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Portal:Japan

Coordinates: 36°30′N 139°00′E / 36.5°N 139°E / 36.5; 139
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Imperial Seal of Japan

Japan is an island country in East Asia. It is located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asian mainland, and 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 in the south. The Japanese archipelago consists of four major islands—Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu—and thousands of smaller islands, covering 377,975 square kilometres (145,937 sq mi). Japan has a population of nearly 124 million as of 2024, and is the eleventh-most populous country. Its capital and largest city is Tokyo; the Greater Tokyo Area is the largest metropolitan area in the world, with more than 38 million inhabitants as of 2016. Japan is divided into 47 administrative prefectures and eight traditional regions. About three-quarters of the country's terrain is mountainous and heavily forested, concentrating its agriculture and highly urbanized population along its eastern coastal plains. The country sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, making its islands prone to destructive earthquakes and tsunamis.

The first known habitation of the archipelago dates to the Upper Paleolithic, with the beginning Japanese Paleolithic dating to c. 36,000 BC. Between the fourth and sixth centuries, its kingdoms were united under an emperor in Nara, and later Heian-kyō. From the 12th century, actual power was held by military dictators (shōgun) and feudal lords (daimyō), and enforced by warrior nobility (samurai). After rule by the Kamakura and Ashikaga shogunates and a century of warring states, Japan was unified in 1600 by the Tokugawa shogunate, which implemented an isolationist foreign policy. In 1853, a United States fleet forced Japan to open trade to the West, which led to the end of the shogunate and the restoration of imperial power in 1868. In the Meiji period, the Empire of Japan pursued rapid industrialization and modernization, as well as militarism and overseas colonization. In 1937, Japan invaded China, and in 1941 attacked the United States and European colonial powers, entering World War II as an Axis power. After suffering defeat in the Pacific War and two atomic bombings, Japan surrendered in 1945 and came under Allied occupation. After the war, the country underwent rapid economic growth, although its economy has stagnated since 1990.

Japan is a constitutional monarchy with a bicameral legislature, the National Diet. A great power and the only Asian member of the G7, Japan has constitutionally renounced its right to declare war, but maintains one of the world's strongest militaries. A developed country with one of the world's largest economies by nominal GDP, Japan is a global leader in science and technology and the automotive, robotics, and electronics industries. It has one of the world's highest life expectancies, though it is undergoing a population decline. Japan's culture is well known around the world, including its art, cuisine, film, music, and popular culture, which includes prominent comics, animation, and video game industries. (Full article...)

Lolicon art often blends childlike characteristics with erotic undertones.
Lolicon art often blends childlike characteristics with erotic undertones.
Lolicon, also romanized as rorikon, is a Japanese portmanteau of the phrase "Lolita complex". In Japan, the term describes an attraction to young girls, or an individual with such an attraction. Outside Japan, the term is less common and most often refers to a genre of manga and anime wherein underaged or childlike female characters are depicted in an erotic manner. The phrase is a reference to Vladimir Nabokov's book, Lolita, in which a middle-aged man becomes sexually obsessed with a 12-year-old girl. The equivalent term for attraction to (or art pertaining to erotic portrayal of) young boys is shotacon. Some critics claim that the lolicon genre contributes to actual sexual abuse of children, while others claim that there is no evidence for this, or that there is evidence to the contrary. Although several countries have attempted to criminalize lolicon's sexually explicit forms as a type of child pornography, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Sweden, the Philippines and Ireland are among the few to have actually done so. Generally, lolicon is a term used to describe a sexual attraction to younger girls, or girls with youthful characteristics. In other words, it can refer to actual or perceived pedophilia and ephebophilia. Strictly speaking, Lolita complex in Japanese refers only to the paraphilia itself, but the abbreviation lolicon can refer to an individual that has the paraphilia as well. Lolicon is a widespread phenomenon in Japan, where it is a frequent subject of scholarly articles and criticism. Many general bookstores and newsstands openly offer illustrated lolicon material, but there has also been police action against lolicon manga. (Full article...)

