People and Things

SCOOPING, RAKING, BECKONING LUCK:LUCK, AGENCY AND THE INTERDEPENDENCE

OF PEOPLE AND THINGS IN JAPAN

Inge Maria Daniels

Royal College of Art

This article focuses on the circulation and consumption of Japanese commodities investedwith an informal, domestic form of spirituality, translated as ‘luck’. Tambiah has arguedthat the dissemination of spiritual power objectified in Thai Buddhist amulets reflects the‘differential power distribution’ and ‘social control’ vested in an hierarchically ordered laysociety. My Japanese case study suggests that commodification of religious forms enablesa more democratic diffusion of spirituality. Good luck charms are neither sacred norsecular; they challenge the supposed divide between the aesthetic value and utility ofobjects. They are part of extended networks of human and non-human agents, butthrough their various trajectories they also retain an independent agency rooted in theirmaterial properties.

Luck has been discussed at great length within Eastern and Western thought.A detailed discussion of the Western notion of luck1 falls outside the scopeof this article. In short, a strong emphasis is placed on unpredictability; luckimplies the existence of agency, good or bad, outside the control of the humanindividual.Within Christianity, for example, luck is portrayed as ‘a secular faith’because ‘it pertains to the worldly or temporal as distinguished from the spir-itual and the eternal’ (Oates 1995: 5).This-worldliness may be associated withsecularization in Western societies (Bell 1997), but it is also a trait intrinsic toJapanese religion. The spiritual is considered to be present in all realms of life and people may turn to religion in their search for success, wealth, andprosperity.2

The Japanese religious landscape is extremely diverse,3 but I am mainly con-cerned with Shinto, the indigenous religious tradition, together with sectar-ian Buddhism and the Taoist concepts that have influenced both. Shinto andBuddhism have a long history of amalgamation in Japan. In times of need,people may visit religious centres4 in order to pray for ‘benefits in this world’(gensei riyaku) to a multitude of deities, both Shinto and Buddhist, whose popularity is often transitory. Money and acts of devotion are exchanged forsacred objects and assistance from the deities.

It would be wrong, however, to see these activities5 as purely instrumentalpractices reflecting nothing more than a concern with personal gain. Suchreductionism has been challenged for other contexts as well. Parry’s (1994)discussion of the fierce bargaining between Hindu priests and clients in mor-

© Royal Anthropological Institute 2003.J. Roy. anthrop. Inst. (N.S.) 9, 619-638

tuary rites in Banaras (North India), for example, has challenged assumptionsthat link bargaining with the impersonal relationships that supposedly char-acterize monetary exchange (Parry 1994: 139-41). In contrast,Tambiah (1984:342) has shown that Thai amulets invested with the charisma of Buddhistmountain priests may be employed to take advantage of others because Buddhism propagates an ideology of generous giving that can be combinedwith exploitation for material gain.

The above examples draw attention to a contradiction inherent in all sal-vation religions. In their striving for a transcendent world that is free fromsuffering, orthodox religious doctrines focus on renunciation of the world, butin practice alternative routes to salvation are sought within the existing socialorder of the human world. In Hinduism and Buddhism these alternatives arecommonly grounded in bodily practices. Dying in Banaras is one way to findsalvation in the Hindu tradition (Parry 1994). In this case priests are key media-tors between both worlds. Similarly, in Japan, religious professionals have adegree of control over the access to spiritual power. For example, people turnto Buddhist priests for the organization of funeral rituals, while their Shintoequivalents orchestrate other life-cycle events, such as birth or marriage(Reader 1991: 55-106). However, the availability of a variety of materialobjects which mediate between the spiritual and the material worlds enablespeople to have a multitude of embodied interactions with deities (for example,ringing the bells at shrines and temples, throwing money in an offering box,or rubbing statues).6

