Blunted Harpoons: A Traditional Japanese Whaling Town and the Modern Environmental Movement

Date and Time: March 15, 2016 - 5:00am to 6:30am
Location: Coor Hall, room 6615, Tempe campus
Campus: Tempe campus
Price: Free

Whalers in the small town of Taiji have hunted the cetaceans that migrate up and down Japan's eastern coast for over four hundred years. Faced with the modern environmental movement, the town has branded itself as the "birthplace of traditional whaling," and local fishermen still catch small whales and dolphins. Western activists are strongly opposed to the modern hunts, and many travel to the town to directly confront its whalers. Today Taiji is a cultural flashpoint, celebrated within Japan as a proud historical remnant and reviled abroad as a cruel anachronism.Speaker: Jay Alabaster, doctoral student and adjunct professor at ASU's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communications. Alabaster lived in Japan for 20 years, where he worked as a reporter for organizations such as the Associated Press.Presented by: The Graduate Forum on Asia.

Department: Center for Asian Research
Website: http://car.clas.asu.edu
Contact: Lora Kile
EmailLora.Kile@asu.edu
Phone: 480-727-4153