Akira and Ranma 1/2

The analysis presented in the article is of two fictional animated Japanese adolescents and their relationships with authority and gender roles in a modern Japanese setting. Upon reading this article, I found some of the author's observations to be very insightful, while others felt as if they were a stretch for the sake of locating metaphors and symbolism.

An example of the latter is the author's contention that perhaps the crater of Old Tokyo (in which Tetsuo has his first run in with a psychic child and awakens his own latent powers) is a feminine symbol. My observation is that the interaction occurs on a long straight highway going off into darkness and from my perspective, there is an increased emphasis on that potentially masculine symbol. While sexuality plays a poweful role in the human creative subconscious, I don't believe Old Tokyo in Akira is an example of that. I also disagree that the ending of the film in any way indicates powerlessness or nihilism, or represents an inability to influence change. The end of the film depicts Tetsuo affirming himself with the utterance "I am Tetsuo" which shows his sense of ownership over himself, his fate, and his new Godlike power.

Tetsuo's primary conflict exists between his new found power and his dependence on others. The more powerful he finds himself becoming, the more unstable and dependent he is. His submissive upbringing has not provided him with the tools necessary to handle such power, leaving him requiring guidance and comfort. His personality and mental state deteriorate drastically throughout the film, as he becomes both increasingly childish and desperately dependent. This physically manifests itself in the film's climax in which Tetsuo loses control of his power and psychically manifests himself into a monstrous baby shaped mass of pulsing body tissue. He begs for help from his friends, killing one in the process, until finally, with the help of others, and only after he has changed realities, is he able to come to terms with himself.

In Ranma 1/2, the title character alternates from his native state as a boy, into a girl whenever he is touched by cold water. A social commentary in the narrative is the way Ranma's transformation into a girl is considered more troubling to him than the transformations of other characters, who transform into creatures such as a Panda Bear or a Pig. As a piece of pop entertainment, Ranma 1/2 plays off the insecurity adolescents feel with their genders and the roles and responsibilities that society assigns to those genders.

Soul Sonic Forces

In Soul Sonic forces, Tricia Rose explains how rap music relates to traditional African as well as European musical traditions. The discussion treads somewhat similar ground to what we have read by Hebdige. Both articles deal with the ways a subculture relates to and differentiates itself from a dominant hegemonic culture. In both articles, it is clear that the dominant culture and the sub culture profoundly influence one another. For example rap producers explaining how their lack of musical education allows them to be more creative when compared with trained musicians (this tension and inspiration would not exist without interplay).

The article outlines the connections between Rap music and traditional African musics. Both frequently employ cyclical melodies and place a particularly high importance on rhythm as opposed to the traditional European style which has a more melodic focus. Whereas traditional European music tends to have the musical progression change and develop from the beginning to the end of the piece. African music is more cyclical, layering and developing a single melodic rhythm allowing it to change and blossom.

The sampling aspect of Rap music can be seen to echo these features of African musical culture, as well as African-American forms such as blues and folk, in which musicians would cover one another's songs, subtly modifying them to lend their own style to the music.


The article discusses the theory that the cyclical and programmed nature of rap is a reflection of modern mass production. With television and the internet, once can often see the same piece of artwork repeatedly. This has an effect on a culture's artistic unconscious. The traditional aura of artistic pieces is being altered the more they are mass produced and brought into the public sphere. This process is exemplified in rap. In which once can observe original pieces sliced up, and re contextualized to fit a completely different message. In this setting the original pieces are no longer solitary expressions of the soul, but instead are emotional and rhythmic products, available for artists to collage together into new and original soulful expressions.

Subculture: The meaning of style

In "The Meaning of Style" Dick Hebdige portrays subcultures as natural responses to the prevailing ideas and attitudes of the era in which they are formed. He also writes that counter-cultures, that begin as genuine ideological rebellions, are soon factored into the logical framework of the prevailing hegemonic culture. Thereby removing their shock value, and ordering them as just another element within the modern set of attitudes which define a civilization.

Hebdige also makes the point that the Punk movement was unique among the counter cultural movements in that it did not have a set of identifying rules or a strict social ordering. I disagree, one can look at images of punk rock concerts and see the common styles that made up the punk counter culture. Punks were definitely (at least to my eyes) recognizable as punks, that is, they had their own set of loose social rules which made them "punks."

The question I have after reading this is, can a counter culture really view itself as being against the primary culture of the time? Any movement which achieves even a small amount of popularity should be considered as part of the mainstream culture of the time. Counter-culture groups, rather than resisting the popular culture of the time, are just another component of them. For example, Hippies were thought of as a counter culture group. But when people my age think of sixties culture, the hippie movement is usually one of the first images to come to mind. While Dick Hebdige writes that counter culture movements are adapted into the mainstream as a later element in their development, I feel that counter cultures are part of the mainstream once they become a movement in even the slightest sense.