• Search
  • Lost Password?

The Soul of Anime: Collaborative Creativity and Japan’s Media Success Story

The Soul of Anime
Ian Condry
Duke University Press

Ian Condry explores the emergence of anime, Japanese animated film and television, as a global cultural phenomenon.

In The Soul of Anime, Ian Condry explores the emergence of anime, Japanese animated film and television, as a global cultural phenomenon. Drawing on ethnographic research, including interviews with artists at some of Tokyo’s leading animation studios—such as Madhouse, Gonzo, Aniplex, and Studio Ghibli—Condry discusses how anime’s fictional characters and worlds become platforms for collaborative creativity. He argues that the global success of Japanese animation has grown out of a collective social energy that operates across industries—including those that produce film, television, manga (comic books), and toys and other licensed merchandise—and connects fans to the creators of anime. For Condry, this collective social energy is the soul of anime.

Ian Condry
Written by
Ian Condry

Ian Condry is a cultural anthropologist who studies sound and Japanese popular culture. He is professor at MIT since 2002, and author of two books, Hip-Hop Japan and The Soul of Anime, both of which explore globalization from below. Free downloads here: mit.academia.edu/IanCondry.

In the fall of 2019, he launched the MIT Spatial Sound Lab, a community production studio for immersive, multiperspective, sonic experimentation. The Lab uses the d&b Soundscape object-based mixing technology and organizes events, including meetups, listening sessions and the Dissolve Music festival each fall.

As the artist Leftroman, he makes sample-based electronic music for multichannel performance as a means to explore the current landscape of music production and streaming services.

He was a WMBR radio DJ from 2018 - 2024 and currently produces a monthly online mixtape at mixcloud.com/iancondry.

His current research is a “spatial anthropology of sound” with a focus on the edges of electronic music performance in Tokyo, Boston, and Berlin.

Ian Condry Written by Ian Condry