The Lifeways of Kamakami Village in Yamaguchi Prefecture

Behavioral Neuroscience & Psychology

Luken, Madison

Godlaski, Aaran (Mentor)

English, Japanese

The landscape of Kawakami Village has undergone physical and cultural changes in response to the evolution of agriculture and fuel production in Yamaguchi prefecture, the mountainous region on the southernmost tip of the Honshū mainland of Japan where it resides. The Abugawa Dam that sits at the doorstep of the local Abugawa Museum of History and Folklife necessitated that the land where Kawakami Village previously resided be submerged underwater in 1966. Still, old river boats remain to tell the story of ayu fishing and the fishing of now endangered cherry salmon, while rafts and sickles expound upon the logging of Japanese cedar and cypress that displaced many native deciduous trees. Ultimately, the lifeways of the people who once lived in Kawakami Village reveal the beauty of mountain village life as well as the effects of the encroachment of pressures of modernization after the Meiji Restoration.