A Dialectic of Native and Newcomer: The Kodaira Citizens' Festival in Suburban Tokyo

Abstract

The creation and staging ofnovelfestivals is on the rise in cities thoughout Japan in the name of tradition to foster affective community relations among relative strangers. The Kodaira Citizens' Festival in suburban Tokyo is one such festival. The tenacious presence in Kodaira of a small native sector among a vast majority of newcomers has occasioned the construction of the Festival as a dynamic juxtaposition of the old and novel, traditional and modern. This construction prefigures the idealizedfuture ofKodaira City. An analysis of the Kodaira Citizens' Festival contributes to an understanding of the affective, traditional dimensions of urbanization and city planning in Japan today. [Japan, Tokyo, cities, festivals, urbanization]