UCLA Lecture Okinawa

UCLA Colloquium

January 25, 2016 | 12:30 - 2:00 PM
Nationalism and Vitalism on the Okinawan Stage
UCLA Royce Hall 314
Colloquium with James Rhys Edwards,  Ph.D (UCLA Ethnomusicology 2015)

In 1879, Imperial Japan annexed the Ryūkyū Islands, dissolving the Ryūkyū Kingdom and establishing Okinawa Prefecture.

This "disposition of Ryūkyū" triggered a fitful transformation of longstanding political and economic relations.

It also stimulated the creation of cultural forms and practices grounded in ethnic-national and class identity rather than status identity.

In this talk, I will introduce the art form perhaps most representative of the prewar Okinawan working class: popular musical drama or kageki. Read more

Free and open to the public