the competition in Europe;

The father explains after the son leaves: “I would only be in the way. I wouldn’t want him worrying about me. I want him to concentrate.”

He does, however write a letter to his son, which the boy reads in a car driving him to training camp.

The letter speaks of the father’s deep feeling for the boy.

When asked for his reaction, the boy, clearly moved, says “If I’d received this letter from a girl, I would be happy.”

Television Tropes and the Invention of Reality

As an aside, it should be noted that this “letter reading in front of the camera” is a contrived method, one that is standard in Japanese TV – especially talk shows;

It’s aim is to stimulate the release of real feelings (on camera) by reading a contrived letter that, though authentically authored, has been crafted at the behest of the media reporting the unfolding.

A Reversal of Frames

In short, the frames of these 2 stories went against expectations; against what tends to be the established way of viewing men and women. The “nurtured, can’t-stand-alone” frame was

accorded to the male athlete; The frame involving a “lone wolf” dueling out in

the world was accorded to the woman;Although it must be recognized that she was

a foreign woman (therefore, distinct from national community / emotional proximity).

Emotion-Added Frames

Beyond gender, though, what may better explain the why behind the how in Japanese Media-Sport, is emotion. Emotion is the reason for the selection and

communication of contemporary frames on TV Emotion is also particular to (though not

limited to) sports and news on TV.

In short: What such communications do is seek to forge an empathic connection – often actively playing off of gender, but also in some ways “beyond” or larger than gender.

Beyond Gender: A Stream of Emotion

It must be observed that the Reversal of Frame is rare.

More common is the “emotio-gendered frames” that follow cultural expectations. For example:

Ai, the 14 year old ping pong player, is asked in a Chinese interview about “boyfriends” and her stunned, uncomprehending reaction is shown not once, but twice, with commentary by the newscasters in Japan.

The rivalry between Okinawa-based golfers Miyazato Ai and Yokomine Sakura is a common frame in news reports.

So too, “Sakura-chan’s” public feuds with her outspoken father, who caddies but most often chides her in front of the cameras.

Emotion in Social Life

In theorizing Emotion in Social Life, Layder (2004) focused on various uses and abuses of emotion.

Doing so, he emphasized: the struggle for control and the search for human security

These were his key elements of the emotional equation underlying social relations.

Emotion in Mediated Society

Conspicuously absent in his writing was the role media play in generating or responding to human emotions The role of emotion in the consumption and use

of information or communication was ignored. Missing was recognition of the importance

of media content in stimulating human interest by forging connection; (or, as in the case of video games, say) stimulating desire or expenditure of time, energy, money.

This is a powerful dimension of much of commercial media activity.

Conclusions:About Media and Society

Whannel (1998), among others has demonstrated how sport has come to command an increasingly large position in society.

So, too, has Rowe (1999) along with others, argued that sport is coming to command an increasingly large position in media.

Conclusions:About Media-Sport-Emotional Frames

It is also true, though, that the directionality of such processes of accession is not entirely one way. Thus, as sport has commanded more societal

space, so too have the structure, processes, institutions, and themes of import in society come to invade sport.

And similarly, as sport has commanded more media space, so too have the structure, processes, institutions, and themes of importance in media come to invade sport.

Conclusions:About Media-Sport-Society

What this means is the transfer of certain key concerns to our encounters with communications about sport. For instance: stratified or otherwise differential

economic, social and political relations deeper social processes such as

economic accumulation, consumerism, and representations of race and gender (to name a few)

Conclusions:About Media-Sport-Emotional Frames

In the case of the media space issue, this means that some of the tropes and many of the logics of communication have transferred to communication about sport. As we have seen in this paper, this means, above

all, an increasing amount of emotional themes or emotion-inducing presentational techniques.

This is not without effects on the subjects that get presented.

Be they about men, women, ethnic/racial group, nation, community, or any other socially-definable thingI

Conclusions:About Emotion in Media-Sport-Societal Theorization

Above all, this means that the subjects of Media/Sport may get presented in ways that tug at emotions. It may, as Ergul will show in his IAMCR

presentation Thursday, impact on economy. It may, as Prieler will show in his forthcoming

presentation in this section, impact on national identity.

This may, as Ito showed in her earlier presentation in this session, impact on Gender.

Thank You Very Much…

For your kind attentionFor your kind attention