This article, which is based on eighteen months of fieldwork conducted in1996-1997 and in 1999 at multiple locations in Japan, focuses on one cate-gory of material objects. These are engimono (literally, things that bring aboutgood fortune – engi – through establishing a bond with certain deities), smallgood luck charms which are invested with spirituality and distributed via reli-gious and commercial networks. Engimono originated at both Shinto and Buddhist religious centres and are intended to be placed in the home. Theyare available at a variety of prices according to their size or the materials fromwhich they are made.7 At the Kameido Tenjin shrine in Tokyo, for example,colourful wooden bird statues (uso) are sold in ten different sizes. Prices rangefrom 500 yen (£2.50) for a 3-centimetre item to 7,000 yen (£35) for the50-centimetre version.The question which this article addresses is how exactlythe spirituality imbued in engimono is appropriated within the domestic arena.Recent studies have shown how easily accessible modern technologies, suchas the television (Goethals 2000: 134-9) or the video-recorder (Coleman 1996:120-1), enable new and more democratic modes of interaction with the divinewithin the private sphere of life. Engimono are ephemeral objects which shouldbe replaced regularly in order to remain effective. They are not venerated aslong-term possessions but are treated casually. However, we will see that peoplemay attach specific significance to them by placing them in different locationsin the home.

I analyse the Japanese home as a dynamic entity, where subtle differentia-tions are established through consumption activities.8 My research therebybuilds on a recent body of anthropological literature which argues that con-sumption located in the concreteness of everyday life is a critical means ofself-expression in contemporary Japan (Clammer 1997; 2000; Moeran 1996;

620 INGE MARIA DANIELS

Skov & Moeran 1995: 55).9 I have also been inspired by current theoreticaldebates about the home in material culture studies (Chevalier 1998; 1999;Miller 2001). In addition, I draw on a body of research about the use of Christian religious imagery in North American homes (Halle 1993;McDannell 1995; Morgan 1998).10

Engimono and the material culture of luck

Luck plays a significant role in everyday life in contemporary Japan.This mani-fests itself most obviously during the New Year period when the theme oftransition, transformation, and overcoming obstacles is strong. Many peopletold me that they purchase engimono at the start of the New Year, when a largeproportion of the population pay their first visit of the year to shrines andtemples (hatsumôde) to pray for good fortune.11 Good luck arrows (hamaya)are popular New Year engimono sold at most temples and shrines (Figure 1).12

During the 2003 New Year period the Hankyû Railway displayed posters intheir carriages providing details of convenient routes to popular shrines andtemples in the Kansai region.These posters depicted a young woman wearinga kimono and holding a hamaya. An article in the Kyoto daily newspaper of

INGE MARIA DANIELS 621

Figure 1. Engimono such as magic arrows and clay bells in the shape of cows are among arange of spiritual commodities on sale at the Kamigamo shrine in Kyoto during theNew Year of 1997.

4 December 2002 reported that the Fushimi Inari shrine, south of Kyoto,which is visited annually by almost 3 million people during the New Yearperiod, expected to sell more than 40,000 fukukasane, a good-luck arrowlinked with this particular shrine.

The English term ‘luck’ does not capture the rich array of nuances sur-rounding the concept within the Japanese context. Japanese notions of luckcan be traced back to two strains of thought: first, Buddhist ideas about karmiccausality and, secondly, Taoist beliefs which are grounded in a cyclical notionof time. Karma theory was introduced into Japan through Buddhism (La Fleur1983: 27-9).Within Buddhism and Hinduism, karma operates on two distinctbut complementary levels (Keyes & Daniel 1983). At the level of formal Buddhist theology, karma is associated with transcendental problems. My ownstudy is concerned with the widely shared and more popular understandingsof the concept; these are grounded in more pragmatic religious traditions andthey situate karma within the immediacies of everyday life (Babb 1983: 170;Keyes 1983: 16). Buddhist doctrine stresses the responsibility of individuals fortheir own actions.Within popular Buddhism it is thought that individuals canavert their destiny by accumulating merit for rightful actions (Keyes 1983: 19).The association between karma and merit is highly significant for my dis-cussion of the Japanese notion of luck. During my fieldwork I was frequentlytold that misfortune could be averted by taking appropriate spiritual precau-tions. One way in which this can be achieved is through establishing a rela-tionship with certain deities.

