キャラクター精神分析　マンガ・文学・日本人（双書Zero） by Tamaki Saitō

キャラクター精神分析　マンガ・文学・日本人（双書Zero） Reviews

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  Wei Lin

  A pretty nice overview of the idea of character in contemporary Japanese culture. Saito's angles include the contexts of school/classroom socialization, dissociative identity disorder, semiotic theory, manga, light novels (particularly NISIOISIN's), superflat art, gijinka, the concept of moe, and Azuma Hiroki's database theory. Ultimately, Saito's main point is a pretty simple though important one, and can be summed up in the following equation: the human individual = the character + the singularity that makes each human unique in itself.
  
  I think that the stakes of this book are similar to those of an article by Bradley Onishi called “Information, Bodies, and Heidegger: Tracing Visions of the Posthuman.” (Not that those concerns are unique to that article, though I thought that it presented those concerns in a well condensed and accessible manner.) Basically, the concern here is about the codification of human beings into units (which the idea of character has the potential to carry out), and how we can rescue or preserve the singularity of each individual human being.
  
  Though I thought that Saito's book was a pretty nice exploration of these ideas with really fascinating examples, I don't really think that the book has a very solid or consistent argument - Saito seems to contradict himself sometimes. In that sense, I suggest viewing the book as a kind of launching pad for further ideas (e.g. through the many sources it introduces) rather than as something to rely on in itself. After all, the book seems to heavily rely on the perspective of other writers (like Azuma, or Ito Go) without really putting a forth a very strong argument on its own.
  
  Nevertheless, a pretty enjoyable read, with an accessible style.