Event Friday - Pockets of Utopia: The Promise of Interactivity in Japanese Journalism and Television
Introduction to the Anthropology of Japan Public Lecture Series - Pockets of Utopia: The Promise of Interactivity in Japanese Journalism and Television
Friday Jan 28, 2022
12:20-1:10pm MT
Dr. Elizabeth Rodwell
Assistant Professor, University of Houston Department of Information & Logistics Technology
Following the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, some within the Japanese TV and journalism industries used the crisis as an opportunity for self-critique; others side-stepped questions of self-censorship and advertiser coercion by focusing on restoring audience engagement through the development of pioneering interactive (social) television. Outside the major broadcast conglomerates, journalists began experimenting with interactivity to try to circumvent the institutions they perceived as working against public interest and safety. Interactive technologies make big promises to Japanese audiences, but do they deliver?