Illinois State University ISU ReD: Research and eData Theses and Dissertations 10-25-2018 A Pokébalancing Act: The Management Of Japanese Cultural “odor” In Pokémon Nicholas Raes Illinois State University,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.library.illinoisstate.edu/etd Part of the Communication Commons Recommended Citation Raes, Nicholas, "A Pokébalancing Act: The Management Of Japanese Cultural “odor” In Pokémon" (2018). Theses and Dissertations. 1022. https://ir.library.illinoisstate.edu/etd/1022 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by ISU ReD: Research and eData. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ISU ReD: Research and eData. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. A POKÉBALANCING ACT: THE MANAGEMENT OF JAPANESE CULTURAL “ODOR” IN POKÉMON NICHOLAS RAES 216 Pages In this project, I analyzed two seasons of the Pokémon anime to discover patterns of cultural “odor” management employed by the show’s producers and editors. In the first season of Pokémon , the producers of the anime included many symbolic representations of Japanese cultural artifacts within the visual features of the show. However, between the Japanese and US versions of the season, most instances of Japanese linguistic text were either “scrubbed” from scenes entirely or replaced with English text. These techniques struck a careful balance between including and excluding Japanese specificity within the first season, subtly expressing to non- Japanese audiences the Japanese origin of the show. However, in the twentieth season, producers removed symbolic representations of Japanese culture almost entirely – replacing these instead with symbols indicative of Hawaiian culture.