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November 27:

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In the news

26 November 2024 – Japanese space program
JAXA aborts an Epsilon S engine test after a fire occurs at the Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan. (DW) (CNA)
24 November 2024 – 2024 World Rally Championship
In rally motorsport, Thierry Neuville of Hyundai wins the World Rally Drivers' Championship at Rally Japan, his first world title in the sport. (France 24)
11 November 2024 – 2024 Japanese general election
Shigeru Ishiba is sworn in as the 103rd prime minister of Japan following the first runoff vote in thirty years. (Kyodo News) (Mainichi)
5 November 2024 –
Researchers at Kyoto University in Japan launch LignoSat, the world's first wooden satellite constructed without screws or glue, into space. It will orbit Earth for six months. (DW)
3 November 2024 – 2024 Japan Series
In baseball, the Yokohama DeNA BayStars defeat the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks to win the Japan Series in six games, capturing their third championship and their first since 1998. (NHK)
31 October 2024 – North Korean missile tests
North Korea launches an intercontinental ballistic missile on a "lofted trajectory" toward the Sea of Japan. Japanese Defense Minister Gen Nakatani says that this was the longest-ever launch of a North Korean ICBM, lasting 87 minutes, marking significant progress in range compared to previous tests. (Al Jazeera)

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Ono in 2016

Yoko Ono (Japanese: 小野 洋子, romanizedOno Yōko, usually spelled in katakana オノ・ヨーコ; born February 18, 1933) is a Japanese multimedia artist, singer, songwriter, and peace activist. Her work also encompasses performance art and filmmaking.

Ono grew up in Tokyo and moved to New York City in 1952 to join her family. She became involved with New York City's downtown artists scene in the early 1960s, which included the Fluxus group, and became well known in 1969 when she married English musician John Lennon of the Beatles, with whom she would subsequently record as a duo in the Plastic Ono Band. The couple used their honeymoon as a stage for public protests against the Vietnam War with what they called a bed-in. She and Lennon remained married until he was murdered in front of the couple's apartment building, the Dakota, on December 8, 1980. Together they had one son, Sean, who later also became a musician. (Full article...)

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Flag of Miyagi Prefecture
Miyagi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region on Honshū island. The capital is Sendai. Miyagi Prefecture was formerly part of the province of Mutsu. Mutsu Province, on northern Honshū, was one of the last provinces to be formed as land was taken from the indigenous Ainu and became the largest as it expanded northward. The ancient capital was in modern Miyagi Prefecture. In the 3rd month of 2nd year of the Wadō era (709), there was an uprising against governmental authority in Mutsu Province and in nearby Echigo Province. Troops were promptly dispatched to subdue the revolt. In Wadō 5 (712), the land of Mutsu Province was administratively separated from Dewa Province. Empress Genmei's Daijō-kan continued to organize other cadastral changes in the provincial map of the Nara period, as in the following year when Mimasaka Province was divided from Bizen Province; Hyūga Province was sundered from Ōsumi Province; and Tanba Province was severed from Tango Province. During the Sengoku period various clans ruled different parts of the province. The Uesugi clan had a castle town at Wakamatsu in the south, the Nanbu clan at Morioka in the north, and Date Masamune, a close ally of the Tokugawa, established Sendai, which is now the largest town of the Tōhoku region. In the Meiji period, four new provinces were created from parts of Mutsu: Rikuchū, Rikuzen, Iwaki, and Iwashiro. The area that is now Aomori Prefecture continued to be part of Mutsu until the Abolition of the han system and the nationwide conversion to the prefectural structure of modern Japan.

Did you know... – show different entries

Sakae Menda

  • ...that the story of Sada Abe, a woman who cut off her dead lover's genitals and carried them around with her for days, is one of Japan's most notorious scandals?

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Economy Japanese Companies | Primary sector | Industry | Tourism | Currency | Tokyo Stock Exchange | Japanese economic miracle | Communications | Transportation (Shinkansen · Tokyo Metro · Railway companies) | Japan Business Federation | Housing in Japan
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Geography Geography of Japan | Japanese archipelago | Islands of Japan | Cities | Lakes | Rivers | Waterfalls | Mountains | National Parks | Japanese Alps | Mount Fuji | Lake Biwa | Seto Inland Sea | Sea of Japan | EEZ of Japan
Demographics Demographics | Yamato people | Hāfu (half Japanese people) | Ainu people | Japanese people | Japanese names | Aging of Japan
Animals Animals in Japan | Japanese macaque | Japanese raccoon dog (Tanuki) | Japanese Green pheasant | Koi | Japanese Bobtail | Hokkaido dog | Shiba Inu | Akita (dog) | Asian giant hornet | Japanese badger
Other Tokyo | Kyoto | Nara | Osaka | Sapporo | Okinawa | Kinkaku-ji | Kiyomizu-dera | Yakushi-ji temple | Tōdai-ji temple | Sensō-ji temple | Meiji Shrine | Akihabara | Shinjuku | Tokyo Tower | Tokyo Imperial Palace | Himeji Castle | Matsumoto Castle | Osaka Castle | Nagoya Castle | Tokyo Disney Resort

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36°30′N 139°00′E / 36.5°N 139°E / 36.5; 139