Yoshitoshi - 100 Aspects of the Moon - 97

is a mythical practice of

senicide Senicide, also known as geronticide or gerontocide, is the practice of killing the elderly. This killing of the elderly can be characterized by both active and passive methods as senio-euthanasia or altruistic self-sacrifice. The aim of activ ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, whereby an infirm or

elderly Old age is the range of ages for people nearing and surpassing life expectancy. People who are of old age are also referred to as: old people, elderly, elders, senior citizens, seniors or older adults. Old age is not a definite biological sta ...

relative was carried to a mountain, or some other remote, desolate place, and left there to die.

Kunio Yanagita was a Japanese author, scholar, and Folklore studies, folklorist. He began his career as a bureaucrat, but developed an interest in rural Japan and its folk traditions. This led to a change in his career. His pursuit of this led to his eventual e ...

concluded that the ubasute folklore comes from

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Buddhist Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or ...

mythology. According to the Kodansha Illustrated Encyclopedia of Japan, ''ubasute'' "is the subject of

legend A legend is a genre of folklore that consists of a narrative featuring human actions, believed or perceived to have taken place in human history. Narratives in this genre may demonstrate human values, and possess certain qualities that give the ...

, but…does not seem ever to have been a common custom.".

Folklore

In one

allegory, a son carries his mother up a mountain on his back. During the journey, she stretches out her arms, catching the twigs and scattering them in their wake, so that her son will be able to find the way home. A poem commemorates the story:

In popular culture

* The practice of ubasute is explored at length in the Japanese novel ''The Ballad of Narayama'' (1956) by

Shichirō Fukazawa was a Japanese author and guitarist whose 1960 short story ''Fūryū mutan'' ("Tale of an Elegant Dream") caused a nationwide uproar and led to an attempt by an ultranationalist to assassinate the president of the magazine that published it. B ...

. The novel was the basis for three films:

Keisuke Kinoshita was a Japanese film director and screenwriter. Ronald Berganbr>"A satirical eye on Japan: Keisuke Kinoshita" ''The Guardian'', 5 January 1999. While lesser-known internationally than contemporaries such as Akira Kurosawa, Kenji Mizoguchi and ...

's '' The Ballad of Narayama'' (1958), Korean director

Kim Ki-young Kim Ki-young (; October 10, 1919According to official documents, Kim was born in 1919. However, Kim insisted he was actually born in 1922. – February 5, 1998) was a South Korean film director, known for his intensely psychosexual and melo ...

's ''

Goryeojang ''Goryeojang'' () is a 1963 South Korean drama film edited, written, produced and directed by Kim Ki-young. Plot The film tells the story of a poor farm worker who, according to local tradition, must take his 70-year-old mother into the mountains ...

'' (1963), and Shohei Imamura's '' The Ballad of Narayama'', which won the

Palme d'Or The (; ) is the highest prize awarded to the director of the Best Feature Film of the Official Competition at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festiv ...

1983 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the ...

Places

* is the common name of , a mountain () in

Chikuma, Nagano is a city located in Nagano Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 58,124 in 22,407 households, and a population density of . The total area of the city was . Geography Chikuma is located in the Chikuma River valley, sout ...

, Japan.Hoffman *

Obasute Station is a railway station on the Shinonoi Line in the city of Chikuma, Nagano, Chikuma, Nagano Prefecture, Japan. It is operated by the East Japan Railway Company (JR East). Lines Obasute Station, which is served by trains on the Shinonoi Line, is lo ...

, Chikuma,

Nagano Prefecture is a Landlocked country, landlocked Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshu. Nagano Prefecture has a population of 2,007,682 () and has a geographic area of . Nagano Prefecture borders Niigata Prefecture ...

, Japan * According to folklore, the Aokigahara forest at the base of Mount Fuji was once such a site, where its reputation as a suicide site might have originated.

References

External links

What Japan can Offer to International Bioethics

in

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

, English version

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Folklore

In popular culture

Places

See also

References

Further reading

External links