Abstract
This paper considers how Japanese futsuu “ordinary”-ness functions as a cultural logic that mediates aspirations and interpretations of a good life under conditions of socioeconomic risk and precarity. Invoking ordinariness can be a tactic for (re)-framing otherwise marginalized or marginalizing practices within the norm, shifting what counts as ordinary in the process, and pushing back against neoliberally inflected pressures toward marketable, financialized selfhood. Alignments toward ordinariness emerge across diverse discursive planes including political slogans, blogs, and natural conversations, where the ordinary is treated as aspirational under the shadow of its potential loss.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 386-407 |
Number of pages | 22 |
Journal | Journal of Linguistic Anthropology |
Volume | 32 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Aug 2022 |
Keywords
- Japan
- interactional semiosis
- ordinariness
- precarity
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Language and Linguistics
- Linguistics and Language