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'Shall We Dansu ?': Dancing with the 'West' in contemporary Japan

In this article we offer a reading of the film 'Shall We Dansu ?' as a cultural text which sheds light on the intriguing theme of the various ways in which things Western and the 'West' as a cultural concept are played with in contemporary Japan. Social dancing has been regarded, from the time of its introduction to Japan in the 1930s, as a Western social skill. While ballroom dancing often has the qualities of 'alternative realities',we argue that in Japan one of these alternative realities is an imagined 'West', which exists in Japan through various social practices. Following the colorful characters of the film we look at specific aspects of the ways in which the 'West' is imagined, exoticized, manipulated and played with in contemporary urban Japan.