"journey To The West And The East Asian Popular Culture

The Journey to the West, the traditional novel in the Ming Dynasty of China, has influenced on countries in the East Asia such as Korea and Japan. The brilliant fantasy, abundant comedy, and profound philosophy and religion of The Journey to the West have penetrated into the thoughts and ideas of people in each country of the East Asia, and deepened their lives. In addition, the preference for the Journey to the West has been lasted until today's modern societies, so it has been an important material in diverse genres such as dramas, comics, children's books and publications in the popular cultures of the East Asia. This thesis examined how the Journey to the West was accepted in the popular cultures of the East Asia based on the movies, dramas, comics, children's books and publications of China, Korea and Japan since 1980s. Simultaneously, by analyzing the features of the Journey to the West in each country's popular culture, this thesis found that these differences had deep associations with each country's culture and folk.In the preliminary of this thesis, the statues of the popular cultures of the Journey to the West, which had researched before in China, Korea and Japan, was summarized and the researching materials of popular cultures related to the Journey to the West were organized. China, the origin of the Journey to the West, has more researching materials than Korea and Japan, but generally speaking, the existing researches of the three countries are still in the beginning stage.The ChapterⅠ, the elements of the modern popular cultures, outlined the reasons why the Journey to the West had been actively dramatized in the products of popular cultures until now by analyzing the Journey to the West itself. As a consequence, the myth and religious outlook on the world, the features of Juvenile literature, and the colloquial style and descriptive structure, which the Journey to the West had, were regarded as the factors matching the modern popular cultures. Furthermore, one of the reasons that the Journey to the West was still loved by people by being actively dramatized was the juvenile-literary element. The hybrid and animal images of the characters in the Journey to the West represented the psychology of children in modern times. What's more, the amusement was the juvenile-literary component of the Journey to the West which cannot be omitted. The comical dramatization, slangs and obscene languages in the Journey to the West matched the psychology of children. The contests, games, magic, weapons, technologies and spells which were appeared in the Journey to the West were also suited to the children's amusement, and reminded the various items in modern computer games. The other juvenile-literary factor included the expression of the longing for heroes and heroic psychology. Also, in the formal aspects of languages and descriptive structures, the element of the modern popular cultures of the Journey to the West could be founded. The dynamically dialogic-style description, colloquial-style speaking and various exclamations became the vital factors which the Journey to the West were welcomed to people in modern times. In addition, the descriptive structure of the Journey to the West had combined rhyme and prose. The prose mainly talked about story, and the rhyme provided communications with and sensible effects to readers. This unique structure was similar to the combined forms between video images and letters which were easily shown in computer games at present.Next, the ChapterⅡ, the Journey to the West in the popular cultures in countries of the East Asia, organized the works in relation to the Journey to the West among the popular cultures of China, Korea and Japan, and looked at the contents. This thesis organized the dramas, movies, publications, and the Internet literacy of China, the comics, children's books and publications of Korea, and the dramas, movies, children's books, comics and other publications of Japan in a systematic way. As a result, there were the large quantities and high qualities products of the popular culture related to the Journey to the West in the East Asia.The ChapterⅢ, the features of the Journey to the West among the popular cultures in the East Asia, the characteristics of each dramatized work produced in China, Korea and Japan were analyzed. China pursued the modernization of the Journey to the West in the relatively traditional and conservative aspect because it was the original place producing the Journey to the West. Hence, even though China made a thorough effort in creating the new meanings, it still kept the conservative attitude towards succeeding the classic. Especially, the various internet versions of the Journey to the West were popular because it was dramatized on the Internet vigorously. From the Journey to the West in the popular culture of Japan, there were two remarkable features shown. Firstly, Monk Xuanzang(玄奘)was described as a female, and secondly, Shawujing(沙悟净)was regarded as a Japanese monster, Hetong(河童).The Journey to the West shows the objective aspect which a classic maintains its life by overcoming the corrosions during periods and by being recreated as an excellent work even in the modern popular cultures. Furthermore, when each country in the East Asia appreciates the Journey to the West remade, they should respect and understand each other's cultures first. Now classics become the passwords which are difficult for people to decipher. The reason is that the languages and cultures which the classics were popular are so different from ones in nowadays. The novels which people were excited in reading are ones which today's people cannot easily understand. I believe that the efforts should be made to keep understanding and accepting the cultural differences of each country by deciphering the classics' passwords and interpreting the works of popular cultures in cultural aspects in order to remove the gaps of times and perceptions. Also, I wish that this thesis makes the small contribution towards succeeding them at this beginning point.