The Japanese concern with luck is also influenced by Taoist thought. ThisTaoist heritage is evident during the annual observance of festivals and ritualsassociated with seasonal change.A number of my informants told me that theyconsulted Taoist astrological calendars13 with practical guidelines for individualpractices during life-cycle events, such as births, weddings, or deaths, and alsoduring periods of transition and change, such as building a new house or evengoing on a journey (Hayashi 1996; Kiba 1997; Uchida 1981).Taoist astrologyalso figured in the lives of those with whom I worked in the form of a beliefthat particular years may be inauspicious for some individuals (yakudoshi)14

(Lewis 1998); there were also people who held numbers to be unlucky.15

When people discussed the subject of luck they used a number of differ-ent terms. The existence of this extensive terminology adds to my claim that luck is considered to be an important quality in the world which affectspeople’s lives.The following terms were most commonly employed. First, fuku,as used in shichi-fuku-jin (the seven good-luck gods), associated with a generalnotion of auspiciousness and blessings from the deities. In past centuries, offer-ings of food and drink made to the deities and distributed and consumedamong worshippers were also called fuku. A second more dynamic term asso-ciated with luck is un. Many people I talked to used the expression un gaaru/nai (‘to be lucky/unlucky’). Un expresses movement. It can be translatedas destiny or fate and relates back to my discussions of karma and the progressthrough different realms of life.

A final saying that I frequently heard is ‘having a good/bad engi’ (engi gaii/warui). Engi is a contraction of the Buddhist concept, inen seigi. This termmeans that direct (in) and indirect (en) causes lead to physical outcomes (seigi).


We have seen above that Buddhism stresses the agency of the individual inaverting his or her destiny.Through their actions individuals can have a directeffect (in) on phenomena that occur in the world. Divine assistance belongsto the category of indirect causes (en) out of which good results are born. Inthis case, en (literally, bond or thread) refers to relationships with the deitiesthrough which people try to influence their fate. Engimono are ‘things thatassist in bringing about a good engi’.

Engimono have been defined as ‘auspicious [objects] considered to have thepower to fulfil wishes for good fortune, prosperity, happiness, longevity, luck,and the whole range of other human desires’ (Kyburz 1991: 108). The defi-nition ‘seeds of luck’ (Komatsu 1998: 34-5) is probably more appropriate,because, as we have seen above, even if engimono enable people to connectwith certain deities which can provide assistance (en), they are thought to beefficacious only if they are backed up by individual efforts (in). Reader andTanabe make a distinction between ‘good luck’, or chance, and ‘moral luck’which is achieved through moral efforts and ritual practices (Reader & Tanabe1999: 109-10). In other words, a certain degree of human intentionality oreffort is considered necessary in order to acquire luck.

An analogy can be drawn between this Buddhist concept of causation andAlfred Gell’s (1998) view with regard to causation and agency in his discus-sion of art works. Gell defines agency as ‘a culturally prescribed frameworkfor thinking about causation, when what happens is (in some vague sense)supposed to be intended in advance by some person-agent or thing-agent’(Gell 1998: 17). His distinction between primary, human agents and the sec-ondary agency of things or other entities (1998: 19) corresponds to the Buddhist notion of direct (in) and indirect (en) causes. Causal intention canbe located in persons and things but also in other external sources, such asdeities, ghosts, or ancestors. Engimono are secondary agents that make thingshappen in the world. My aim in the following section is to ask how thesecharms are actually intended to work.

