JKT48, More Than Meets The Eye

RedRanger48

A Super Sentai in the night, A lightstick-wielding man in the day. Subject of Her Majesty Queen Vienny Fitrilya. And please call me Red. http://twitter.com/theredranger48

6 Responses

  1. kurisu says:

    A really interesting read, articulate and well presented points… and it put into fully fleshed out sentences what I’ve been feeling over the course of the past year.

    To me, it all feels rather seamless how much JKT48 just ‘feels’ synonymous with Japan these days. And, Japan itself as a brand… is always ‘cool’.
    (To the people of our generation anyway, there’s seems to be at least one aspect of Japan that they like… whether it’s travel, architecture, food, animated film… there’s a underlying ‘something’.)
    I’m an outsider to Indonesia, so I don’t know what’s happening on the streets… but on the internet, I really do see an “ownership” being there, Japan and JKT48.
    And it’s a mutual… though not equal… give and take, which is very rare to see.

  2. KicauSinSit says:

    To be fair, most Indonesian do trust Japanese product even before JKT48 sprung out. I do hope there would be a batik motif to their costume in some JKT48 songs. As it is currently they are just an Idol group which is emulating Japan culture by Indonesian. I do believe that Batik can be implemented to pop culture without being to traditional. e.g. http://batiku.com/shop/dress-batik-couple

    Now I hope JOT can implement it somehow.

  3. zef says:

    and i think it’s high time that we Indonesians begin a “soul searching” of sorts, to have a distinctly “indonesian” pop culture, and i think that clinging slavishly to the batik-angklung-saman scheme is not the way forward, nor is trying to contort them in an attempt to “modernize” these cultures. I am not against the people who try to “conserve” these cultural heritage, they must exist, but alongside them we also need our “renegades”.

    i’m not an expert on Japan, but I don’t think that their pop culture icons (manga, anime, or perhaps idol groups) were created by “conservationist”. in saying that i mean that these japanese pop culture icons were relatively free of previous precedents in “traditional” japanese arts. yet, as they matured, these cultural products are still distinctively Japanese. cmiiw, but i suspect that animes, idol groups came out as attempts of copying western arts got “lost in translation” resulting in something distinctively Japanese.

    i think it’s okay, at first, to copy foreign cultures. i believe that one day, organically, involuntarily, a distinct local twist would emerge. so paradoxically, in trying to create a distinctively “Indonesian” pop culture product, we actually have to forget about “conservation” and commit fully to blazing new trails.

    after all, before batik, angklung, manga, anime, ukiyo-e, noh theatres, wayang etc, we were all cavemen without any cultural products weren’t we? :-D

  4. zef says:

    and oh, as an aside, this sort of commercial diplomacy between these countries actually had roots in a very distant past.

    just google “Sakiko Tanase”. apparently the first president of Indonesia was attracted by this Japanese girl while visiting Kyoto, and, seizing this opportunity, Kinoshita Group, a Japanese company which was interested in investing in Indonesia brought Miss Sakiko for the lobbying process.

    of course it’s very different from the sort written in the article, and for some, embarassing, but there :mrgreen:

  5. Thank you for reading and thanks for the comments! I too learn a lot from reading your comments, lots of information and further insights to the issue :)

  6. Tarsisius Bagus says:

    JKT48 CD/DVD 7th Single “Kokoro no Placard” limited version. Buy it and get the bonus!

    – CD
    1. Kokoro no Placard
    2. Kurumi to Dialogue
    3. Lucky Seven
    4. Iiwake Maybe
    5. Kokoro no Placard – English version –
    6 Kokoro no Placard (off vocal version)

    – DVD
    1. Kokoro no Placard Music Video
    2. Kokoro no Placard behind the scenes
    3. Kokoro no Placard dance tutorial video

    – Bonus:
    Same with the regular version, with some addition :
    1. T-shirts limited edition Kokoro no Placard
    2. Special Photo pack Kokoro no Placard
    3. Tickets to 2-shot with your oshimen
    If you buy this limited version, you can write your feeling from your heart in a special T-shirts and take a 2-shot with your ​​favorite member. Maybe later your oshimen will also write down her feeling on the board and answer the feeling of her fans?
    – Price:
    IDR. 280.000,-

    – How to Purchase:
    Pre-order on the Rakuten’s special web page. The delivery date will be informed through the official website at the end of September.
    2-Shot with Oshimen: Will be announced.

    Keep Supporting JKT48!
    You can buy it here : http://rakuten.co.id/shop/jkt48-official/product/KNP_SetLimited/?l-id=id_search_product_10

    Source : https://facebook.com/48FamilyNoFansuIndonesia/photos/a.363390413779895.1073741828.360551397397130/613477775437823/?type=1