Optimizing one’s own death: The Shūkatsu industry and the enterprising self in a hyper-aged society

Dorothea Mladenova

Contemporary Japan, 2020, vol. 32, issue 1, 103-127

Abstract: Since 2009, the preparation for one’s own end-of-life (shūkatsu) has become a media buzzword. Conceptualized by the funeral industry, it provides a model subject formation along with a set of self-technologies that individuals are supposed to follow. Following the lines of governmentality studies and subjectivation research, this paper scrutinizes shūkatsu by looking both at the model subjects’ programmatic implications and at the actual ways of subjectivation as practiced by the addressees of the program. The analysis is based on field research and interviews with both shūkatsu suppliers and addressees.

Date: 2020
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DOI: 10.1080/18692729.2020.1717105

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