Seichi junrei 聖地巡礼—a series of pilgrimages to sites featured in popular media—has received increasing attention from scholars and the public alike for the past few years. While scholarship on the topic is slowly growing, discussions on the material impact of these journeys remain limited. This article examines the seichi junrei phenomenon through a variety of material objects such as ema and notebooks left at pilgrimage sites, focusing on Kamado Shrine (Kamado Jinja 竈門神社) and the city of Takayama. Engaging with these objects reveals a complicated network of agents that participate, maintain, and support this practice. By using ethnographic sketches and the concept of focal objects, I argue that material objects in anime pilgrimages serve as a focal point to understand how networks of human and non-human actors, organizations, institutions, and ideas operate. Examining such elements will provide an insight into the layered meanings behind these pilgrimages.
Purchase
Buy instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Institutional Login
Log in with Open Athens, Shibboleth, or your institutional credentials
Personal login
Log in with your brill.com account
Anderson, Richard W. 1991. “What constitutes religious activity?” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 18: 369–372.
Andrews, Dale K. 2014. “Genesis at the Shrine: The Votive Art of an Anime Pilgrimage.” Mechademia 9: 217–233.
Andrews, Dale K. 2015. “An Animated Adoration: The Folk Art of Japanese Gamers.” Academic Quarter | Akademisk Kvarter 10: 118–132.
Anime Tourism Association. 2022. Japanese Anime 88-Spots (2022 Edition). https://animetourism88.com/en/88AnimeSpot (accessed 9 September 2022).
Appadurai, Arjun (ed.). 1986. The Social Live of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Barush, Kathryn R. 2021. Imaging Pilgrimage: Art as Embodied Experience. New York: Bloomsbury.
Bowman, Marion. 1993. “Drawn to Glastonbury.” In Pilgrimage in Popular Culture, eds. Ian Reader and Tony Walter, London: The Macmillan Press, 29–63.
Breen, John. 2010. “Resurrecting the Sacred Land of Japan: The State of Shinto in the Twenty-First Century.” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 37(2): 295–315.
Carter, Caleb. 2018. “Power Spots and the Charged Landscape of Shinto.” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 45(1): 145–173.
Chidester, David. 2018. Religion: Material Dynamics. Oakland: University of California Press.
Doss, Erika. 2008. “Rock and Roll Pilgrims: Reflections on Ritual, Religiosity, and Race at Graceland.” In Shrines and Pilgrimage in the Modern World: New Itineraries into the Sacred, ed. Peter Jan Margry, Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 123–143.
Gould, Hannah. 2023. When Death Falls Apart: Making and Unmaking the Necromaterial Tradition of Contemporary Japan. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Hoshino, Eiki 星野英記, Yamanaka Hiroshi 山中弘, and Okamoto Ryōsuke 岡本亮輔. 2012. Seichi junrei tsūrizumu 聖地巡礼ツーリズム. Tokyo: Kōbundō.
Houtman, Dick and Birgit Meyer (eds.). 2012. Things: Religion and the Question of Materiality. New York: Fordham University Press.
Imai, Nobuharu 今井信治. 2018. Otaku bunka to shūkyo no rinkai: Jōhō, shōhi, basho wo meguru shūkyō shakaigaku teki kenyū オタク文化と宗教の臨界—情報・消費・場所をめぐる宗教社会学的研究. Kyoto: Kōyō shobō.
Iwai, Hiromi 岩井宏実. 1974. Ema 絵馬. Tokyo: Hōsei Daigaku Shuppankyoku.
Johannsen, Dirk and Anja Kirsch. 2020. “Narrative Cultures and the Aesthetics of Religion: An Introduction.” In Narrative Cultures and the Aesthetics of Religion, eds. Dirk Johannsen, Anja Kirsch, and Jens Kreinath, Leiden, Boston: Brill, 1–16.
King, E. Francis. 2010. Material Religion and Popular Culture. New York and Abingdon: Routledge.
King, Christine. 1993. “His Truth Goes Marching On: Elvis Presley and The Pilgrimage to Graceland.” In Pilgrimage in Popular Culture, eds. Ian Reader and Tony Walter, London: The Macmillan Press, 92–106.
