Urban Princesses Performance and Women's Language in Japan's GothicLolita Subculture

 

SLA Prize Winning Graduate Paper 2007 

  Isaac Gagné YALE UNIVERSITY

Urban Princesses: Performance and “Women’s Language” in Japan’s Gothic/Lolita Subculture This paper investigates the linguistic strategies used in the counterpublic discourse of Gothic/  Lolita, Lolit a, a young Japanese Japanese women’s subculture subculture of the late 1990s and early 2000s, and explore exploress how the subculture and its practices are characterized by the Japanese media. Particular attention is paid to how subcultural magazines, websites, and Gothic/Lolitas themselves create and sustain a “virtual linguistic community” through a specialized lexicon of neolo gisms and re-appropriated “women’s language,” as well as negative identity practices that seekk to defin see definee Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa aga agains instt othe otherr sub subcul cultur tures es and fas fashio hions ns suc suchh as   kosupure “Cosplay” i.e., [“Cosplay”  i.e., Costume Play]. Additionally, Play]. Additionally, an analysis of representations of Gothic/Lolita speech in two television programs reveals how the media constructs ambivalent images via iconization and erasure through narration and editing.  [youth subculture, gender and language, speech community, counterpublic, Japan] T  HIS

IS A WEB-ENHANCED ARTICLE  (URL)

[“What are you, an alien?” Having an ignorant mother who doesn’t want to acknowledge Lolita and calls it “Cosplay” is really tiring . . . so I think to myself.] [Blog entry, Night Moon 2006]

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apanes apan esee yo yout uth h ha have ve a lo long ng hi hist stor ory y of en enga gage geme ment nt wi with th la lang ngu uag agee in no nonnmainstream forms that express resistance to certain cultural norms. Young women in part articu icular lar ha have ve bee been n eff effect ective ive man manipu ipula lator torss of lan langu guage age con conven ventio tions, ns, and the past century and a half has been a prolific period in the rise and fall of young

 Journal of Linguistic Anthropology Anthropology,, Vol. 18, Issue 1, pp. 130–150, ISSN 1055-1360, EISSN 1548-1395. © 2008  by the American Anthropological Association. All rights reserved. DOI: 10.1111/j.1548-1395.2008.00006.x.

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women’s alternative speech patterns and related subcultures. Among these, there is onee th on thaat se seem emss to sp spea eak k ou outt ag agai ains nstt no nott on onlly “t “tra radi diti tion onal al”” ma main inst stre ream am cu culltu ture re bu butt al also so other contemporary subcultures. This is “Gothic & Lolita.” Gothic Got hic & Lol Lolit itaa (he (herea reafte fter, r, Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit lita) a) is a fa fashi shionon-ori orient ented ed subc subcul ultur turee of  young females who wear elaborate, antiquated dresses and aspire toward looking, acting, and speaking like “princesses.” Participants and producers of this subculture have also revived and recreated joseigo recreated  joseigo,, or “women’s language,” in order to achieve this idealized role, creating thereby a linguistically distinct community through a metalinguistic and counterpublic discourse in magazines and internet forums. The news media usually portrays Gothic/Lolita as they have previous youth cultures: as a social problem and a moral panic that embodies the declining morals of Japanese youth. Here, however, the exaggerated politeness of Gothic/Lolitas’ behavior and language use presents these stock criticisms with a conundrum. In this paper I will first describe the contours of young women’s subcultures and counterpublic discourses and their relationship with “women’s language” in Japan. Then, I will situate Gothic/Lolita within this discourse and examine how magazines and web forums concerning Gothic/Lolita create a sense of community for girls through a specialized lexicon of neologisms and re-appropriated “women’s language.” Next, I will briefly explore the negative identity practices used by Gothic/ Lolitas to define themselves recursively against other youth subcultures. Finally, I will end with a brief discussion of how representations of Gothic/Lolita in television programs construct ambivalent ambivalent images via iconization and erasure through narration and editing. By examining the two interdependent and mutually constitutive levels of virtual and represented speech community I show thefemininity paradoxical mix of youth counterpublic and re-appropriated norms of (linguistic) in Gothic/Lolita and the ambiv ambivalence alence it enge engender nderss in the news medi media. a. The majority of my data for the virtual speech community of Gothic/Lolita comes from the growing wealth of magazines and web forums on the subculture. Over the past ten years Gothi Gothic/Lol c/Lolita ita-rela -related ted liter literatu ature, re, mo movies vies,, comics and inter internet net sites have rapidly increased, but most activity has occurred in the past six years, during which whi ch two hi hitt Go Goth thic ic/L /Lol olit itaa-or orie ient nted ed ma maga gazin zines es we went nt on sa sale le::   Gosurori   (the  Japanese abbreviation for Gothic & Lolita) and and The  The Gothic & Lolita Bible  (hereafter, GLB). GLB ). For the purposes of this paper I focus on web forums, Gothic/Lolita wiki-sites  GLB.. For analyzing news media representations I used taped recordings of Fuji and GLB and Television’s “Super News” and TBS’s “Hanamaru Market.” I supplement this data with my own fieldwork conducted in the spring of 2003 and the summer of 2007.

“Women’s Language” and Young Women’s Counterpublics in Japan

Gothic/Lolita is one of the most intriguing examples of a young women’s’ subculture and counterpublic in Japan that circumvents and re-appropriates language for community building and the creation of an alternative social world. 1 Gothic/Lolita is a subculture in the sense used by Dick Hebdige, Stuart Hall, and Phil Cohen in that it is a group of people with a distinctive style and jargon existing within a larger culture, but on a more discursive level it can also be usefully analyzed as a counterpublic. Drawing on Miriam Hansen’s (1993) work on the emergence of new aspects of the public sphere, Miyako Inoue characterizes counterpublics as “constituted by ‘particularized individuals’ and their interests and experiences situated in their concrete material situations” (Inoue 2006:127). Counterpublics thus differ from Habermas’ description of the public sphere as including “working-class people . . . and other disenfranchised people, including women and ethnic minorities, and their situated interests, needs and experiences” (Inoue 2006:127; see also 1989). Alternative linguistic practices are a central organizing feature of Habermas young women’s counterpublics that give them a shared virtual space and language in which they can express their own desires and interests outside of the male-dominated public sphere.

 

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In Japan, counterpublic activities were accelerated by the language modernization movement following its opening to the West and the Meiji Restoration in the latter half of the 1800s. 18 00s. Inoue argues that one of the state’s goals goals of language reforms during this time was the creation of “a new modern Japanese language by which they could represent modern subjectivity” (Inoue 2006:26). She shows that as the state pushed to   jogakusei reform the Japanese language there was the simultaneous development of  jogakusei kotoba,, or “sch kotoba “school oolgir girll spe speech ech,” ,” amo among ng yo young ung wom women en at atten tendin ding g hig high h sch school ool and higher education in urban Japan. Intellectuals and news media at the time dismissed it as vulgar and low-class (2006:37) and “an aural specter of Japan’s modernity and modernization . . . that embodied a surplus of Japan’s modernization and modernity thatt had to be excluded” tha excluded” (2006:2 (2006:26). 6). As notions of femininity and appropriate language use changed,  jogakusei kotoba trans tr ansfo form rmed ed in into to an ap appr prop opri riaate an and d ev even en de desi sire red d way of sp spea eaki king ng fo forr you oung ng wo wome men. n. By the mid-1920s “the set of speech forms ideologically associated with ‘schoolgirl speech’ erased from the national and cultural memory its derisive origin in ‘vulgarity’ and its geographical and class-specificity, and inaugurated itself as the universal ‘Japanese women’s language’ ” (Inoue 2006:147). This universal “Japanese women’s language,” or   joseigo, joseigo, is “a set of linguistic beliefs about forms and functions of  language used by and associated with (Japanese) women . . . it is a culturally salient category and knowledge about “how women speak,” how they “usually speak” or “should speak” (2006:13). Inoue notes that joseigo that  joseigo is  is actually an idealized notion of  language langu age use that sociolinguistic studies have attempted attempted to ascribe to women, “which include[s] a specific set of vocabulary, first-person pronouns . . . final particles . . . and a so-called beautification prefix” (2006:14). Springing up nearly a century later, contemporary forms of speaking linked with  go and young women’s counterpublics such as the childlike  noripı¯ go  and masculine gyaru masculine  gyaru jogakusei kotoba kotoba.. Jap speech are treated in a similar manner as the original   jogakusei Japanese anese intellectuals and the media are exceedingly critical of these counterpublics because they deviate from the reified notions of “traditional” and “traditionally feminine” speech forms and because of their perceived connection with youth deviance more generally generall y. For instance, young girls who used the infantile speech pa patterns tterns of  noripı  noripı¯ go during dur ing the 1980s, coined by the idol singe singerr Sakai Norik Noriko o (a.k.a. NoriNori-P) P) in the imitation of a child’s lisp, also used a rounded and childlike way of handwriting. They seemed to reject notions of responsibility and adulthood by escaping through language into a linguistic space of childish fantasy “where young people could be liberated from the filthy world of adult politics” (Aoyagi 2005:142). Gyaru speech, Gyaru  speech, which also developed in the 1980s but is still used today, took the opposite approach. As Laura Miller (2004) compellingly explores in her article on language strategies used by Kogal (an extreme style of  gyaru)   gyaru) to fashion identities, Kogal’s “gender-transgressing identity and language style challenge longstanding norms nor ms of ado adoles lescen centt fem femini ininit nity” y” (20 (2004:2 04:225). 25). Mil Miller ler wri writes tes tha thatt Kog Kogal al and oth other er new female identities “challenge prescriptive norms of gendered talk, yet despite the condemnation of the parent culture, young women continue to create and use exu berant new forms of expression” (2004:226). The way ayss in which female subcultures like gyaru like  gyaru accomplish  accomplish this is quite different from noripı from  noripı¯ go  go users.  users. Instead of drawing on childish speech patterns, gyaru patterns,  gyaru speech  speech appropriates brash and “masculine” forms  boku instead of speaking, such as using the masculine first-person pronoun  boku  instead of the more feminine atashi feminine  atashi or  or gender neutral and polite watashi polite  watashi.. In addition, gyaru addition,  gyaru speech  speech also uses extremely casual forms of speaking considered vulgar in public contexts, and thus the use of   gyaru  gyaru   speech is often linked to “deviant” and “un-feminine”  behavior.  beha vior. It is significant that both of the latter two styles of speech have their origin in the decadent decade of the t at he the Bubble Economy . Like the period rapid modernization moderniza tion and rising urbanization turnEconomy. of the 20th century, the of 1980s was also a period in which there was a “surplus of modernity” in the form of unprecedented affluence. Even following the burst of the Bubble Economy in 1989, the affluence and decadence

