Japan
the “lost generation” (ushinawareta sedai)
"I felt I was being excommunicated from the *shin jin rui*
-- that's what the Japanese newspapers call people
like those kids in their twenties at the office -- *new human beings*. It's hard to explain. We have the
same group over here and it's just as large, but it doesn't have a name -- an *X* generation -- purposefully
hiding itself. There's more space over here to hide in -- to get lost in -- to use as camouflage. You're not
allowed to disappear in Japan."(Douglas Coupland, Generation X)
-- that's what the Japanese newspapers call people
like those kids in their twenties at the office -- *new human beings*. It's hard to explain. We have the
same group over here and it's just as large, but it doesn't have a name -- an *X* generation -- purposefully
hiding itself. There's more space over here to hide in -- to get lost in -- to use as camouflage. You're not
allowed to disappear in Japan."(Douglas Coupland, Generation X)
"Generation X in Japan"
"Japan’s Generation X is known by a different name, but as a marker of youth’s uncertainty towards their future, arising in part from changes in the global economy and a withered social safety net, the resonance is clear. In Japan, the generation born between 1970-86 has been called the “lost generation” (ushinawareta sedai). The loss here refers to the “lost decade” starting in the mid-nineties, when Japan went into a recession following the boom years of the “bubble economy,” and still, two decades later has yet to return to strong growth."
~ Ian Condry, Excerpt from Generation X Goes Global
Ian Condry. A cultural anthropologist and associate professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Comparative Media Studies. He is author of Hip-Hop Japan: Rap and the Paths of Cultural Globalization (2006, in Japanese 2009) and a forthcoming book called The Soul of Anime: Collaborative Creativity and Japan's Media Success Story. His research explores how cultural movements go global, even without the push of governments or major corporations. More info: http://iancondry.com