How Many Nobel Prizes Does it Take to Make You Japanese? (w/Mary Kobayashi)

Japan By River Cruise

Syukuro Manabe and some other people win the Nobel Prize, illustrating a lot about how and why Japan claims people as Japanese.
We talk to Mary Kobayashi about how she defines her Japanese identity, and how media representation works to define "Japanese..." as sexy, anime robot.

The average age of Ollie's friends is getting lower.

Bobby recycles.

Topics discussed on this episode range from:

• Brian's back!
• Performance anxiety and the introvert/performer paradox
• Syukuro Manabe's Nobel Prize Win
• How Japan latches on to successful members of the diaspora even when they've left
• Japanese people trying to monopolize all the good qualities
• A thorough interrogation of how Bobby racially profiles his children
• How using "Japanese people are okay with us loving their culture" to defend cultural appropriation
• Mary's research into who the most popular Japanese characters are
• The stereotypes that get used in Western Media to depict Japaneseness
• The stages of minority representation, and how anti-stereotype roles are still racist
• Mary's experience with adult swim and in the entertainment industry
• Her take on how Western Media handles Asian representation, whitewashing and tokenism
• How Korean Entertainment contributes positively to representation
• Terrace House
• How the discussion of what Japaneseness is has moved from one that happens mostly in Japan to one that happens globally

Topics discussed on the extras include:

• Mary's mom knew who Bobby was
• How Bobby curates his personality depending on what jobs he's doing.
• The teenage Ollie Horn who's beating Ollie out of the google search results
• Mary's experience in comedy, music, and entertainment overall
• The unfortunate timing of her departure from Adult Swim due to a move, and the advent of remote work
• The experience of having to do entertainment on ZOOM
• MUCH MUCH MORE

Get access to the extras for standard episodes by supporting the podcast for less than $1 an episode by becoming a member at http://buymeacoffee.com.

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Social Media Links:

Mary Kobayashi: Twitter

Ollie Horn: Twitter | Instagram

Bobby Judo: Twitter | Instagram | YouTube

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• Bobby uses the Samson Go Mic and Ollie uses the AT2005USB mic

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