 

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that youth became accustomed to in the 1980s did not disappear overnight, overnight, but rather persisted in the realms of fashion and youth cultures that have continued to spring up and vanish just as quickly throughout the 1990s and into the 2000s.  Jogakusei kotoba kotoba,, noripı¯ go  go,and ,and gyaru  gyaru spe speech ech thu thuss re repre presen sentt a sim simila ilarr tre trend nd of cou counte nterrpublics in 20th-century Japan through which young women are able to articulate and create their own notions of community and desired lifestyles. For the young women who use   noripı¯ go   and   gyaru   speech this often takes the form of hedonistic and decadent consumption and play that that expresses dissatisfaction with gender ideals and notions of adulthood and responsibility. The Gothic/Lolita counterpublic developed along the same lines and shares many similarities, but it is also an ambivalent counterpublic that occupies a marginal position between generations and genders: it goes against both the conservative social norms of the male-dominated public sphere and the alternative social norms of contemporary youth cultures and counterpublic discourses. As a youth culture, Gothic/Lolita dates back to the latter half of the 1990s. It was first inspired by devotees to Mana, the cross-dressing guitarist for the Japanese rock  band Malice Mizer.2 The name indicates its distinctive hybrid style: it combines gosu combines  gosu,, a Japanized version of Western “Goth” fashion, music, and hobbies with Victorian/ ta,, or “Lolita” Edwardian-inspired doll-like clothes and fairy-tale motifs called  rorı¯ta (see Figure 1). At any moment, most girls will stress one pole or the other in their attire, but over time most will oscillate between both Goth and Lolita. These These two poles themselves embody the ambivalence of the style as they appear to be paradoxical displays of light and darkness, innocent youth, and jaded womanhood. However, they find common their location outside of adult. male and young female social normsground and in in their pursui pursuit t of princ princess-l ess-like ikeboth elegance elegance.

Figure 1 An Amarori and an Elegant Gothic Lolita in Harajuku on a very hot day, 2003. (Photo by the author)

 

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The most recognizable markers of the Gothic/Lolita counterpublic are precisely these sartorial conventions: long one-piece dresses with wit h bustles and pannie panniers, rs, corsets,  bonnets, parasols, and Mary Janes and other (imagined) elements of Rococo and Bar aroqu oquee fashi ashion on.. The ton tonee sug sugges gests ts ant antiqu iquat ated ed ari aristo stocra cracy cy in shad shades es of hal halcy cyon on pastels and decadent blacks and reds, and the girls themsel themselves ves insist that the meaning of the fashion is to become a “princess,” though the meaning of the word in the imaginations of Japanese youth and popular media is different from that of EuroAmerican conceptions. To many Gothic/Lolitas, being a princess means participa articipation tion in a wide range of hobbies and interests vaguely connected with aristocratic themes including European fairy tales and dolls, Gothic vampire movies, girls’ sho girls’  sho jo  jo manga  manga ¯ comic book stories like The like  The Rose of Versailles  Versailles   or or Ribon  Ribon Kishi, Kishi, and the Japanese metal genre of visual rock. Moreover, Gothic/Lolitas’ efforts at princess-like behavior are most noticeable in the distinctive style of speech used by the more ardent adherents in magazines, magazines, web forums, and on the stree streett. The Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa sty style le of spe speaki aking ng dif differ ferss fr from om tho those se use used d by oth other er yo young ung women’s counterpublics both past and present in its use of the honorific language and fem femini inized zed wor word d con constr struct uction ion ide idealiz alized ed in con contem tempor porary ary med media ia as   joseigo. In postwar Japan,   joseigo   connotes educated upper-class femininity. Gothic/Lolita  joseigo as  shukujo no kotoba or kotoba  or “lady’s speech,”  borrows this connota connotation tion by recasting recasting joseigo  as shukujo and using it as a way to affect the image of a “princess.” This is particularly notable in thaat Go th Goth thic ic/L /Lol olit itaa ha hass ap appe pear ared ed at a ti time me wh when en po popu pula larr me medi diaa an and d (m (mal ale) e) in inte tell llec ectu tual al discourse is lamenting the “death of women’s language” and the corruption of youth, as exemplified by  noripı¯ go   and and   gyaru   speech (see Inoue 2006). Gothic/Lolita thus creates creat es a vir virtu tual al spe speech ech com commun munity ity thr throug ough h ma magaz gazine iness and web for forums ums bot both h in opposition to other (vulgar) contemporary women’s counterpublics and as a re-inscription of conventional(ized) linguistic ideals, embodied in the image of a modern, urban princess.

Talking Talki ng Like a Prince Princess: ss: Virtu Virtual al Speech Community Community in Gothi Gothic/Loli c/Lolita ta Magazi Magazines nes

Magazine producers in particular have had a strong influence in the creation of the Gothic/Lolita counterpublic, specifically the publisher Kera, which is known for its  Gosurori.. These magafocus on non-mainstream fashions and produces both GLB both GLB and  and Gosurori zines present a catalogue of Gothic/Lolita clothing and related products as well as interviews with celebrities. The They y also employ fascinating fascinating language language styles and include sections for letters from readers and for candid photographs of Gothic/Lolitas on the street, complete with handwritten messages from those photographed. In this way, the Gothic/Lolita magazines create what Inoue calls “a sense—a well-calculated effect sought by the producers of the magazines—that the community [is] autonomous and self-governed by the girls” (2006:102n33). Wha hatt is mo most st fas asci cin nati ting ng ab abou outt wo wome men’ n’ss ma maga gazin zines es in Ja Jap pan is wh whaat In Inou ouee call ca llss th thee “u “uni nifie fied d vi virt rtu ual sp spee eech ch co comm mmun unit ity” y” th thaat th they ey cr crea eate te,, wh wher eree re read ader erss from all over Japan who speak various dialects are able to communicate together in “the speec speech h style of mode modern rn Jap Japanese anese women women”” (2006:1 (2006:102n33). 02n33). Similarly Similarly, Shige Shigeko ko Okamoto, writing on contemporary fashion magazines, concludes that “the community constructed in the discourse of fashion magazines for young people is an imagina imag inary ry inter interactiv activee commu community nity.. Const Constructi ructing ng mag magazine azine commu communities nities crea creates tes a set of membership identities, a process that transforms the information in the magazines zin es int into o re resou sourc rces es for con constr struct ucting ing tho those se ide identi ntitie ties” s” (200 (2004:14 4:141). 1). This mir mirro rors rs Anderson’s, 1983 notion of an “imagined community” that is constructed through the shared use of a standardized language and nationalist discourse, creating the image meet. of being a member of a wider group of individuals whom one may never Part of the process of community construction is the creation of a specialized lexicon accessible only to members of the community. Okamoto writes that

 