The efficacy of words and things

Engimono are portable objects employed to establish a tangible relationshipwith a certain deity and, by extension, a particular sacred locality.16 How isspiritual power reduced and transferred to engimono, and how are they con-sidered to be effective at a distance from sacred sites? Freedberg (1989) hasdemonstrated that within Christianity the power of portable, secondary objectsis grounded in the spirituality of the original of which they partake.The trans-mission of power can occur in any of the following ways: through contact,through mimetic figuration, or through the agency of words (Freedberg 1989:128). Engimono are imbued with spirituality in a similar manner. Miyajimarice-scoops, for example, are engimono that are distributed throughout Japanfrom Miyajima, an island southwest of Hiroshima. It is one of the main sitesfor the veneration of the deity Benzaiten, who is part of the group of sevengood-luck deities, and the scoops are linked with the spirituality of this deitythrough contact. According to local myths of origin, rice-scoops are made


from the wood of sacred trees that grow on the island; the island as the wholeis one embodiment of the deity Benzaiten. However, these days Miyajimarice-scoops are produced from imported woods, and they are authenticatedby stamping the Chinese characters for Miyajima on their handle. Similarly,most other engimono I studied were linked with particular locations throughthe use of images and/or words as empowering agents.

Both craftsmen and wholesalers have had much success in generating anextensive national market for engimono, building particularly on assertionsabout their connection with particular sacred sites. One such case is Kotohirafans: these engimono were formerly linked with the Kotohira shrine on MountKonpira on Shikoku Island and are distributed via various local commercialnetworks throughout Japan. However, the production and distribution of engi-mono are not necessarily limited to the specific sites with which they werefirst associated. The wooden bird statue, uso, mentioned above, was originallyproduced by local craftsmen and sold as an engimono of the deity Tenjin at theDazaifu Tenmangu shrine in northern Kyushu. Today, these bird statues aresold at a large number of shrines which are associated with this god.They arealso thought of as local items with a more general connection to the Kyushuregion and are sold in craft-ware centres nation-wide. According to my infor-mants, any uso-shape, regardless of its place of production or distribution, canbe an engimono. For example, Mrs Tanaka, a 40-year-old housewife fromOsaka, has a tiny uso statue, purchased in 1997 at a craft exhibition held at adepartment store in Kyoto, and refers to this item as an engimono.

The fact that these items, which are sold nation-wide through both reli-gious and commercial distribution networks, are considered to be engimonoreveals that the need not be a link with a specific sacred site for them to beeffective.17 Engimono are not mere embodiments of luck. They are creditedwith a certain independent agency which is grounded in their particular physi-cal properties.They imply action; they help to invite luck or drive away evil.The sheer variety of forms and applications of engimono makes it difficult toattempt a comprehensive explanation of their independent efficacy. However,the power in most good-luck charms is released through homophonic asso-ciation (goroawase). During my fieldwork, I repeatedly saw images of frogsemployed as good-luck charms. The word for frog, kaeru, is a homonym forthe verb ‘to return’. These charms are thought to help people to ‘return’ totheir everyday routines, for instance, after an illness or coming safely homefrom a trip. Some of my informants kept a tiny frog figure with the changein their purse, because it is thought it can make money spent return.The effi-cacy of the uso statue is also attributed to a homophone. Ceremonies yearlyheld to exchange old birds for new ones are called usogae, which means ‘toexchange uso’ and also ‘to make lies void’.

Above, I have argued that Japanese religion is grounded in bodily practices,but I did not mean to suggest that language is considered trivial. Sacred wordsplay a significant role in religious life but, again, a distinction should be madebetween the in-depth study of sacred texts by religious professionals and religious practices in which the exteriority of sacred words is invested withvalue. The case of homophones illustrates this point, because their power isnot located in the meaning of their content but in the repetition of theirsounds.18


The locus of the spiritual in the domestic

An important characteristic of engimono is that, unlike other charms that arecarried close to the body to protect the person, they are intended to be placedin the home.19 Two spaces are traditionally associated with the domestic reli-gious cult.The butsudan, a Buddhist house altar, is dedicated to Buddhas, ances-tors, and the spirits of the recently dead.20 The kamidana, literally meaning ‘godshelf ’, is a small Shinto altar where the protective deities of the house areworshipped. Throughout the year, householders frequently rearrange thesealtars, removing some items and adding others to the display. These actionsare of particular interest in the light of recent studies exploring the signifi-cance of the material culture of the house, and particularly the much taken-for-granted everyday practices involved in rearranging the home (Garvey2001; Marcoux 2001). I focus here on the kamidana, because its display generally centres on the themes of good fortune for the house and its inhabitants.21

