CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein to Participate in Conference on Creative Expression in Japan

by Betsy Gomez

This weekend sees CBLDF events around the country and around the world: CBLDF Executive Director Charles Brownstein is headed to Japan to talk about the challenges creative expression faces in Japan and abroad.

Japanese manga and anime have strong appeal worldwide, and as their popularity has increased, they have faced challenges in Japan and overseas, including in the United States. Japanese censors have actively called for and passed laws that regulate the sale of manga and the depiction of sexuality in manga. In the United States, a Korean manwha — the equivalent of manga — is near the top of the list of the most-challenged books in 2011, and the ownership of manga led to the prosecution of Christopher Handley and Ryan Matheson.

The conference addresses the challenges faced by manga and anime and the detrimental effect of regulation on creative expression in Japan. During the symposium, Brownstein will join local and international experts to talk about the censorship of content in manga and anime in both Japan and overseas.

The discussion takes place Friday, May 18, 2012, at 6:30 p.m., at the Hibiya Library Cultural Center Convention Hall (Hibiya Park, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo). The event is free, but capacity is limited, so reservations are recommended. The speakers include:

Charles Brownstein (CBLDF Executive Director)
Patrick W. Galbraith (The Otaku Encyclopedia)
Yu Sum Hayashi (Editor-in-Chief, Taiwanese anime magazine Frontier)
Rujirat Vinitphol, Ph.D. (Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, University of Tokyo)
Kaichiro Morikawa (Associate Professor, Meiji University)
Yukari Fujimoto (Associate Professor, Meiji University),
Takashi Yamaguchi (lawyer)

Reserve your spot here. (Please note that the reservation website is in Japanese.)