<論文>戦前期日本農村における映画製作 : 奈良県吉野郡上北山村を事例として

Abstract

This study examines the film making experiences of rural villagers in prewar Japan. As motion picture films and theater are usually regarded as modern, urban culture, they have often been examined in cultural studies and media studies, but rarely mentioned within rural sociology. Due mainly to this disciplinary division, the relationship between film and the rural village has not received sufficient academic attention. This study illuminates the sociological significance of this relationship by focusing on film production practiced by prominent villagers in rural areas. Firstly, this paper provides an overview of the filming process in rural areas through examples of film making in the Yoshino Area, Nara Prefecture. Secondly, two film texts made in 1928 in Kamikitayama village, a village in the Yoshino Area, are examined. The analysis of their contents reveal that prominent villagers during the prewar period established their village's cultural self-portraits by appropriating the "sangaku-shumi" (the promotion of hiking) policy, the Japanese nationality, and the Imperial myth of "Jinmu Tennou (Emperor Jinmu)". This article is a case study to redefine rural villagers as subjects capable of establishing their own cultural self-portraits through the production of films.