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New expressions and novel uses of existing words also increase the sense of shared knowledge ed ge.. Fo Forr in inst stan ance ce,, th thee id idea eass ex expr pres esse sed d by th thee co comp mpou ound nd no noun unss   iro-shatsu   (colored T-shirt) . . . and   hayamimi kyara  (rapid-ear character) . . . are usually expressed by relative clause   +  noun constructions, such as iro as  iro no tuita T-shatsu (T-shirt or  dare mo T-shatsu  (T-shirt that has color) or dare mitsukete mitsu kete inai kyara kyara   (an animation character nobody has found). By being expressed in compound nouns without explanation, the ideas are presented as presupposed categories. [Okamoto and Smith 2004:141]

Gothic/Lolita magazines have an abundance of such specialized words that both unite readers in their shared knowledge of them and also reify specific substyles. Examples of new expressions include the very name of the community (and also a specifi specificc substy substyle), le), gosurori  gosurori,, which is a combination of the two English words Goth and Lolita. Other neologisms include the names for numerous substyles created by contra con tractin cting g and com combin bining ing Jap Japane anese se and Eng Englis lish h mor morphe phemes mes,, suc such h as   kurorori (black Lolita), shirorori Lolita), shirorori (white  (white Lolita), amarori Lolita), amarori (literally  (literally “sweet” Lolita), itarori Lolita), itarori (literally  (literally “painful” Lolita) and many others. In the case of these compound Japanese-English neologisms, the new terms are a combination of adjectives and nouns in which the conjugating ending   –i  of the adjective is dropped. In standard Japanese usage, terms like kurorori like  kurorori,,  shirorori  shirorori,, and amarori would amarori rori,  shiroi rori, rori, and amai rori, respectively. Even  would be written as  kuroi rori, and  amai rori, grammatically grammaticall y correct, these terms would be mystifying to non-Gothic/Lolitas, as the  rori (short word rori word  (short for Lolita) itself possesses a different meaning among those unfamiliar with the counterpublic. The use of such Japanese-English neologisms to create differentiated knowledge value among consumers is a common feature of postwar  Japanese advertising in general, as Miller documents in the use of such words in the discourse of beauty products and beauty salons (esute (esute): ): “within the world of beauty, English and other foreign-derived linguistic materials are part of a domestically created crea ted semiotic system with its own webs of nu nuance” ance” (Miller 2006:177). In addition to neologisms, Gothic/Lolitas and producers of Gothic/Lolita culture are adept at manipulating the three syllabaries used in Japanese in surprising ways, specifically contractions like those above which are written in a combination of  kanji   kanji and katakana and  katakana.. Kanji are ideograms that were imported from Chinese and became a permanent part of the writing system for Japanese, and katakana is the phonetic syllabary used for foreign loanwords like (skirt) and (soup). One intriguing example of using katakana to set the language of the community ta.. It is unclear when apart from standard Japanese is in the spelling of the word rorı word  rorı¯ta the word was first used in Japanese. It came into common English use with the publication of Vladimir Nabokov’s novel Lolita novel  Lolita,, and was probably imported to Japan with the translation of the novel. In Japan, however, the word became associated almost exclusively with the sexual attraction of older men to young girls, and the word is now most commonly seen in the compound word that describes this phe rorikon,, short for   rorı¯ta conpurekkusu (Lolita conpurekkusu  (Lolita complex). Rorikon has also nomenon, rorikon nomenon,  become a genre of comic book that “objectifies young female characters—most typically as the victims of rape” (Aoyagi 2005:211). It is unclear why Gothic/Lolitas adopted or accepted such a word to describe themselves, and there is very little information available on the actual origin of the term “Gothic/Lolita.” Interestingly, Gothic/Lolitas have attempted to avoid the conflation of Gothic/Lolita with rorikon  by adopting a nonstandard way way of writing the word (rorı¯ta), substituting an altern alt ernate ate phone phonetic tic katak katakana ana chara character cter to enuncia enunciate te the “ ¯ı ” ( ) soun sound d in th thee word word.. ta has Another alternate way of writing rorı writing  rorı¯ta  has been to substitute the standard character for the long “ı¯” vowe vowel, l, , with with , an arch archai aicc kat katak akan anaa char charac acte terr with with the the sam samee pronunciation. This also lends the word the connotation of antiquity and “classical”  Japanese.. In addition, online fan and wiki sites devoted to Gothic/Lolita note that an  Japanese

¯

internet of the standard spelling for rorı for  rorıta ta reveals  reveals a  large of pornographic search sites, and thus using alternate spellings of   rorı¯ta of   prevenumber prevents nts Gothic/Lolita devotees from having to wade through unwanted and offensive links (see Gothic & Lolita @Wiki 2006).

 

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Regardless of the empirical validity of such metapragmatic explanations for the specialized speci alized spelling of  rorı   rorı¯ta ta,, the other uses of distinctive neologisms and alternate spellings in magazines and online forums speak to a similar “virtual speech community” that Inoue locates in women’s magazines of the 1920s and that Okamoto finds in general fashion magazines in contemporary Japan. Particularly through the interactive context of street fashion magazines, distinctive terms and specialized neologisms “serve as secret codes that unite members of the magazine community. The process of interpreting these new expressions is a process of learning and aligning oneself with these secret meanings of the magazine community” (Okamoto and Smith 2004:141). Here Okamoto and Smith are drawing on Goffman’s notions of  footing and alignment (Goffman 1981), summarized by Michael Silverstein as “a stance presumed of both sender and receiver of [a] discourse with respect to the ‘reality’ one is communicating about” (2000:113). The secret meanings thus create a shared, imagined ‘reality,’ “a utopian world that is neither fictional nor real and that defiess any realist assump defie assumption tion or skept skepticism” icism” (Inoue 2006:129). For Gothic/Lolitas, the “unified virtual speech community” goes beyond shared ways of writing and specialized fashion jargon and extends to all aspects of speech and behavior. In addition to merely descriptive sections on new clothes and styles, proscriptive lifestyle guides like “Gothic & Lolita Living” and the “Gentleman and Lady’s Gothic & Lolita Manner Encyclopedia” are published in magazines and internet sites. The latter gives advice on how to act and speak, and revives and (re)creates  joseigo. This instructional “revival” of  joseigo is  joseigo  is particularly insightful in the a form of  joseigo. creation of a distinctive “princess-like” communicative style for Gothic/Lolita. The “Gentleman and Lady’s Gothic & Lolita Manner Encyclopedia” appeared as a one-page spread in vol. 4 of   GLB GLB,, and features entries for general manners (tachı ( tachı¯  furumai hen hen)) such as eye contact, facial expressions, ways of walking and sitting, and proper greetings (aisatsu (aisatsu). ). The entire article is addressed to both men and women, but pictures that accompany the text are all of a young woman in a puffy, frilly dress common of the amarori style (see Figure 2). In addition, the article also includes a

Figure 2  amarori , dressed to the hilt, 2006. (Photo by the author) A typical typical amarori

 

