Pokémon(oracial): J-pop and the marginalization of mixed-heritage Japanese Americans

This thesis deconstructs the use of Japanese popular cultural iconography by art and community festival spaces in Bay Area Japantowns and critiques the ways in which they reinforce traditional and new Orientalist stereotypes of the Japanese American community. Through use of Japanese popular culture these spaces create a visual narrative that promotes homogenous and monoracial stereotypes of the Nikkei community. Leveraging ethnographic observations of community gallery and festival spaces this work investigates how meaning is constructed and derived within Japantown spaces through the use of Japanese popular culture imagery. Furthermore, this thesis explores how such imagery reinforces Japanophilic delineations of the Nikkei community that distort the heterogeneous mixed-heritage make-up of the Japanese America.