Cool-Kawaii: Afro-Japanese Aesthetics and New World Modernity

The Cool-Kawaii: Afro-Japanese Aesthetics and New World Modernity, by Thorsten Botz-Bornstein, analyzes and compares African American cool culture and the Japanese aesthetics of kawaii or cute and characterizes them as expressions set against oppressive homogenizations of a technocratic world. The Cool-Kawaii sheds light on the history and development of both cultures in three main ways: First, both emerge from similar historical conditions; second, both are in search of human dignity and liberation, and finally, both kawaii and African American cool establish a new kind of modernity able to transcend both traditionalism and anti-traditionalist modernity.

• | Author: Thorsten Botz-Bornstein
• | Publisher: Lexington Books
• | Publication Date: Dec 28, 2010
• | Number of Pages: 238 pages
• | Binding: Hardback or Cased Book
• | ISBN-10: 0739148451
• | ISBN-13: 9780739148457