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hen) aimed solely at women that provides guidelines for section on speech (kotoba (kotoba hen) speaking shukujo speaking  shukujo no kotoba, kotoba, literally “lady’s speech.” Tips for speaking “lady’s speech” are organized into three “oaths”: “1. Speak slowly and politely; 2. Do not use elliptical words; 3. Be polite when answering in the positive and indirect when answering in the negative” (GLB ( GLB 4:90)  4:90) These three oaths, like li ke th thee re rest st of th thee ar arti ticl cle, e, ar aree wr writ itte ten n in a hi high ghlly an anti tiqu quaate ted d, ho hono nori rific fic fo form rm th thaat is no now w most commonly identified with the speech patterns of members of the upper class in prewar Japan. The article continues: “Ladies, one must take extreme care in language use. Vulgar language is especially unacceptable. Are you speaking lady’s speech properly? Let’s check the chart below.” The chart shows a list of phrases divided into two colum columns ns titled “ippan “ippan jin no kotob kotoba” a” [Ordi [Ordinar nary y Peopl People’s e’s Speech] and “shuku “shukujo jo no kotoba” [Lady’s Speech]. The phrases in the “Lady’s Speech” column include irimasu  (excuse me) and watakushi contemporary honorific words such as osore as  osore irimasu (excuse and  watakushi (hon (honorific form of “I”), somewhat archaic and literary word forms, such as polite conjugations ending in –seu in  –seu,, as well as phrases with aristocratic connotations like sayo like  sayo¯ de  gozaimasu no   (Is that so?) and   go-kigen yo¯   (goodbye, hello). All of these linguistic conventions are elements of  joseigo,   joseigo, and many are seldom heard in contemporary  Japan except in historical dramas or when employed ironically. ironically. Interestingly, this style of speaking has recently returned to the public discourse Guide  by Kato with the popularity of a book called  called   Ojo¯-sama Language Quick Study Guide by -sama,, Emiko, published in 2000. This book purports to teach how to speak like an ojo an  ojo¯-sama or “a daughter from a decent family” family” (Inoue 2006:202), 2006:20 2), but as Inoue notes it is actually actually “a strikingly faithful replication of the prewar model conversation for the middleclass housewife in terms of the use of stereotypical female utterance-endings, elaborate honorifics, and polite greetings” (2006:202). The linguistic advice on “lady’s speech” in the GLB the  GLB article  article seems to closely parallel the advice in Kato’s book, and on Goth Go thic ic/L /Lol olit itaa we web b fo foru rums ms ma many ny gi girl rlss wr wrot otee th thaat the they y we were re “t “tak akin ing g car caree to watc tch h th thei eirr language use” and that they were studying Kato’s book to learn how to speak like a ¯ku keijiban 2006). Interestingly, Inoue notes that the book “lady” (Fasshon: gakusei to is half self-help and half parody with tongue-in-cheek remarks on how to “fake it,” i.e., to cover up one’s own non-upper-class origins through the linguistic creation of  a “cultured” persona. While more astute readers may detect this parody within the text, it is unclear whether or not many of the Gothic/Lolitas using the book are conscious of the implicit sarcasm. The degree to which the meta-linguistic rules of language described in books and articles are actually embodied by readers is difficult to ascertain, but one method is to look at the “Letters from the Readers” section of  GLB.  GLB . Starting from vol. 6 in the November 2002 issue of  GLB,  GLB, the magazine devoted a section called Tsudoi called  Tsudoi no Hiroba, Hiroba, or “Gathering Place,” to correspondence from readers across the country, including sections for drawings, photographs, and letters. Intriguingly, the subheading for the Koe, or lit lett le tter erss fr from om th thee re read ader erss se sect ctio ion n was Dokusha-sama Kara no Koe, litera erall lly y “V “Voic oices es fr from om our Readers” (in honorific form). Many of the letters printed in this section are written in plain form or polite form, and usually note the reader’s appreciation for certain clothing lines or models, as well as their thoughts about Gothic/Lolita in general or the magazine in particular. In vol. 8, one reader makes explicit the sense of  community created by the magazine, though her letter is written in plain form and makes no use of “lady’s speech”: Watashi ni ha rorı¯ta na tomodachi ga mada hitori mo imasen. Demo kono hon wo yonde, nakama ga takusan iru to ki ni tzuite, tottemo ureshikatta. Arigato¯! [I don’t have any Lolita friends yet. But reading this book [GLB [GLB], ], I came to realize that I have lots of friends, and I was so happy! Thank you!] [GLB [ GLB 8:118]  8:118]

Other lettersdegrees demonstrate the appropriation “lady’sgirl speech” (with various of accuracy), includingand oneembodiment letter from aofyoung from Saitama Prefecture (a prefecture north of Tokyo) who writes about how happy she was when she went to Tokyo Disneyland dressed in Lolita clothing and received

 

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praise and invitations to take photographs with other visitors. Her letter is written in “lady’s speech” throughout, and ends with the invitation: “Minna-san, korekara mo ¯ to, gosurori shite iki maseu (heart mark)” [Everyone, let’s continue  jishin motte do¯do to do gosurori with confidence and dignity!] (GLB (GLB 8:118)  8:118) Another reader’s letter remarks that until recently she had dressed as  gyaru  gyaru,, but ¯ sekai  (“world of Lolita”), she has had an awakening. since encountering the rorı the  rorıta no sekai (“world This illustrates both how fluid the practitioners of Gothic/Lolita are—they can move from one youth subculture to another—and how closely these subcultures are intertwined twi ned.. This fa famil miliar iarity ity can als also o bre breed ed amb ambiv ivale alence nce and con contem tempt pt,, how howev ever, er, as another reader points out in a letter in the July 2007 issue: Saikin no gy Saikin gyaruaru-shi shi no iw iwaayuru musu musume-gy me-gyaru aru kei no ka kata taga gata ta ga “ro “rorı rı¯ta ha kinp kinpat atsu su ¯ ru wo tsukuri, gehin na meiku de rorı¯ta fuku wo  jyanaky  jy anakyaa dame na no” nado nado,, katte na ru kiteiru no wo mikakeru to, sukoshi kanashiku narimashita. [Recently, gyaru [Recently,  gyaru magazines  magazines featuring so-called “princess- gyaru “princess- gyaru”” style individuals have been selfishly selfishl y making rules like “Lolitas must be blond or else,” and wearing vulgar makeup with Lolita clothes. Seeing this, I feel a little sad.] [GLB [ GLB 25:100]  25:100]

In addition to expressing sadness about   gyaru’s gyaru’s vulgar appropriation of Lolita fashion,, this reader also includes a quotation of reported speech attributed to gyaru fashion to gyaru in  in a plain form that contrasts with her own polite form of writing, further illustrating  gyaru fail that gyaru that  fail at being Gothic/Lolita because of linguistic vulgarity as well. Apart from the letters themselves, it is interesting to note that many years after the initial section detailing “lady’s speech” in vol. 4 of  GLB,  GLB , the heading for the “Voices from th from thee Re Read ader ers” s” se sect ctio ion n it itse self lf ch chan ange ged d to “Shu Shukuj kujoo no Sas Sasaya ayaki ki,” ,” or “L “Lad ady’ y’ss Whispers.” No longer was the space left relatively unstructured; the explanation under the “Lady’s Whispers” heading read: Fudan, futo kuchi ni shite shimau yo¯na . . . keredo, mizukara ga shukujo de aru koto wo ¯kina koe de ha ienai yo¯na koto . . . Koko deha, sonna minna-sama no sasayaki wo omoi, o oshiete itadaite orimasu. [For those passing comments that you often almost say aloud . . . but then you realize that you are a lady, and so you can’t say in a loud voice . . . In this section, please whisper them to us.] [GLB [GLB 25:100]  25:100]

This exp explan lanat ation ion giv given en by GLB edi editor torss is ope open n to mul multip tiple le int interp erpret retat ation ions, s, how howev ever, er, and the various letters—some written in elaborate “lady’s speech” like the previous letter about  about   gyaru, gyaru, and others written in plain or polite forms—testify to readers’ various understandings of what or how they should be whispering. Should their whis wh ispe pers rs be in “l “lad ady’ y’ss sp spee eech ch”” be beca caus usee th thaat is wh who o th they ey tr trul uly y ar are? e? Or sh shou ould ld th they ey be in less elaborate form, because they are revealing their true plebian selves? The fact that some letters are written without “lady’s speech” could indicate the kind of selfawareness of the constructedness and parody of “lady’s speech” hinted at by Inoue. Manner guides, internet forums, and letters from readers printed in magazines like GLB like  GLB all  all comprise what can be called the media micromarket of Gothic/Lolita. In much the same way that Miller talks of the micromarkets of “Kogal-oriented and Kogal-produced media,” the media micromarkets of Gothic/Lolita also “help establish and maintain youth subcultures, which in turn contribute to a stronger sense of subcultural identity” (Miller 2004:226). Though exceptions can always be found among adherents of any particular subcultural style, Gothic/Lolitas who are deeply enough involved involved to seek lifestyle and langu language age advice from the various Gothic/Lolita media have appropriated ojo appropriated  ojo¯-sama -sama language  language as the dialect of their community in the same way as fans of Sakai Noriko adopted noripı adopted  noripı¯ go  go,, and gyaru and  gyaru developed  developed their own slang and linguistic style. By recycling an archaic and feminine form of speaking, Gothic/Lolitas have bricolages made it their own, much like the and (re)appropriation ofscandalous past clothing styles in fashion such as hippie, punk, goth. Thus, the  jogakusei kotoba kotoba that  that arose in the early 1900s evolved into the idealized joseigo idealized  joseigo of  of the postwar period, was rejected by young women’s counterpublics in the 1980s and

 

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onward ard and has now been re-ap re-approp propria riated ted,, recon reconstruc structed ted,, and ren renamed amed “lad “lady’s y’s onw speech” by the schoolgirls and young women of Gothic/Lolita. Indeed, “schoolgirl speech” is almost like a historical mansion whose origins are lost on passersby. If  the jogakusei the  jogakusei kotoba builders kotoba  builders of the past resemble the “lady’s speech” squatters of the present, it is more a result of a preserved exterior than an unchanging interior. With kotoba, a new layer of  each reappropriation reappropriation and reconstruction of this storied jogakusei storied jogakusei kotoba, meaning is added, continually remodeling the rooms within for new purposes and new tenants in a spiral of sedimented meanings.3 Negative Identity Practices: Sexualization and Kosupure and  Kosupure (“Cosplay”)  (“Cosplay”) in Gothic/Lolita

