Transposition (Mar 2021)
L’hyperféminisation des chanteuses japonaises : shôjo kashu et aidoru
Abstract
The phenomenon of the aidoru, young female stars that are singers, dancers and actresses, and often come from Japanese pop groups made from scratch by a powerful music industry, developed greatly in the late 1960s. The high media coverage of these young artists puts them under important physical and moral demands: they must adopt outfits and behaviors to satisfy and retain their fans. But their portrayal of model adolescents with physical characteristics and hyperfeminized attitudes can be disturbing, as it plays both on seduction and sexual allusions, and on a deliberately childish and immature appearance. Their careers and salaries are determined by their notoriety, which can quickly be undermined by a scandal affecting their privacy, and the aidoru evolve in a relationship with their public that resembles a device of voyeurism and fan service.This figure of the successful teenage singer or actress has been present since before the war, with the phenomenon of shôjo kashu ("girl singers"). They embody the purity and innocence of childhood and are often confined to repertoires and roles that value these qualities. However, in the 1950s, artists like Misora Hibari seemed to gradually move away from this vision and offer an image playing on a seductive ambiguity embodied in a child's body. In this article, we will return to the historical and cultural contexts in which shôjo kashu and aidoru evolved, in order to better understand a major phenomenon in the Japanese music industry.
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