2019 Fiscal Year Research-status Report
Symbolic Politics and the Ascendance of Rhetoric: An inquiry into Political Symbols, their Usage and Role in Japan
| Project/Area Number |
19K01462
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| Research Institution | Doshisha University |
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Principal Investigator |
FELDMAN Ofer 同志社大学, 政策学部, 教授 (50208906)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2019-04-01 – 2022-03-31
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| Keywords | Political Communication / Political Rhetoric / Political interviews / discourse analysis / Political symbols / Symbolic interaction |
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| Outline of Annual Research Achievements |
This study examines the forms and functions of the symbols used in the public sphere in Japan within the broad framework of political behavior and communication. For this purpose, data was collected during 2019 from four nationally-broadcast television programs: Puraimu Nyusu (Prime News), Shin Hodo 1930 (New Broadcast 1930), Gekiron Kurosufaya (Gekiron Crossfire) and Nichiyo Toron (Sunday Debate). Interviews from these programs were carefully selected based on detailed criteria. Interviews then were recorded using a DVD recorder. A verbatim transcript was made of each selected interview.
Based on a methodology used by the chief researcher in previous research in Japan, criteria for identifying questions and responses were determined. Two coding sheets were devised for analyzing the structure and verbal content of the interviews: the first for interviewers' questions, and the second was devised for interviewees' responses.
I will continue to gather interview data in the coming few weeks and analyze, as planned, the nature of these interview programs with the aim to later compare and evaluate the performance and the communication style of Japanese televised political interviews with their counterparts in Western societies.
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| Current Status of Research Progress |
Current Status of Research Progress
2: Research has progressed on the whole more than it was originally planned.
Reason
Assessing the processes of data collection and the initial analysis of the data, the study is progressing at the present time rather smoothly. As for the data collection: I plan to include in the sample of this study and analyze 125 interviewee-politicians and nonpoliticians. As of today, 115 interviews were DVD recorded and 110 of them were fully transcribed. The number of identified questions and answers in these 110 interviews reached 2,107; this suggest that the total number of questions and answers can reach 2,500, which is a large sample in this type of research.
Regarding the data analysis: I am working now on building a model on the interaction between questions and answers and the usage of symbols. This model consists of the content of interviewers' questions (regarding knowledge of events, personnel affairs, political parties, political processes, political commitments, and issues) in addition to the attributes of the respondents (including their affiliation as members of the coalition or opposition camps, their role in government, gender, age, local or national level politicians, and nonpoliticians).
As mentioned, data collection and data analysis are still in progress. Yet, at this stage the study smoothly progress. I am planning to finish the collection of the remaining data and the coding of the interviews within the coming few months and to start immediately after the analysis of the total data.
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| Strategy for Future Research Activity |
In the following research, I will utilize the two coding sheets designed especially for this research to analyze the collected data from the televised political interviews. To assess the way and extent Japanese politicians, government bureaucrats, entrepreneurs, and the mass media employ symbols to address the public, a special attention will be allocated to the use of sources; that is, what symbols do interviewees use and who they rely on and cite when presenting replies to questions they are asked. Further attention will be given to the context in which symbols and sources are used (either to address questions regarding knowledge of events, personnel affairs, political parties, political processes, political commitments, or issues), and the attributes of the respondents (their position in government, political affiliation a coalition or opposition parties’ members, local, national level politicians and nonpoliticians, their gender, and age).
This type of analysis will help in to identify and construct a model on the nature, characteristics, role, and usage of political symbols in Japan, to detail the role and affect symbols play in Japanese political culture (including public discourse) in a comparative, cross-cultural, cross-national context, Further it will advance the scholarly debate on the functions of symbols in the conduct of politics, and the manner in which those functions are performed under various situations in different societies and cultures.
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| Causes of Carryover |
(理由) This is because those who helped in the transcriptions of the televised political interviews were keen in their work and ended earlier than the planed schedule for this year.
(使用計画) In the next fiscal year, as in this fiscal year, I intend to use personnel expenses for such goals as transcribing the rest of the interviews data, coding the interviews, and inputting the data before starting the calculation with the computer. In addition, expenses will be used for purchasing of DVDs for the videotaping of interviews sessions, for data analysis, statistical analysis software, and for editing/rewriting papers before presenting them in international associations and in international journals and books. For that matter part of the expenses will be used to participation in international scientific meetings and for collaboration in research with Europeans and American colleagues.
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