For Gothic/Lolitas, there is more at stake in educating each other through magazines and web forums than merely constructing a shared notion of community. Haunting the Gothic/Lolita at every turn is what they perceive as a pervasive misunderstanding of their subculture by society at large, and results in attempts both passive and active to distance themselves from unwanted stereotypes. Negative identity politics—recursively defining oneself against other groups—is of course a common strategy within subcultures (see, for example, Bucholtz 1999). This is particularly true of Gothic/Lolita due to its superficial similarities to bondage fashion and the fetish rorikon, as well as the subcultural practice of  kosupure.  kosupure. These similarities ized Lolita of  rorikon, are exacerbated by the fact that Gothic/Lolitas and  kosupure  kosupure fans  fans all share the same primary gathering spot of Harajuku. Harajuku is a popular shopping district in western Tokyo, on the busy Yamanote train line. It is known throughout Japan for its claustrophobic streets honeycombed with small fashion boutiques, as well as a somewhat incongruous youth gathering ¯  Bashi, a bridge directly in front of the shrine to the Meiji Emperor. In spot on Jingu the world of Gothic/Lolita magazines and internet forums, Harajuku is essentially the Holy Land of Gothic/Lolita culture and the most authentic site for practicing and experienci exper iencing ng Gothi Gothic/Lol c/Lolita ita style style.. Most Gothi Gothic/Loli c/Lolitas tas in the Toky okyo-me o-metrop tropolit olitan an area gather in Harajuku, and some girls even commute several hours from the suburbs or countryside. Harajuku is a subcultural fashion venue not only for Gothic/Lolitas, but for many other subcultural styles as well. In fact, Harajuku has become such a Mecca for outrageous youth fashions that every Sunday the district is inundated with tourists (both foreign and domestic) who swarm through the streets taking pictures of the elaborately adorned youths (see Figure 3). This is how the fashion became known thro th roug ugho hout ut Ja Jap pan and in ma many ny ot othe herr co coun untr trie ies, s, as im imag ages es of Go Goth thic ic/L /Lol olit itas as ha have ve be been en taken up by many foreign journalists. Special features on the fashion have appeared in Singaporean newspapers, German and Dutch television programs, on the U.S. news program “20/20,” and on the Reuters website, testifying and contributing to its global recognition. Such media saturation has also meant that Gothic/Lolitas are exposed to the uncomprehending gazes of outsiders to their style. Unlike the “priv “pr ivat ate” e” med medium ium of pub public lic dis discou course rse in mag magazin azines es lik likee   GLB GLB,, Gothi Gothic/Lol c/Lolita itass in Harajuku must share a physical public space with other sometimes superficially similar fashion subcultures, even as they carve out a place for their own specific counterpublic. In other words, whatever ambivalence or ambiguity Gothic/Lolitas may express about their “true selves” in the “Lady’s Whispers” section of  GLB of  GLB,, when forced to occupy the same spa space ce as other youth subcultures the counterpublic boundaries of Gothic/Lolitas may become exaggerated and reified. News media both within and outside of Japan frequently place Gothic/Lolita and the other fashions present in Harajuku alongside subcultural phenomena that are  better known, such asofbondage fashions (especially the,West) and  rorikon in  in Since the publication Gothic/Lolita magazines likein GLB, like GLB whichand rorikon publicized theJapan. style  beyond the small group of practitioners, Gothic/Lolita has had a conflicted relationship with these kinds of sexualized and fetishized images.

 

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Figure 3 An Elegant Gothic Lolita in media-saturated Harajuku, 2003. (Photo by the author)

On the Goth side of the spectrum, there has been a tenuous relationship with  bondage clothing. Bondage clothes—leathe clothes—leatherr straps and metal accessories, for example—have always been a peripheral part of the magazine’s clothing advertisements and occasionally make an appearance in the candid street photographs. The  bondage element of Gothic/Lolita is most likel likely y tied up with the European and American Goth scene, where it is a prominent fashion in movies, music, and art. Despite drawing on similar images, however, there is no emphasis or attention paid to the sexual element of bondage lifestyles, and thus Gothic/Lolitas for the most part seem to merely ignore this sexualized side. On the other end of the spectrum of sexualized images of Gothic/Lolita is rorikon is  rorikon.. As previously described, rorikon described,  rorikon is  is the term for a man’s sexual attraction to young girls. It is precisely the similarity between the word “Lolita” in this context and the word “Lolita” as it is use by Gothic/Lolitas that has motivated some to practice alternative spelling strategies. Regardless of this attempt at recursive distance, it seems that the Lolita side of Gothic/Lolita has attracted (and created) the attention of  consumers of rorikon pornography. pornography. In my own conversations with Gothic/Lolitas on the street and from comments on web forums, many Gothic/Lolitas have a very real fear of being appropriated not as a “figure of identity,” expressing their own idea of  their authentic self, but instead recirculated as a sexualized, pornographic “figure of  desire,” a costume-fetish “character” addressed to the desires of an indefinite population of rorikon fetishists (on the opposition between figures of identity and figures of desire within the category of sexuality, see Cameron and Kulick 2005). When I first began researching Gothic/Lolita five years ago, I often saw middleaged men (foreign and otherwise) with massive cameras ogling the girls gathered in Harajuku (see Figure 4). This has continued to the present day, and if anything it has increased. When I talked with some young Harajuku denizens this summer, they all agreed that the worst part about gathering and hanging out in Harajuku is that many people don’t ask permission to take photographs, and just snap away as they stroll around the area. The girls’ biggest fear was that they didn’t know where those pictures would end up. Several added that they might end up on internet sites, cropped so that the heads were cut off and only the Lolita body was visible, or in other sexualized ways.and Forby theGothic/Lolitas most part, however, aspect of Gothic/Lolita ignored in magazines on the this street, though I did witnessisa few girls refuse photographs from men whom they seemed to feel uncomfortable around.

 

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Figure 42003. (Photo by the author) An amarori posing for the camera,

An additional catalyst catalyst to the sexual objectification of Gothic/Lolita may also be the  boom (now waning) in so-called “maid cafes” in Japan, where one can go for a cup of  coffee or a heart-shaped omelet served by a young girl wearing a French maid outfit. Gothic/Lolitas (especially those more on the amarori “sweet Lolita” side) are often mistaken for maids, and maids are often thought to be extensions of the same fashion. Like Gothic/Lolitas, the maids in the maid cafes also use extremely polite Japanese, which was one element taken up briefly by the Japanese media in some reports on the maid cafe phenomenon. Gothic/Lolitas I spoke with virulently denied any connection tio n to ma maid ids, s, ho howe weve ver, r, cla claim imin ing g th thaat th thee cr cruc ucia iall di diff ffer eren ence ce (b (bey eyon ond d th thaat of th thee ma maid id’s ’s vastly inferior clothing style and quality) was that maids served served  people, whereas Gothic/Lolitas were were served  (because   (because they are princesses). Indeed, one of my informants even mentioned that she enjo enjoyed yed going to maid cafes with her Gothic Gothic/Loli /Lolita ta friends, because they were served like princesses. In general, however, both Gothic/ Loli Lo littas and no nonn-Go Goth thic ic/L /Lol olit itas as al alik ikee cl class assif ify y th thee ma maid idss of ma maid id caf cafes es wi with thin in th thee re real alm m   kosupure, another fashion that Gothic/Lolitas feel they must constantly distance of  kosupure, themselves themsel ves from. More than being targeted as sexual objects Gothic/Lolitas express the most frustration about being categorized together with kosupure with  kosupure (“Cosplay”).  (“Cosplay”). Kosupure is a  Japanese neologism neologism that stems from the combination of the English words “costume” and “play.” To Gothic/Lolitas I spoke with, kosupure means mimicry and dressing  as someone, someone, that is, as a specific character from comic books, movies, video games up as up or animation. In contrast, my informants would stress that their own Gothic/Lolita style was personalized and was an expression of their “true” selves, and that they took pride in choosing their own styles and making their own clothing (although kosupure fans also seem to spend a great deal of time making their own costumes to   ″ 

  ″ 

″ 

″ 

match a character). Exactly what separates kosupure and Gothic/Lolita is very difficult to determine, and merits an investigation of its own. One possible way of conceptualizing the difference between the two subcultural phenomena is precisely the distinction that

 

