Génération Otaku/ Hiroki AZUMA (Hachette, 2008)

Hiroki Azuma (東浩紀, Azuma Hiroki^?), born May 9, 1971 in Mitaka, Tokyo is a Japanese cultural critic.

He began his writing inspired by the work of Kojin Karatani and Asada Akira. He is an associate of Takashi Murakami and the Superflat movement.

He received his Ph.D. from the University of Tokyo in 1999 and became a professor at the International University of Japan in 2003. Since 2006 he has been working at Center for Study of World Civilizations at the Tokyo Institute of Technology.

Comments

[Victor WORONOV]

I'm not sure the picture goes with the book but it is nevertheless stunning. The usual image of the otaku is someone who forgets his body, or for a small group of them disguises it. He says in his book that in actuality "their" sexuality is fairly pedestrian, but he has also said that analyzing their sexuality is quite difficult. Once again, in his book, he only comes close to the subject when writing about porno games, but here he does a take on them as a literary form. At any rate, Generation Otaku is a grab bag of "esquisses" on the subject(s), a beginning...work towards a fuller analysis. He has since put out a second volume, "The birth of game-type realism".
For those who are interested, he will be attending the "Manga, 60 ans après" symposium in Paris this saturday (march 15). He has also opened a bilingual blog at saysibon.com....A chance to dialogue with him that won't last long, just till the end of March.