Coffee shops offer their customers a special place in their urban lives, and offer observers a window on social and cultural norms and realities. Japan’s kissaten have long been unscripted places for an escape from the programs and demands of social roles. Over time they have reflected and served different social, political and personal needs. In the Meiji era, they were a means to emulate London or New York, to be modern which meant then to be Western. During the Taisho era, they became the venues of expression and creativity for feminists, radicals, poets, and artists. The post WWII Showa-style kissaten, now an object of nostalgia for retired people and for young people with a borrowed yearning for the past, was smoky with salarymen, reading fat manga during breaks. During the bubble economy of the 1980s, drinking gold-sprinkled coffee from antique Limoges cups could demonstrate a sense of exuberant luxury, even as students and others inhabited their own less pricey coffee spaces. Today’s very diverse coffee spaces, including the spread of American coffee chains, the high level techno-geek coffee of connoisseurs, the personal café spaces created by young couples, and the persistence of kissaten, jazz and classical music cafes demonstrate the constant and changing interest in these places where, above all, an outstanding cup of coffee can be found.

Speakers:
• Merry White, Professor of Anthropology, Boston University
• Ulrike Schaede, Professor and Director of the Japan Forum for Innovation and Technology, GPS UC San Diego