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Gothic/Lolitas make: kosupure is alw always ays bound up in mimicry mimicry,, and is not a matter of  expres exp ressin sing g one one’s ’s “tr “true” ue” sel selff, but ra rathe therr it is mas masque querad rading ing as som someo eone ne el else se.. In Go Goff ffma man’ n’ss terms, Gothic/Lolitas are invested in expressing their “self” as natural figures—a flesh-and-blood,, animated individual—whereas flesh-and-blood individual—whereas kosupure fans are alw always ays expressing to a certain degree a “not-self” that involves imitating someone else but with no emphasis on a convincing performance, as in a cited figure (see Goffman 1974). Seen See n thr throug ough h thi thiss len lens, s, Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit lita’s a’s fa fashi shion on,, lan langu guag age, e, and ent entire ire mod modee of bei being ng is thus viewed by themselves as a “figure of identity,” whereas the entire practice of  kosupure is essentially a superficial, transpare transparent, nt, and vulgar mimicry of appearances. Unlike Gothic/Lolitas who strive to perfect an embodiment of a princess-like self, kosupure fans could be seen as having no “unique” self but being merely an undifferentiated individual on which a costume clumsily hangs. This is precisely what Hastings and Manning (2004:302) call a “figure of alterity,” what Goffman describes as a kind of figure where “serious impersonation is not involved, since no effort is made to take anyone in, nor is theatre involved. . . . At the center is the process of  projecting an image of someone not oneself while preventing viewers from forgetting even for a moment that an alien animator is at work” (Goffman 1974: 534). Actual practices of Gothic/Lolita and kosupure are not quite so neatly defined, however, and even the individu individual al Gothic/Lolitas themsel themselves ves may in fact have have participated in kosupure in the past. Considering the actual kinds of figures embodied by individual participants in these subcultural practices thus adds an additional layer of  complexity to Goffman’s continuum of natural, staged, cited, and parodied figures (Goffman 1974: 524–537; Hastings and Manning 2004: 302–4). It could be argued that Gothic/Lolitas are also involved in mimicry like kosupure fans, although their object of mi mimi micr cry y is an archetypical figu figure— re—aa pri prince ncess, ss, an inn innoce ocent nt “swe “sweet et lol lolit ita,” a,” an “el “elega egant nt gothic lolita”—rather than a cited a  cited figure,  figure, like a character from a popular manga or Sailor lor Moo Moon n. Mor anime ani me ser series ies lik likee Sai Moree int inter erest esting inglly, Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa mot motifs ifs are oft often en dra drawn wn from inanimate figures like dolls (see Figure 5). This contrasts with the animate (or at least animated least  animated)) figures of kosupure, which are always recognizable as a pre-existing identity within a narra narrativized tivized context, like a video game or comic book story. story. Gothic/ Lolita archetypes that are drawn from dolls or other inanimate sources may lack any pre-existing story-based context. In this way, an inanimate figure such as a doll from the popular Blythe company company becomes the model for a Gothic/Lolita, who then strives to become an animate representation representation of that figure—a process that contrasts explicitl explicitly y  reanimation of with kosupure fans who are always involved in the  reanimation  of already animate figures. Concep Con ceptu tuali alizin zing g the kin kinds ds of per perfor forman mance ce of figu figures res tha thatt Gof Goffma fman n exp explor lores, es, together with the inspiration and sources of those figures, leads to the intriguing possibility of a matrix of figures, ranging from “figures of identity” to “figures of  alterity” on one axis, and animate figures to inanimate figures on the other. This second axis might be broken down further into imitations of true animates (other people), animated characters (manga, anime, and video game characters), to inanimate figures (dolls). (For one view on how the boundaries between human and non-human are blurred through through animation and toys, see Allison 2006.) In this second axis we could also locate archetypical figures like  amarori  amarori in  in the middle, a sort of  templa tem plate te tha thatt pos posses sesses ses ani anima mate te pot potent ential iality ity,, with cer certtain pr prosc oscrib ribed ed ways of dre dressin ssing, g, speaking, and acting, but with no narrativized context of its own. Additionally, the fears expressed by Gothic/Lolitas regarding misappropriation of their style by others also remind us that a third continuum must be considered in this matrix, specifically Gothic/Lolitas’ own desired expression as “figures of identity” (for self) versus the sexualized, fetish “figure of desire” (for others) consumed by rorikon fetishists (see Cameron and Kulick 2005). 2005 ). Taken together, the various combinatory permutations permutations on the these se thr three ee axe axes s rep repres resent ent most how subcultures), tenuou ten uouss the as proce pr ocess sscontinually of sel self-r f-repr eprese esent ntat ation ion is for Gothic/Lolitas (and indeed they struggle to define themselves against the buffeting winds of adults’ lecherous gazes, other contemporary subcultures, and their own ambivalent biographies of subcultural participation. 4

 

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Figure 5 Girls and dolls, out on the town, 2006. (Photo by the author)

Ambivalent Representations: Iconization and Erasure in News Media

In all subcultures there are numerous layers of media representations involved in the constr con struct uction ion of a sty style’ le’ss ima image. ge. In add additi ition on to the Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litas’ as’ own int intern ernal al projects of community-making and recursive distancing, there are always external media representations as well, and these external and internal representations are often conflicting. Consid Con sideri ering ng the pol polite ite and “fe “femin minine ine”” lin lingui guistic stic and beh behaavio vioral ral asp aspect ectss of Got Gothic hic/ / Lolita in comparison to other young women’s counterpublics such as  noripı¯ go  go   and  gyaru speech,  gyaru  speech, it would seem that the princess-like values championed by Gothic/ Lolitas would be welcomed by parents, the general media, and (male) intellectuals concerned about the vulgarity and dangerous lifestyles of today’s youth. This is not entirely so, however; there are a number of competing views of Gothic/Lolita that find expression in various media. On the one hand, there are programs like the segment titled “The Summer of Gothic Lolita Girls” on Fuji Television’s “Super News,” which features mostly male interviewers and narrators and is broadcast primarily for a mixed male and female audience (Gosurori sho¯ jo no na natsu tsu 2004). On the other hand, there are programs like the special “Gosurori: Gothic & Lolita” on TBS’s “Hanamaru Market,” which features mostly female interviewers and narrators and tar arge gets ts a mo mostl stly y fe fema male le aud udie ienc ncee (G (Gos osur uror ori: i: Go Goth thic ic & Lo Loli litta 20 2002) 02).. The hese se programs reveal the ambivalence that Gothic/Lolita evokes in the Japanese media, with the former taking a moral panic stance and the latter playfully praising certain characteristics like their language use or elaborate clothing. They achieve this by employing strategies of iconization and erasure via creative narration and editing to construct alternative yet totalizing images of the subculture and counterpublic. The metapragmatic representation of Gothic/Lolita in certain (conservative) news programs like “Super News” infantilizes and delegitimizes Gothic/Lolita via the iconization of iconization  erasure   of   of inarticulate utterances and childish Gothic/Lolitas and the  erasure  behaviors  beha viors and individu individuals als that present a positive or articulate image. In the words of Irvi Irvine ne and Gal (2000) (2000),, iconi iconizati zation on is the process whereby “linguistic “linguistic fea features tures that index social groups or activities appear to be iconic representations of them, as if a linguistic feature somehow depicted or displayed a social group’s inherent nature or esse es senc nce” e” (2 (2000 000:37 :37). ). Er Eras asur uree is th thee pr proc oces esss in wh whic ich h “f “fac acts ts th thaat ar aree in inco cons nsis iste tent nt wi with th th thee ideological scheme either go unnoticed or get explained away” (2000:38). Programs critic cri tical al of Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa ren render der the utte utteran rances ces and beh behaavio viors rs of in inart articu icula late te and

 

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childish Gothic/Lolitas as iconic of the counterpublic as a whole, while erasing actions that would contradict this image via creative narration and editing. The captions provided for many Japanese television shows reveals one fascinating method of creative narration and editing. In Japanese television programs in particular, captions represent an intriguing example of “reported speech” in that they are displa dis played yed sim simul ulta taneo neousl usly y whi while le the spe speake akerr is sti still ll spe speaki aking. ng. Suc Such h cap captio tions ns eff effect ective ivelly employ processes of erasure and iconicity to construct certain iconic images of the counte cou nterpu rpubli blicc whi while le mas maskin king g oth others ers.. Volo olosin sino ov (19 (1973) 73) wri writes tes tha thatt the there re are two kinds of clear-cut, reported external speech, “linear and “pictorial style “construct[s] contoursstyle” for reported speech,style.” whose Linear own internal individuality is minimized . . . [where] the grammatical and compositional manipulation of reported speech achieves a maximal compactness and plastic relief” (120). In contrast to this is pictorial style, in which “language devises means for infiltrating reported speech with authorial retort and commentary in deft and subtle ways.” When used effectively, the pictorial style in particular can have a powerful influence on recontextualizing the utterance of the individual as if the reported form of the utterance was the actual form spoken by the quoted individual herself. In addition to these visible processes of creative narration and editing, what is erased can be just as revealing as what is shown. Examining the selective editing of  programs—what was left out—can tell us much about how the producers wish to iconize Gothic/Lolita. Though we can never be sure about what exactly has been edited out of television programs, in programs critical of Gothic/Lolita like “Super News” we only see interviews with Gothic/Lolitas who speak inarticulately or in somewhat slang forms. This notable absence, combined with the pictorial style of  reported speech captioning used liberally throughout, reveals the extent to which programs like “Super News” actively create a “moral panic” view of inscrutable wayward young girls that at the same time seek to subsume them within a familiar category of young women. A few examples of the practices in “Super News” will help to elucidate this point. In one portion of “Super News” in particular, erasure through creative narration and editing is made explicit by a young male interviewer (who remains unseen) when he interviews a particularly outrageously dressed teen in the Gothic/Lolita Mecca of  gurorori,5 a girl dressed in Gothic/Lolita with Harajuku Haraju ku.. When appr appro oachin aching g one   gurorori,  bloody bandages, one of the first questions he asks is “Do your pare parents nts know you no?), spoken in a very casual (almost rude) dress like this?” (oya (oya wa kono kakko¯ shitteiru no?), form. When the girl responds in the negative in the standard polite form (oya ( oya ni wa ittenai desu), desu), the male interviewer discursively repeats her words in the same casual form that he used previously, indexing his purported objectivity while really emphasizing the very judgment he attempts to obviate as a fact-finding journalist. Later on in the program, the male interviewer accompanies two Gothic/Lolitas  back to their home after a concert concert.. In this portion of the program, his feminizing and infantilizing interview style becomes even more pronounced in both his patronizing questions and the use of captions c aptions to paraphrase the interviewees’ speech. Throughout the entire interview, interview, which is carried out in their room, the girls demonstrate constant collaborative language use where they either answer questions in unison or build off  of each other’s comments, a manner of speaking that Lakoff characterizes as typical of “women’s language” (Cameron and Kulick 2003). The captions on the screen highlight this by embellishing their remarks with colored hearts and squiggle marks signifying “girlish” intonation. This same pattern is used throughout the program when the male interviewer interviews Gothic/Lolitas, and seems to reinforce the childishness of the girls. The most telling part of the interview comes at the end when the girls say (collaboratively) that in the future they would like to open a shop that sells Lolita clothing. The narrator closes the segment by commenting, “Until the end, they want  egao”” (smiles to do what they like! This is where they showed their   sho¯ jo rashı¯  egao appropriate for/typical of a young girl). The tone of the narrator’s voice seems to