The Miyadas live on Miyajima, the island mentioned earlier.22 Mr Miyadais the president of a company that produces and distributes kitchen utensils,while Mrs Miyada is a housewife. Above the door of the dining-kitchen areain their home hangs a kamidana. During my fieldwork in 1999, three objectswere added to this kamidana. The first was a magic arrow which the couplebought during their first visit of the year to a local shrine. The second was awooden conical object called an otama, or seed of life. Mr Miyada receivedthis object as a commemorative gift when he participated in a local Shintofestival. Finally, they added a wooden rice-scoop with a picture of a rabbitand the text, kaiun (‘to open up better fortune’). Every year, Mr Miyada’scompany produces a large number of these scoops with the image of theappropriate zodiac animal.They are marketed in the same way as other house-hold crockery. Both types of goods are distributed to local souvenir shops, butthe engimono are mainly sold during the New Year period. However, all thegoods that the company produces can be ordered throughout the year nation-wide through their wholesale catalogue. This is another example of the wayin which a commercial company can successfully build on its historical con-nection with the sacred site and its engimono.23

All three objects on the Miyadas’ kamidana are engimono. They exemplifythe main characteristics of the material culture of luck. First, the items dis-played have a temporal character. Two of them are linked with the New Yearperiod, while the other was received during an annual festival. Secondly, theseed of life, like the majority of the engimono I encountered in people’s homes,is a gift. The last characteristic, which I discuss below, is that through theirparticular physical quality engimono are imbued with agency; they either invitegood luck or drive away evil.The arrow shoots evil and the seed of life growsluck, while the shamoji scoops luck.

A large number of engimono are tools or utensils.There are fork-like objects(kumade) which are used for the raking in of good fortune; minnows (mi),aids to the discerning of good luck from bad; and rice-scoops with whichluck may be gathered by scooping or dipping. The agency of these objects isthus linked with homophones of everyday embodied practices, such as scoop-ing rice or sifting food.The physical quality or materiality that influences the


efficacy of these tools is their shape. Tool shapes are intended to invite luckwithout human intervention.Thus, any rice-scoop shape, regardless of whetherit has been used, has the ability to scoop luck.

What these examples suggest is that, far from being insignificant ormundane, the domestic sphere of life can play a major role in the creation ofspiritual and social values. In her study of the retailing of Christian com-modities in the United States, McDannell shows that religious mottoes andimages are added to all types of goods, such as reading lamps,T-shirts, or evenbiscuits (McDannell 1995: 236). Everyday use is not considered to profane theobject, nor the idea expressed in texts. Likewise, my study shows that utilitydoes not need to reduce the spirituality of objects. In Shinto, objects such asmirrors and swords are among the objects in which deities can reside. More-over, Buddhism teaches respect for all inanimate things.The good luck objectsdiscussed above are of particular interest in this regard because they demon-strate so clearly that the power of objects can be situated in their mundaneapplication.

Rabbits for an auspicious year

Many houses in the countryside still possess a kamidana, but in contemporaryJapan god shelves are becoming increasingly rare and the eclectic materialculture of luck can be found in various locations in the house. Morgan definesfour zones where religious images may be found in middle-class Protestanthomes in North America: the bedroom, the dining room, the entrance, andthe living room (Morgan 1998: 158-71). In the Japanese home specific spatialmechanisms are similarly at work.

