Language, music and cultural consolidation on Minami Daito
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/prbt.v14i1.7Keywords:
cultural consolidation, Hachijo, language variation, Minami Daito, music, Okinawa, shima utaAbstract
The remote, southern Japanese island of Minami Daito was first settled in 1900. It is part of the Japanese prefecture of Okinawa but is geographically distant from the main Okinawan archipelago and displays many non-Okinawan linguistic, cultural and social characteristics. The island was settled by two culturally disparate groups: pioneers from Hachjio Island, 1150 kilometres to the north east, who established a sugarcane industry on the previously uninhabited island; and workers from Okinawa, some 450 kilometres to the west, who were brought in to work in the fields and refineries run by Hachijoan supervisors. Over the last century the island has experienced a process of rapprochement and consolidation between the two communities that has resulted in linguistic syncreses and, more recently, the incorporation of Hachijoan descendents into a local music culture that primarily derives from Okinawa. Since the late 1980s a small group of musicians have coalesced in a musical initiative that has, to date, produced several CDs, a number of original songs and a performing ensemble that has gained external concert and media exposure. This activity has created a sense of cultural cohesion and a distinct identity for contemporary Minami Daitoans. This article analyses the historical process of consolidation; the context and nature of the musical material performed in recent years (with particular regard to song texts); and the manner in which the island community inter-relates with other areas of Japan.
References
——1949. ‘Bali: The Value System of a Steady State, “Ethos” and “Schismogenesis”’. In Social Structure: Studies Presented to A. R. Radcliffe-Brown, ed. Meyer Fortes, 35–53. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Reprinted in Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology, 107–127. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000.
Bise, Zensh?. 2001. ‘Chikuonki’ (phonograph), online at: http://www.campus-r.com/chikuonki01.html.
Feld, Steven. 1994. ‘From Schizophonia to Schismogenesis: Notes on the Discourses of World Music and World Beat’. In Music Grooves, ed. Steven Feld and Charles Keil, 257–89. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Hamazato, Yasuyuki. 2011. Interview with Philip Hayward and Daniel Long, March 8.
Hayward, P., and J. Konishi. 1999. ‘“Mokuyo-to no ongaku”: The Music of the Japanese Community in the Torres Strait 1884–1941’. Perfect Beat: The Pacific Journal of Research into Contemporary Music and Popular Culture 5/3: 34–47.
Higashi, Kazuaki. 2009. ‘The Origins, the Charm and the Future of Minami Daito Island’. In Minami Daito-jima no Hito to Shizen (‘The People and Nature of Minami Daito Island’), ed. Seiichi Nakai, Kazuaki Higashi and Daniel Long, 21–33. Kagoshima: Namp? Shinsha.
Hosokawa, Shuhei. 1999. ‘Soy Sauce Music: Haruomi Hosono and Japanese Self-Orientalism’. In Widening the Horizon: Exoticism in Post-War Popular Music, ed. Philip Hayward, 114–44. Sydney: John Libbey and Co.
Iwahori, Haruo. 2005. Minami Daito-jima: Iwahori Haru Shashinsh? (‘Minami Daito-jima: Iwahori Haruo Photograph Collection’). Nishinomiya-shi: Nainen Shuppan.
Kuwahara, Sueo, Takahiro Ozaki and Akira Nishimura. 2007. ‘Transperipheral Networks: Bullfighting and Cattle Culture in Japan’s Outer Islands’. Shima: The International Journal of Research into Island Cultures 1/2: 1–13.
Le Page, Robert B., and Andree Tabouret-Keller. 1985. Acts of Identity: Creole-based Approaches to Language and Ethnicity. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Long, Daniel. 2004. ‘Airando hopp? to nihongo no gengo k?ry?’ (‘Island Hoppers and Japanese Language Interaction’). In Nihonkai, Higashi Ajia no Chich?kai (‘Sea of Japan, the Mediterranean of Asia’), ed. Seiichi Nakai, Junz? Uchiyama and K?ji Takahashi, 237–53. Toyama: Katsura Shob?.
——2009. ‘Minami Daito-jima kotoba ga tsukuriageru gengo keikan’ (‘The Linguistic Landscape Created by the Minami Daito Dialect’). In Minami Daito-jima no Hito to Shizen (‘The People and Nature of Minami Daito Island’), ed. Seiichi Nakai, Kazuaki Higashi and Daniel Long, 74–87. Kagoshima: Namp? Shinsha.
Malakhovskii, K. V. 1983. ‘Russian Discoveries in the Pacific Ocean from the Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Century’. Russian Studies in History 21/4: 27–46. http://dx.doi.org/10.2753/RSH1061-1983210427
Nakai, Seiichi. 2009. ‘Shug? airando, minami daito no kaihatsu to keikan’ (‘Sugar Island, the Development and Landscape of Minami Daito’). In Minami Daito-jima no Hito to Shizen (‘The People and Nature of Minami Daito Island’), ed. Seiichi Nakai, Kazuaki Higashi and Daniel Long, 36–52. Kagoshima: Namp? Shinsha.
Nakai, Seiichi, Kazuaki Higashi and Daniel Long, eds. 2009. Minami Daito-jima no Hito to Shizen (‘The People and Nature of Minami Daito Island’). Kagoshima: Nampo Shinsha.
Nakai, Seiichi, Daniel Long, Naoyuki Hashimoto and Yoshiyuki Asahi. 2003. ‘Nan’y? purant?shon shakai ni okeru h?gen sesshoku’ (‘Dialect Contact in a South Seas Plantation Society: Based on Fieldwork from Minani Daito Island’). Chiiki Gengo 15: 51–60.
Okudo, Haruo. 2000. Minami Daito-jima no Shizen (‘The Nature of Minami Daito Island’). Naha: Nirai-sha.
?sawa, Y?shi, and Keiko ?sawa. 1997. Minami Daito-jima Shizen gaido bukku (‘Minami Daito Island Nature Guidebook’). Naha: Borderink.
?tomo, Masashi. 2011. Grace Islands—Minami Daito-jima, Kita Daito-jima. Tokyo: Kula.
Poppi, Cesare. 1997. ‘Wider Horizons with Larger Details: Subjectivity, Ethnicity and Globalization’. In The Limits of Globalization: Cases and Arguments, ed. Alan Scott, 284–305. London: Routledge.
Shingaki, Norio. 2011. Interview with Philip Hayward and Daniel Long, March 9.
Takeuchi, Akira. 2002. Minami Daito Sugar Train: Minami no shima no chiisa na tetsud?. (‘The Little Railway on a Southern Island’). Tokyo: Iwasaki Digital Publishing.