 

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imply that, that, despite their unorthodox fashion and interests, there is still hope that they are “typical” girls on the inside. What is notable throughout the “Super News” segment to those who are conversant in the Gothic/Lolita counterpublic is not only the emphasis on outrageous, unrepresentative incarnations of the style like gurorori like  gurorori that  that are set up as iconic, but also the noticeable lack of Gothic/Lolitas who use “lady’s speech.” Given the discourse on practicing “lady’s speech” in magazines and on internet forums, not to mention interviews with articulate and polite Gothic/Lolitas on other programs such as “Hanamaru it is such almost certain that thepractice producers of critical programs choose toMarket,” “erase” any interviews. Such is common innews broadcast interviews and reminds us that all editing is inherently a discursive process. The processes of iconization and erasure embodied in video editing also involve multiple layers of what Goffman terms “footing,” a crucial part of narration. News programs incorporate several levels of narrative embeddedness including narration of interviewees’ responses, narration in the form of interview questions, and narration between segments. Taken as a whole, the entire news program itself can be seen as one narration by a master narrator (the producer(s)), someone who is rendered invisible to the viewers. This is necessary to truly (dis)embody the practice of “objective” reporting, for as Goffman (1981) notes, “a full-scale story requires that the speaker remove himself for the telling’s duration from the alignment he would maintain in ordinary conversational give and take, and for this period of narration maintain another footing” (1981:152). Speaki Spe aking ng on la layer yerss of foo footin ting, g, Gof Goffma fman n (198 (1981) 1) wri writes tes tha thatt “ea “each ch inc increa rease se or decrease in layering—each movement closer to or further from the ‘literal’—carries with it a change in footing” (1981:154). Thus, for each added layer of embedded narration the spectacle is more thoroughly manipulated and controlled by the master nar arra rato torr who is abl ablee to “s “sys yste tema mati tical callly om omit it th thee nar arra rati tive ve fr fram amee br brea eaks ks th thaat ve very ry li like kelly occurr occ urred ed thr throug oughou houtt the ac actu tual al tel tellin lings” gs” (19 (1981:1 81:152), 52), and con condu duct ct oth other er edi editin ting g sleight-of-hand to ignore the Gothic/Lolitas’ own virtual speech community and erase anything that would undermine the socially shocking image of Gothic/Lolita that such programs strive to create. On the other hand, there are programs that take a positive stance toward Gothic/ Lolit Lol itaa lik likee “Ha “Hana namar maru u Mar Marke kett,” whi which ch dem demons onstra trate te edi editin ting g and na narra rratio tion n tha thatt support the virtu virtual al speech community of Gothic/Lolitas. Such programs may feature feature joseigo/”lady’s speech” (re)appropriated by interviews that match the register of   of   joseigo/”lady’s Gothic/Lolitas, momentarily embracing Gothic/Lolita to lend familiarity to it for viewers, and legitimizing it by participating in the co-construction of Gothic/Lolita’s speech patterns as a socially viable and intelligible register. Compared Comp ared with the infantilizing and “moral panic” of “Super News,” the differing use of erasure and iconicity in programs like “Hanamaru Café” is revealing. In marked contrast to the interview style of the faceless young man in “Super News,” the very first interview in “Hanamaru Café” combines implied equality by matching politeness in language forms with a linear style in the reported speech of the captions that highlights the articulateness of the interviewee. The first question that the celebrity female interviewer Kaiho Sato asks is in honorific form, characteristic of both  joseigo and  joseigo  and Gothic/Lolita’s (re)constructed “lady’s speech.” When the Gothic/Lolita  being interviewed responds in the same honorific form, Kaiho repeats the utterance ne!). and remarks that her use of language is “very refined, isn’t it!” (o-jo (o-jo¯hin desu ne!). Furthermore, unlike the male reporter in “Super News,” Kaiho does not repeat the interviewee’s every utterance but rather lets her speech stand for itself. In a later segment of the program Kaiho interviews a shop clerk at a Gothic/Lolita clothi clo thing ng sto store re and sev severa erall Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litas as and a mal malee mod model el at a Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa convention. While While the content of the interviews is generall generally y descriptive in nature (i.e., the nuances of Gothic/Lolita’s fashion elements), the reported speech in captions is particularly revealing. All of Kaiho’s questions in these segments are framed in masu), standard polite form (desu (desu/ /masu ), and for the most part the interviewees respond in

 

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the same form, though they all use common youth slang and some grammatically incorrect utterances. In these segments, the reported speech of the captions rephrases the interviewees’ utterances in the pictorial style by dropping slang and adding honorifics when grammatically appropriate.6 One likely reason for this rephrasing is to facilitate easy reading for viewers, and it is also possible that the use of pictorial style in this way in fact draws attention to the speakers’ inarticulate/incorrect language use. However, taking into account the supportive and positive tone of the program as a whole, the end result is an image of articulate, well-mannered individu vid uals as opp oppose osed d to the inf infant antili ilized zed and in inart articu icula late te Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litas as of “Su “Super per News.” The final scene of the program is a roundtable discussion in the studio by the female commentators. While Kaiho gives viewers various information on the many substyles of Gothic/Lolita in an authoritative tone, the commentators try on various pieces of Gothic/Lolita clothing, such as miniature bowler hats and bonnets. At one point one of the middle-age commentators puts on a bonnet, to which the other commentators respond “Oh, it suits you! (o-niai ( o-niai desu!)” desu!)” in a sudden shift to joseigo to  joseigo/ / “lady’s “lad y’s speec speech,” h,” signi signified fied particu articularl larly y by the “so-cal “so-called led bea beautifica utification tion prefi prefix x   oo-”” (Inoue 2006:14). Conversa Conversation tion then returns to standard polite form. This sudden foray  joseigo of into joseigo into  of the kind (re)appropriated by Gothic/Lolitas, as well as the matching  joseigo/”lady’s speech” in the segment’s first interview use of the register of  joseigo/”lady’s interview,, could be seen see n as bot both h mom moment entari arilly emb embra racin cing g Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa to len lend d fami amilia liarit rity y to it for viewers, and as legitimizing it by participating in the co-construction of Gothic/ Lolita’s speech patterns as a socially viable and intelligible register. As Agha (2005) writes, “registers have a social existence only insofar as—and as long as—the metapragmatic stereotypes associated with their repertoires continue to  be recognized by a criterial population of users, that is, continue to ha have ve a social domain” (2005:46). In this way, the use of Gothic/Lolitas’ speech patterns by interviewers like those in “Hanamaru Market” serves to enhance “a social domain of  persons who recognize it as a model enactable enactable through speech”. Rather than falling in line with the hegemonic (male) discourse of young women as dangerously unfeminine and bloated with excessive modernity, producers of programs like “Hanamaru Market” praise their linguistic practices and manners, and display openness to the changing lifestyle options and increasing agency of young women in Japan.

