In this paper I will focus on the urban festival, Kokura Gion Daiko, in the kokurakita-ku Kitakuysyu-city Fukuoka-prefecture and consider the transient fashions or Fuzoku created by young people and their awareness on the festival. This festival is organized by Yasaka shrine, Chonai, Hozonshinkokai (the society for the preservation and promotion of Kokura Gion Daiko), enterprises and volunteer groups. Volunteer groups in particular have had an increasing role and responsibility in this festival. Members of volunteer groups from connections beyond those based on territory, kinship or a combination of territory and kinship. Why are volunteer groups accepted by the community as a whole, despite their recent appearance? Those groups welcome those young people who, out of their self consciousness and/or defiance toward adults, may have once left their neighborhood Chonai groups, but who later return to take part in the festival. Volunteer groups make it possible for diverse groups of people including residents of other areas to partipate in the festival.

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This is a study on the modern Japanese festival. About 5 years ago, the author published a book named "Sociology of City Festival." In the book, he picked up the famous traditional dance, Awa-Odori which was originally a local dance in Tokushima-prefecture, and he discribed its transfering processes to the very far and large city, Tokyo. And then, he concluded that the Tokyo Awa-odori became one of typical models of modern Japanese city festivals. The author thinks that Awa-Odori has some special key characters comparing with the other Japanese traditional dances. The former is not only for the people who live in closed narrow areas (such as the old traditional city festivals), but also for all of the persons who are interested in with it. It can change themselves into various styles (Dancing styles, Instruments, Merodies, etc.) following the changes of ages. And it can offer dancing plesures for every persons (old and young, men and women, expert and beginner, etc.). So it looks mostly nice with the modern isolated and separated city people. And now, Tokyo Awa-Odori has begun to spread to many cities. It has now totally about 100 fellow groups in varios cities in Eastern Japan. And they are making various styles of networks each other. (Radial connection, mutual network, father-son-grandson relations, satelite style, etc.) The author is not so sure that such a collective action will directly connect to the future or not. But perhaps it may be true that it is reflecting one of modern life and culture in Japan.

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I hear that more than five hundred thousand women were widowed by the World War II in Japan, however only a thesis on them can't be found. Soldiers' deathes of that war were highly admired especially during the war, and they were deified as the national heroes in Yasukuni shrine. Therefore we call the war widows "Wives of Yasukuni", who were taken care of by nation then. Japan defeated in 1945, the war widows lost then honorable positions as well as compensations. In those days, they were still young; seventy percent under thirty five with two or more children on the average. Unfortunately, after the War, they were forced to make very hard livings especially till 1952 because of three factors mainly as follows. First, they were very short of the abilities to lead their independent lives. The second is the discrimination against the fatherless families "The same in an American Society", Lynn Caine told us in "WIDOW" in 1974. Last of all, they have borne the spiritual burden of the families of military personnel's who were thought to be responsible for the War. As things change, positions of the war-widows as between victims and helpers have changed under Japanese social circumstances.

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The aim of this thesis to examine (1) the acculturation process of the Yamatji, a tribe of Aboriginal people living in Mid-Western Australia, and (2) the impact of the Native Administration ACT 1905-1936 on their way of life. The main source of information was a Yamatji lady who was raised on the Mingenew Native Reserve, where the Aborigines were relocated by the Government from 1938 to 1963. Her history details how reserve life detached the Yamatji from their traditional law, culture and kin-relations, and how the Act successfully isolated them from White society. Interestingly, the Reserve days are remembered as being very comfortable-it was a familiar and constant social milieu, and there was no drinking problem. They were comfortable for the Whites too, who were not disturbed by the Aborigines. Superficially comfortable inter-cultural relations aside, the discrimination essentially blocked the autonomous life of Aborigines and crushed their traditonal culture. The Act forced the Yamatji to live by the rules of a White culture, but it restrict or denied their access to White education, work opportunities and living standards. This contradiction is one of the main causes of the current inter-cultural tensions in this region.

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It is important to study traditional Japanese food in festivals which view health as being expressed in the model for dietary life peculiar to the Japanese. Therefore, it is necessary that we understand the actual conditions under which Japanese food in customs and festivals have been transmitted from generation to generation. This study was made to characterise how the Japanese food used in customs and festivals had been transmitted from generation to generation, in a farming mountain village in the north of Okayama Prefecture, where the traditional food culture had developed. Then, in order to analyse the changes in Japanese food in the customs, the history of the customs was researched by hearing from informants and observers in the rural community named Chuka-son, Maniwa-gun. The most typical six dishes that should be passed on to later generations were found, based on the results of the investigation. These dishes were tested for palatability by housewives living in those village and female students. Both the housewives and the female students had a strong liking for the local healthy dish Hiruzen- Okowa. The traditional foods such as Happosai using Sansai are suggested to be well received at events and at festivals, depending on the cooking person in charge, the way of cooking, and the careful consideration of health matters.

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The Patent Law in Japan was established in July 1885. Ever since that time, both city dwellers and provincial people had invented a lot of new ideas about furniture. Japanese devisers of those patent furniture were inspired by European and American one such as chairs and tables. In the materials of the industrial property, we can read both the criticism of Japanese life style sitting on the tatami mat that has been formed historically, and desire to constitute the better life space. Those should be summarized as follows: Intention to empty life space: A device folding table and desk to reduce its capacity which realizes fair ability of transportation. Intention to health: Since Japanese have been inexperienced in use of chair, they seem to have regarded it as a cause of illness. Intention to comfortable: In a chair, we can lean back and rest our arms. They tried to realize the comfortable posture on the floor. Intention to rationality: A structure for rationality on every stage-production, circulation and use. Intention to novelty: They pursued the novelty such as space-savingor prevention of wrinkle of clothes. Intention to safety and security of property.

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This essay focus on media-fandom, which is a new folklore, developing media-technology. I have researched on the fandom, especially "Comic Market (called Comike or Comiket)", and fan's activities in such conventions. In my reseach, fans have produced many things always. However, many of the products is the textual poachings which is the cultural practices of fans. In this essay, I will propose to call such new folklore as "filk" which come from mistyped folk.

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