Kreativa liv. Konstnärligt arbete och kosmopolitisk vardag i Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York

Abstract

The everyday experiences of young Japanese individuals in creative careers, living in the neighborhood of Williamsburg in Brooklyn, New York City, is the starting point for this study that investigates the informants strategies in the creative field they belong to, as well as how cosmopolitanism and globalization is experienced on an individual level. The research is based on ethnographic fieldwork, primarily interviews and participant observations, carried out between 2008 and 2012. The main fieldwork is from New York City but the study also includes fieldwork from Japan and Sweden. The 15 informants were born in Japan in the 1970’s and 80’s and belong to the first generation in Japan that has started to question traditional national norms regarding, for example, career building and family life. Williamsburg is a traditional immigrant neighborhood, and today a typical example of an area that is going through a gentrification process. Since the 1990’s the area has had an influx of young people from different parts of the world who have come there to work in a creative setting, with freelance jobs in fashion, music, art, photography, et cetera. Through applying Pierre Bourdieu’s field theory, the study examines how this alternative creative field is organized and what strategies the agents in the field take on. Arjun Appadurai’s theoretical concepts imagination and -scapes are applied to examine how globalization and cosmopolitanism is experienced on an individual level. The dissertation examines how old and new media and communication techniques, along with travel have influenced the informants’ lives. How the informants relate to the their homeland and how national identification is made in the cosmopolitan environment is also analyzed. The notion of cosmopolitanism is regarded as an opportunity to oppose national cultural norms and conventions and as a chance for new perspectives and possibilities. On the other hand, alternative choices may also have consequences for the individual, which the dissertation discusses, using the informants’ complex experiences as a starting point.