Conclusion

Like most youth cultures, the Gothic/Lolita subculture and counterpublic discourse is a bricolage of elements and ideas from a variety of different global and historical sources, ranging from Japanese impressions of Western fashion and history, to contemporary rock music, to postwar ideas of prewar femininity and aristocracy and idealized “women’s language.” Also, like other youth cultures, the syncretic combination of recontextualized elements in Gothic/Lolita, combined with the register of  “lady’s speech” and a specialized lexicon that only Gothic/Lolitas have access to, creates an alternative virtual community where they can assume the fantasy role of  “princesses” and step outside of social norms of dress and speech promoted in the (adult male) public sphere and the counterpublic spheres of other young women. As the abo above ve exa exampl mples es sho show w, the cou counte nterpu rpubli blicc dis discou course rse of Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa is supported by “enregistered voices”—“social voices linked to registers” (Agha 2005:39) found in magazines and internet forums from other Gothic/Lolitas and from Gothic/Lolita culture producers. Put differently, the register of Gothic/Lolita is, like all registers, a “reflexive model of language use” (2005:38), and as such it is iconically indexical of what it means to be Gothic/Lolita. What’s more, the individual voices represented in magazines and other media—and indeed by the very Gothic/Lolitas themselves—become iconic of the register itself, transforming it and reifying it with every utterance. In this way, Gothic/Lolitas are able to tap into and create various

 

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substyles and ways of speaking that provide both structure and creative flexibility, and th thaat ju just stif ify y th thei eirr pe perf rfor orma manc ncee th thro roug ugh h a re regi giste sterr sha share red d by pe peer erss an and d ro role le mo mode dels ls.. Further, it is through the “virtual speech community” created by the discourse of  fashion magazines and internet forums that the counterpublic of Gothic/Lolita is invested with the unified language ideal of “lady’s speech” (the extent to which it is actuall actu ally y prac practiced ticed notwit notwithst hstanding anding), ), a (re)a (re)appr ppropria opriated ted regis register ter of femin feminine ine and polite speech that adds another chapter to the storied history of Japan’s vulgar “schoolgirl speech” cum idealized “women’s language.” This is perhaps an example  par excellence excellence of  of what Agha describes as the “dynamic social life” of registers, where the repert repertoires oires of a regis register ter . . . change . . . whether thro through ugh an analogi alogical cal extens extension, ion, ‘borrowing,’ changes in ‘reference standards’ (such as changes in exemplary speaker), changes in practices of codification (cf. dictionaries), or even the substitution of the speech of one group  by the speech of another under the same metapragmatic label. [Agha 2005:56]

Crucially, the location of the revitalization and (re)creation of  joseigo in   joseigo  in the context of a young women’s counterpublic—typically a realm of social concern for adults— has eng engend endere ered d con confus fusion ion and amb ambiv ivale alence nce in pop popula ularr med media ia and int intell ellect ectu ual discou dis course rse.. Cri Critic tical al new newss med media ia and (ma (male) le) int intell ellect ectu ual dis discou course rse thu thuss re releg legat ates es Gothic Got hic/Lo /Lolit litaa to the st stand andard ard dis discou course rse of “d “dang anger erous ous”” fem female ale yo youth uth cul cultur tures es through iconization and erasure, and ignore the “traditional” nature of its speech practic pra ctices. es. This is occ occurr urring ing ag again ainst st the bac backdr kdrop op of a con contem tempor porary ary bel belief ief tha thatt “women’s language, which once existed in pure form, is now lost as a  consequence  consequence of   of  women bec women becomi oming ng mor morall ally y and lin lingui guisti sticall cally y cor corrup rupted ted in the pre presen sent” t” (In (Inoue oue 2006 2006:14, :14, emphasis in original), a belief that is reaffirmed with every iconic reference to lin go   and  gyaru speech, guisticc prac guisti practices tices like noripı like  noripı¯ go and gyaru  speech, and by erasing the polite and “traditional” linguistic practices of counterpublics like Gothic/Lolita from mass media consciousness. It is unlikely that the counterpublic of Gothic/Lolita indexes a future trend among young Japanese women to “return” to an idealized “women’s language” and femininity, however. Gothic/Lolita as a counterpublic has not become mainstream (i.e., advertised and manufactured by popular major clothing companies and adopted in toto by toto  by a significant enough number of consumers to become a regularized and naturalized part of Japanese youth culture), but rather its elements have been diluted and fed into the river of mass consumption that flows around the many islands of   Japanese youth cultural trends. As with most youth cultures, the music, fashion fashion,, and language langua ge of Gothic/Lolita will continue to change until it is no longer recognizable as what it once was. What Gothic/Lolita’s use of (re)constructed joseigo (re)constructed  joseigo in  in the form of  “lady’s speech” indicates, however, is how the fertile ground of idealized femininity can be tilled for expressly non-mainstream purposes, presenting the popular media and (male) intellectual discourse with a linguistically nostalgic pastiche wrapped in an inscrutable sartorial coating that is hard for many to digest. Just like Kato’s Ojo¯-sama Language Quick Study Cours Coursee, the counterpublic discourse of Gothic/Lolita magazines and web forums “offers a site where the dead women’s language is  brought back to life” and where “excessive imitation inadvertently inadvertently exposes the original absence of pure women’s language” (Inoue 2006:203), regardless of the intent of  Gothic/Lolitas who are trying to use it. In the end, Gothic/Lolita offers young women the opportunity to linguistically and sartorially perform the self-indulgent role of a princess, and allows them to arti ar ticu cula late te in inte tere rests sts an and d de desi sire ress in Go Goth thic ic fan anttasy an and d do doll ll-l -lik ikee in inno noce cenc ncee th thaat are erased by the dominant male public sphere and by contemporary “masculine” and brash women’s counterpublics. It does not matter that they live in early 21stcentury Japan, that they are neither princesses nor dolls, and that many must play the roles of student on weekdays and daughter at home. In his essay “Social Life as Drama” (1997), Goffman seems to be speaking directly to Gothic/Lolitas when he writes that

 

 

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It is not only that the girdle, brassiere, hair-dye, make-up disguise body and face, but that the least sophisticated of women, once she is ‘dressed,’ does not present  herself  to   to observation: she is, like the picture or the statue, or the actor on the stage, an agent through whom is a suggested someone not there; that is, the character she represents, but is not. [Goffman 1997:103]

For those brief few hours after school, for that short afternoon on Sunday, or for those several minutes spent reading a Gothic/Lolita magazine in line at the convenience store, “it is this identification with something unreal, fixed, perfect as the hero in a novel, a portrait or a bust, that gratifies her; she strives to identify with this figure as and thus seems to herself to be stabilized, justified in her herself splendour” (1997:103). Notes  Acknowledgments.. I wish to thank Jennifer Jackson and William Kelly for their patience,  Acknowledgments support, and helpful advice. I would also like to thank Paul Manning, Miyako Inoue, and Shunsuke Nozaw Nozawa for helping me work through and revise this article. All translations are my own except where otherwise noted. 1. I use the word altern alternati ative” ve” here and thro througho ughout ut the text as mean meaning ing world worldviews views,, strategies of meaning-making, and language language and beha behavioral vioral practices that exist alongside other worldviews, strategies, and practices. By using the term “alternative” I do not mean that there are “alternative” ways of living set against one reified “mainstream,” but rather a multiplicity of “alternatives,” some of which are more or less dominant at certain times, among certain   ″ 

groups, and in 2. It must becertain noted places. that the original creator of Gothic/Lolita style and culture, Mana, is himself a fascinating figure. A cross-dressing guitarist and designer, he is regarded as an enigmatic (and paradigmatic) figure within the subculture, and he enhances his mystique by never speaking in public. In fact, the only instances where Mana’s “voice” is heard are in magazines like  like   GLB GLB and  and in printed interviews. In live interviews, Mana employs an “interpreter” who answers all questions for him while he nods and performs delicate gesticulations. The reason for his silence is no doubt partly to preserve the purity of his role as a perfect feminine figure; in internet forums, many (female) Gothic/Lolitas remark that he is so beautiful that “sometimes, I forget he is a man” (Mana-sama Aisuru Kai 2006). If Mana were to actually speak, it is likely that his performance of the role would be shattered for his many fans. 3. My thanks to Shunsuke Nozawa for suggesting this phrasing. 4. I thank Miyako Inoue and Paul Manning for bringing this manner of conceptualizing kosupure and Gothic/Lolita to my attention. 5. This is a rather uncommon substyle. In response to the program, several posters on a popular Gothic/Lolita message boardlike wrote like “That’s the first heard of  it!” or “Why’d they pick something thatcomments to focus on?” (Goshikku rorı¯I’ve ta niever tsuite katari ¯  2006). Other posters dismissed the girl as being a kosupure fan. masho 6. For example, example, the comments comments made by a mod model el at the Got Gothic hic/Lo /Lolit litaa con conven ventio tion n are ¯ no hito mo zenzen ni kirareru to omou ndesu kedo,” rephrased thusly: “Furu “Furu de soroe nakereba, futsu kedo, ” ¯ ni kirareru to omou.”  becomes “Subete “Subete soroe nakereba, ippan no kata mo futsu omou.” Both sentences mean exactly the same thing, “I think that if you don’t wear the whole outfit, normal people [nonGothic/Lolitas] can wear the clothes, too,” but the re-phrased reported speech of the caption is more polite and articulate.

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