The top of the television frequently functions as a display area.24 TheMiyadas display the following objects on the television, which is centrallyplaced in their kitchen-dining area.25 First, there is a square-shaped woodenmeasuring vessel (masu),26 on which the image of a rabbit is printed. This isanother engimono produced by the Miyadas family business. Next to this objectstands a white rabbit made of soap with the Chinese character for fuku, oneof the terms for good fortune discussed above, painted on it. The Miyadasreceived this item from a local pharmacy during the New Year period. Alsoon display is a pair of clay bells that depict a male and female rabbit, a NewYear gift from a local temple. Objects linked with the animals of the Chinesezodiac27 are a common type of engimono in Japanese homes. During 1999, theyear of the rabbit, images of rabbits were prominently displayed in all thehomes in which I conducted fieldwork.28

It is common practice for businesses to present their customers with zodiacengimono during the New Year period, and the majority of my informantsreceived theirs in this way.29 They did not distinguish between these zodiac-engimono and those received from temples and shrines. According to MrMiyada, ‘all these objects can be called engimono because they depict the zodiacanimal that will be auspicious for this year’. Moreover, it can be argued thatby displaying all the religious and the commercial items together on top ofthe television, the Miyadas show that they consider their relationship withreligious institutions and commercial outlets to be equally important.


The auspicious property of any zodiac shape is released during the yearwith which it is associated. Like the good luck tools discussed above, the distinction between the use and symbolic value of the material culture of thezodiac is often blurred. Some of the zodiac animals I encountered were decorative items, such as ceramic rabbits, rabbit paintings, or images of rabbitsembroidered on cloth items (Figure 2). However, the majority of materialculture items of the zodiac in my informants’ homes was linked with func-tional objects.These were, first, functional items, such as the scoops, plates, orcups decorated with the image of a zodiac animal. A second group consistedof functional objects formed in the shape of zodiac animals. I have alreadymentioned rabbit soaps and rabbit bells, but other examples were rabbit vases,rabbit containers for incense, and rabbit-shaped fabric covers for facial tissueboxes.

Seasonal change and spatial mechanisms of luck

Two other locations in the house where I repeatedly found engimono were thehallway and the decorative alcove (tokonoma).The Kuwaharas live in Itami City


Figure 2. A knitted rabbit and a rabbit bell are placed among a number of souvenirs, familyphotographs, and other decorative items in the Tanakas’ dining-kitchen area inOsaka, in 1999. In the right-hand corner, behind the box, stands a statue of a tiger,last year’s zodiac animal.

north of Osaka. Mrs Kuwahara is a secondary school teacher and Mr Kuwahara is a pharmacist.They have two teenage daughters. In 1999, two tal-ismans that Mrs Kuwahara purchased at the famous Nishinomiya shrine inKobe hung in the hallway of their home. One is a large bamboo rake (kumade)with plastic objects associated with prosperity, such as a mask of the good-luck deity Ebisu, attached to it. Mrs Kuwahara told me that the idea behindthis object is that it will rake in good fortune for her husband’s business.Theother object is a paper talisman (ofuda) intended to direct good fortune towardsher eldest daughter, Keiko, who was about to sit her university entrance exami-nations. These examples show that engimono may be purchased to invite luckfor a particular member of the family. Mrs Kuwahara explained that ‘bothitems were placed in the hallway because it faces the east, the inauspiciousside of the house’.30 In the hallway of another home in Hiroshima City, theIshidas, both retired primary school teachers, hung a 1-metre long Miyajimarice-scoop with the inscription, kanai anzen (‘safety in the home’). This wasa present for their thirtieth wedding anniversary from their two married sons.Nearby, on top of a shoe cupboard, Mrs Ishida had placed two decorativeplates with rabbit images and a bell in the shape of a devil (oni).31

The top of the shoe cupboard, a common feature of the entrances of Japanese houses, functioned as a display area in most of the homes in whichI did fieldwork.These displays consisted mainly of engimono, particularly zodiacanimals, devil-shaped objects that are thought to protect the home against evil,and items associated with seasonal change. The entrance hall of theMurakamis’ home in Uji City, south of Kyoto, is a typical example. MrMurakami works in a large company selling electrical appliances; his wife isa housewife and their two daughters are secondary school students. In 1999,they displayed on top of the shoe cupboard a ceramic statue of a rabbit, a giftfrom their local food store, and a wooden mask of an oni made by MrMurakami’s father, who lived with the family. During February, Mrs Murakamiadded branches of plum blossom and a small mandarin tree, and in March shethen displayed a pair of dolls.32 Postcards or photographs depicting seasonalscenes, such as kite-flying in winter or fireworks in summer, were also dis-played in the hallway of many of the houses studied. Moreover, a number ofhousewives I talked with produced handicrafts related to the seasons to displayin their homes. Mrs Miyada, for example, painted seasonal flowers in her paint-ing class (nihonga – Japanese-style painting) and Mrs Tanaka created seasonalfruit, such as persimmons, from remnants of cloth. The fact that many of myother sources also changed or moved objects around according to the seasonsillustrates the continued influence of the cyclical notions of time in everydaylife.

