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Aum Shinrikyo and Religious Terrorism in Japanese Collective Memory
Rin Ushiyama
2022
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Aum Shinrikyō’s sarin attack on the Tokyo subway in March 1995 left an indelible mark on Japanese society. This book is the first comprehensive study of the competing memories of Aum Shinrikyō’s religious terrorism. Developing a sociological framework for how uneven distributions of power and resources shape commemorative processes, this book explores how the Aum Affair developed as a ‘cultural trauma’ in Japanese collective memory following the Tokyo attack. The book shows how numerous stakeholders, including the state, the mass media, public intellectuals, victims, and perpetrators offered competing narratives about the causes and consequences of Aum’s violence. Combining multiple methods including media content analysis, participant observation, and original interviews with victims and ex-members, this book reveals various flashpoints of contention such as the state regulation of religion, ‘brainwashing’ and ‘mind control’ controversies, and the morality of capital punishment. It shows that although cultural trauma construction requires the use of moral binaries such as ‘good vs.. evil’ and ‘sacred vs.. profane’, the entrenchment of such binary codes in commemorative processes can ultimately hinder social repair and reconciliation.
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Keywords
- Asahara Shōkō Aum Shinrikyo commemoration new religion mass media cults brainwashing religious violence terrorism
- thema EDItEUR::1 Place qualifiers::1F Asia::1FP East Asia, Far East::1FPJ Japan
- thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JB Society and culture: general
- thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHB Sociology
- thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JM Psychology::JMR Cognition and cognitive psychology
Links
DOI: 10.5871/bacad/9780197267370.001.0001Editions