¡°Why study anime?¡± the author of this study of anime asks himself. Good question, thinks the reader. Why indeed ¡°study¡± a pop art whose appeal is less to thought than to mass, unreflecting, spontaneous enjoyment?
THE SOUL OF ANIME: Collaborative Creativity and Japan¡¯s Media Success Story, by Ian Condry. Duke University Press, 2013, 241 pp., $23.95 (paperback)
There are reasons, of course. The wildfire spread, the global reach, the character-transforming impact it has on fans ¡ª the world-transforming impact it has on fans¡¯ world ¡ª all elevate anime to something beyond mere entertainment. It is a phenomenon. Enter, therefore, the cultural anthropologists, sociologists, philosophers, media scholars, Japanologists and other trained and dispassionate academic observers, all seeking to penetrate ¡°the soul of anime.¡±
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