In the course of my fieldwork, I also encountered engimono placed amongother objects in decorative alcoves (tokonoma).33 The items in the tokonomaobjectify a variety of values that the inhabitants deem important (Daniels2001b). For example, the Kuwaharas’ alcove contained two magic arrows pur-chased at a local shrine, a swan statue made by their youngest daughter, awork of calligraphy made by their eldest daughter, two pieces of calligraphydrawn by Mrs Kuwahara, two miniature pagodas built by Mr Kuwahara, twotraditional dolls in glass cases which were gifts, and, finally, a traditionalhanging-scroll, an heirloom.The Kuwaharas employed objects made by family


members, traditional gifts, heirlooms, and ephemeral items imbued with spir-ituality (such as magic arrows) to personalize their home. Interestingly, severalof the alcoves in the homes studied contained engimono, mainly statues ofgood-luck deities, passed on from previous generations.This demonstrates thatalthough in theory engimono are ephemeral items, they may occasionally beturned into heirlooms.

The circulation of lucky gifts

The examples discussed above indicate that engimono are part of a thrivingJapanese gift economy (Ito 1995). This system of gifting often involves theexchange of mass-produced commodities and plays a prime role in the con-solidation of social relations in contemporary Japan (Daniels 2001a). A largenumber of engimono enter the home during the New Year period, when manyreligious institutions and commercial venues consolidate their relationshipswith devotees or customers by presenting them with engimono. In fact, how-ever, engimono can enter the home as gifts at any time during the year.34

Several informants received engimono from relatives or friends who had visitedreligious centres. These gifts may be received as part of a formal religiousexperience, but the majority are linked with a more domestic, everyday formof spirituality. They are tools that invite luck into the home.

Engimono embody a variety of bonds or relationships and the agency attrib-uted to them might be thought of as being closely comparable to the much-discussed Polynesian concept of mana. Mana refers to an independent animatedforce attributed to objects that are part of exchange networks (Mauss 1967).35

However, the spiritual power with which I am concerned corresponds moreclosely to the Indonesian notion of dewa, as discussed by Webb Keane (1997)in his ethnography of exchange relations among the Anakalangese. Keanedefines dewa as ‘[a] spirit, [the] soul, fortune, fate, life force, or reproductivepotential’ (1997: 202). Like the Japanese notion of luck, dewa is considered toplay an important role in generating success and wealth. Wealth is not basedsimply on economic principles but is related to one’s place in the world. Inother words, individual efforts to become successful can be fruitful only withthe intervention of some external force (Keane 1997: 204). Dewa is thoughtto be strengthened or weakened through exchange. Keane mentions theimportance of matching dewa between parties and discusses the significanceof similar dewa of husbands and wives in the creation of social value (Keane1997: 205). The Japanese concept of bonding in order to influence one’sfortune indirectly (en) has similar implications. Exchange with deities strength-ens bonds and increases one’s luck or merits. However, bonds between peopleare also considered to be important in the creation of social values.The expres-sion ‘tying together bonds’ means to find a love match or to marry, while‘cutting bonds’ points at separation or divorce.

