The Production of Tradition and Culture in the Japanese Wedding Enterprise

Abstract

In this article I examine the production of culture in the contemporary commercial Japanese wedding. This is analyzed in relation to the theoretical discourse of ‘the invention of tradition’. However, while this ‘invention’ is usually related to political motivations, I discuss the invention of tradition and of culture for economic motivations. I offer a broader perspective of tradition and culture and show how flexible these two may be as they are manufactured, played with or imagined. The contemporary wedding consists of both ‘traditional-Japanese’ and ‘Western’ inventions. These are regarded here as cultural constructs which both play a significant role in the construction of contemporary Japanese cultural identity.

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