@article {3302,
	title = {To be Seen, Not Just Read: Script Use on the Votive Prayer Tablets of Anime, Manga, and Game Fans},
	journal = {Japanese Studies},
	volume = {42},
	year = {2022},
	month = {02/2022},
	chapter = {1-22},
	abstract = {This article proposes one social explanation for the occurrence of graphic variation in contemporary written Japanese by examining a heretofore unexamined context of writing. Embracing the material culture approach, I explore the votive prayer tablets dedicated at Shinto shrines by fans of popular culture media productions. Fans pen text on the votive tablets that follows aesthetics of manga as well as online communication, incorporating features that are usually limited to print and online writing. Analyzing upwards of 2,000 votive tablets from three shrines, this article proceeds to dissect a writing style composed of a mix of syllabaries and symbols using {\textquoteleft}thick description{\textquoteright} to evince the emotion behind fans{\textquoteright} calculated efforts to construct text that is not simply to be read, but to be seen. Seeking to answer the question of what fans attempt to achieve by writing on the votive tablets in the way that they do, I will reference folklorist Elliott Oring{\textquoteright}s {\textquoteleft}appropriate incongruity{\textquoteright} to put forth an argument that fans, harnessing a sense of play and endeavoring to animate the text on the votive tablets, intimate by means of the visual presentation of writing-restricted variation a questioning of the perceived division between the two-dimensional and three-dimensional worlds.},
	keywords = {Japan, religion and culture},
	doi = {https://doi.org/10.1080/10371397.2022.2031138}
}