Kubota, Yoshihiro 久保田芳廣. 1978. “Hatsuwa kōi to shite no ema” 発話行為としての絵馬. Minzoku gaku kenkyū 民俗学研究 42(4): 294–311.
Margry, Peter Jan (ed.). 2008. Shrines and Pilgrimage in the Modern World: New Itineraries into the Sacred. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.
Mirsalis, Dana. 2022. “Gendering the Shinto Priesthood in Postwar Japan.” Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.
Morgan, David. 2018. Images at Work: The Material Culture of Enchantment. New York: Oxford University Press.
Morgan, David. 2016. “Materializing the Study of Religion.” Religion 46(4): 1–5.
Payne, Richard. 2005. “The Ritual Culture of Japan: Symbolism, Ritual, and the Arts.” In Nanzan Guide to Japanese Religions, eds. Paul L. Swanson and Clark Chilson, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 235–256.
Porcu, Elisabetta. 2013. “Sacred Spaces Reloaded: New Trends in Shintō.” In Self-Reflexive Area Studies, ed. Matthias Middell, Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag/Leipzig University Press, 279–294.
Porcu, Elisabetta. 2014. “Pop Religion in Japan: Buddhist Temples, Icons and Branding.” Journal of Religion and Popular Culture 26(2): 157–172.
Rambelli, Fabio. 2007. Buddhist Materiality: A Cultural History of Objects in Japanese Buddhism. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Reader, Ian. 1991. “Letter to the Gods: The Form and Meaning of Ema.” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 18(1): 24–50.
Reader, Ian. 2004. Making Pilgrimages: Meaning and Practice in Shikoku. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press.
Reader, Ian. 2015. Pilgrimage in the Marketplace. New York and Abingdon: Routledge.
Robertson, Jennifer. 2008. “Ema-gined Community: Votive Tablets (ema) and Strategic Ambivalence in Wartime Japan.” Asian Ethnology 67(1): 43–77.
Seaton, Phillip, Takayoshi Yamamura, Akiko Sugawa-Shimada, and Kyungjae Jang. 2017. Contents Tourism in Japan and Pilgrimages to “Sacred Sites” of Popular Culture. Amherst: Cambria Press.
Salazar, Noel B. and Nelson H.H. Graburn (eds.). 2014. Tourism Imaginaries: Anthropological Approaches. New York: Bergham Books.
Tillonen, Mia. 2021. “Constructing and Contesting the Shrine: Tourist Performances at Seimei Shrine, Kyoto.” Religions 12(19): 45–64.
Watson, Nicola J. 2006. The Literary Tourist: Readers and Places in Romantic and Victorian Britain. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Yasui, Manami 安井眞奈美. 2021. “Negai wo e ni takusu: Kingendai no koema” 願いを絵に託す—近現代の小絵馬. In Shintai no Taishū Bunka: Kaku, Kiru, Utau 身体の大衆文化 書く・着る・歌う, eds. Yasui Manami and Alvaro D. Hernandez, Tokyo: Kadokawa, 213–246.
Yoshitani, Hiroya 吉谷裕哉 and Satō Kikuichirō 佐藤喜久一郎. 2015. Sabukaruchā seichi junrei: Anime seichi to sengoku shiseki サブカルチャー聖地巡礼—アニメ聖地と戦国史蹟. Tokyo: Iwada Shoin.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 514 | 514 | 79 |
Full Text Views | 20 | 20 | 4 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 101 | 101 | 11 |
Seichi junrei 聖地巡礼—a series of pilgrimages to sites featured in popular media—has received increasing attention from scholars and the public alike for the past few years. While scholarship on the topic is slowly growing, discussions on the material impact of these journeys remain limited. This article examines the seichi junrei phenomenon through a variety of material objects such as ema and notebooks left at pilgrimage sites, focusing on Kamado Shrine (Kamado Jinja 竈門神社) and the city of Takayama. Engaging with these objects reveals a complicated network of agents that participate, maintain, and support this practice. By using ethnographic sketches and the concept of focal objects, I argue that material objects in anime pilgrimages serve as a focal point to understand how networks of human and non-human actors, organizations, institutions, and ideas operate. Examining such elements will provide an insight into the layered meanings behind these pilgrimages.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 514 | 514 | 79 |
Full Text Views | 20 | 20 | 4 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 101 | 101 | 11 |