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Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 25, 2010

Happily lost in the 'empire of signs'

Signs and symbols play an ever-growing role in our increasingly complex society. In this respect, Japan — the "empire of signs," as French semiologist Roland Barthes called it back in 1970 — strikes and confounds the foreign visitor with a vast array of alphabets, shapes and designs.
EDITORIALS
Dec 24, 2010

Support for assault victims

The National Police Agency's crime statistics for 2009 show that 8,090 cases of rape and indecent sexual assault were reported to police that year.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Dec 21, 2010

Dreams for life, not just for Christmas

The noise echoing down the dimly lit street in suburban Tokyo suggested it was no ordinary Sunday for the kids at St. Francis Children's Home. The usually subdued atmosphere in the alleyways around Kugahara Station in Ota Ward was punctured by shouts and laughter as the children worked themselves up...
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Dec 19, 2010

The explosion of life: demise

Second of two parts
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 15, 2010

The Kremlin resets Russian foreign policy

2010 has seen a change in Russia's relations with the West. The Obama administration came to office promising a "reset" in relations with Moscow, and in the past year, this new mood of cooperation has begun to deliver tangible results. Moscow and Washington are working together to reduce their nuclear...
COMMENTARY
Dec 12, 2010

The dead weight on Taiwanese aspirations

HONG KONG — The ruling party of Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou — in an election carefully watched in Beijing — has managed to win three of five mayoral races in Taiwan, reversing a losing streak in legislative by-elections since Ma's presidential election triumph in 2008.
EDITORIALS
Dec 11, 2010

Test results still worrisome

Japan's ranking had been falling in the triennial international academic survey of 15-year-old students by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). In the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), Japan fell from eighth place in 2000 to 15th place in 2006 in reading,...
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Dec 10, 2010

Spa gets into festive mood at aquarium

Spa resort The Luigans is organizing a Christmas show at an adjacent aquarium on Dec. 18, featuring live performances by a painter and various musicians.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 8, 2010

The Chinese challenge

NEW YORK — So far, discussions about whether China should revalue its currency, the renminbi, have focused almost exclusively on the impact of the currency's exchange rate on China's trade balance. But what would an appreciation of the renminbi do to China's inward and outward foreign direct investment...
COMMUNITY / Issues / JUST BE CAUSE
Dec 7, 2010

MOFA gets E for effort in 'with or without U' farce

My Japanese passport expired last month, meaning I've been a citizen here for a full decade now. Hooray.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Dec 7, 2010

Uniqlo billionaire Yanai goes back to the basics

Tadashi Yanai, Japan's richest man, used advice from management guru Peter Drucker to build his Uniqlo clothing empire. To pull out of a slump that's hammered profits and shares, the billionaire is revisiting the lessons.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Dec 5, 2010

Rape: A crime for which hush-up society ought to stand trial, too

Mika Kobayashi is a brave woman.
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / NPB NOTEBOOK
Dec 5, 2010

Valentine says NPB needs major reform

The posting system is far from perfect, but is there a better solution?
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Dec 5, 2010

Cabrera looking for work after injury-plagued season

There has been a lot of cross-traffic in recent days with players switching from one Japanese team to another or heading for the majors. One question yet to be answered, though, is: Where will Alex Cabrera play in 2011?
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Dec 3, 2010

Carl Craig

In April 2000, Tokyo nightclub Womb opened its doors and became one of the cornerstones of Japan's dance-music scene. This weekend, the club brings music fans the third installment of their Womb Adventure event, which adopts the theme of "expansion of reality." Though the club is located in Tokyo's Shibuya...
JAPAN / ANALYSIS
Nov 30, 2010

Nakaima victory helps Kan, U.S.

NAHA, Okinawa Pref. — The re-election of Okinawa Gov. Hirokazu Nakaima on Sunday is a much-needed victory for Prime Minister Naoto Kan's government, which clearly wanted him to win, and the United States, who saw his opponent as a threat to the entire U.S. military presence in the prefecture.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHO'S WHO
Nov 30, 2010

Frenchwoman's passions realized with Japanese help

Florence Roca, 45, is a French mother of three married to a fellow countryman who has lived on and off in Japan for 10 years. Aside from family, she has a passion for painting porcelain and making jewelry.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Nov 28, 2010

Education profiteers and the public trough

NEW YORK — A college or university, especially of a private variety, may not be "an eleemosynary institution," as Sen. Sam Ervin, of the Watergate hearings, might put it were he alive, but the American insistence on free-market notions has brought the matter to the other extreme in higher education....
EDITORIALS
Nov 28, 2010

Death sentence for a minor

Six lay judges and three professional judges at the Sendai District Court on Nov. 25 sentenced a male 19-year-old to death for murdering two people and injuring two others, one of them seriously. This is the second death sentence under the lay judge system introduced in 2009 and the first death sentence...
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Nov 24, 2010

'Virtua Tennis 4' moves into the next dimension

Another motion controller, another sports game. It didn't take game developers long to follow the lead set by Nintendo's Wii and create games for the new PlayStation 3 Move and Xbox 360 Kinect add-ons that revolve around throwing, batting, putting or lobbing things. And yet somehow it's still not hard...
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Nov 23, 2010

Move over 3G, LTE new kid on the block

Mobile communications have become part of daily life and the trend is accelerating. This has fueled the development of Long Term Evolution, a next-generation communications network.
JAPAN
Nov 23, 2010

Japan hand Chalmers Johnson dead at 79

OSAKA — American author and scholar Chalmers Johnson, whose views on postwar Japan angered American academics and Japan experts in the late 1980s but influenced a generation of students studying the country, died Saturday in California at age 79.
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Nov 19, 2010

UNESCO artist to hold concert to warn against medicine abuse

Missa Johnouchi, one of UNESCO's Artists for Peace, is helping spread the message of harmony in Japan.

Longform

After pandemic-era border regulations eased, Indian migrants began returning to Japan. Their population now stands at more than 50,000 across the country.
How remote work is rewriting the migrant experience in Japan