Finally, the Anakalangese talk about having strong or weak dewa (Keane1997: 217). Similarly, Japanese consider themselves to have good or bad engi.Luck is a democratic quality in the world that anybody can draw on, but thespirituality that I have called ‘luck’ also has the potential to become oppres-sive. In Indonesia, some actions result in a good, strong dewa. Through


recurrent activities, such as ritual speech performances, the living have to asserttheir relationship to the valuables of the ancestors. Whereas the valuables ofthe Anakalangese are inalienable objects that metonymically link the presentwith the past, engimono are ephemeral items that mediate between this worldand the world of the deities. Like other charms distributed at religious centresin Japan, engimono are only supposed to be effective until one’s wishes are ful-filled or until the beginning of a new year. People are instructed to returncharms to religious institutions where they are ritually disposed off and canbe exchanged for new ones.36 I was told by many people that failing to expressgratitude for benefits received and not disposing properly of engimono mayresult in bad luck, even though, as we have seen above, some engimono, suchas good-luck statues, may become inalienable possessions.

Their ephemerality does not need to make engimono less valuable. SusanneKüchler has shown that it is the continuous renewal of carefully producedMalangan carvings that is significant for the ongoing creation of social rela-tionships in New Ireland (Papua New Guinea) (Küchler 1987; 1992). In theJapanese context, the ongoing renewal of engimono similarly objectifies thecontinuation of bonds or relationships between devotees and their deities, andby extension religious institutions. The continuous flow of goods from andtowards shrines and temples is of course also of economic significance. At thesame time, however, religious institutions are expected to return part of theirwealth to the community. Some temples offer social welfare services likehousing for the elderly (Reader & Tanabe 1999: 121-3).37

Averting the flow of things

Their ephemeral quality, and the fact that it is believed that engimono have tobe disposed of properly to avert bad luck, places pressure on people to returnthem to religious centres. During my fieldwork, however, it emerged that individual attitudes towards engimono may vary greatly. For example, the twoMiyada daughters, both unmarried and in their late 30s, express contrastingviews about the disposal of the luck items displayed in their home. Naoko,the younger, said that because these objects are linked with temples and shrinesthey should be handled with great care. Kaori, on the other hand, claimedthat she does not see any problem in disposing of them in the bin. One wayto interpret her words is that the commodification of engimono has resultedin a kind of inflation effect, whereby the presence of too many engimono inthe home might have devalued their power. However, the above exampleshould be seen as an exception. Although engimono were not specially vener-ated in the majority of the homes in which I did fieldwork, my informantstold me that they felt they should dispose of them with care.

We have seen that engimono are placed in various locations in the home.They are frequently moved around, and some may end up in storage spaces.The Kuwahara family, mentioned earlier, stores their unwanted items in agarden shed. Engimono may also be passed on to relatives or friends. Mrs Takahashi, a woman in her 40s who works part time in a small food store inthe outskirts of Hiroshima City, told me that she never returns the New Yearshamoji with zodiac animals which she receives each year from a local shrine.


Instead, Miki, her 20-year-old daughter, took them as gifts for her home-stayfamily and school friends when she went to study in Australia for a fewmonths in 1999.

A number of engimono are sold with other souvenirs, gifts, and bric-à-bracat garage sales or charity events. They may also end up in temple markets,where they start a second life (Kopytoff 1986) as antiques, folk crafts, or exoticJapanese souvenirs for foreign tourists. Among my discoveries in the courseof frequent trips to temple markets in Kyoto were small statues of beckoningcats, rice-scoops, clay bells of devils, and statues and functional objects depict-ing animals of the zodiac (Figure 3). According to stall-owners these items arealmost exclusively purchased by non-Japanese. Riikka, a Finnish academic inher 30s who has lived in Kyoto for eight years, displays in her home animpressive collection of Japanese dolls and engimono found at temple markets.Laura, a 25-year-old Canadian teacher who lived in Osaka for two years,bought clay bells in the shape of zodiac animals to give to friends on return-ing home.

The interdependence of people and things

The home has been defined as ‘a world in which a person can create a mate-rial environment that embodies what he or she considers significant’ (Lupton


Figure 3. Rice-scoops and a beckoning cat are among discarded items that start a second lifeas antiques or exotic souvenirs at a temple market in Kyoto in 1997.

1998: 158). However, my work shows that the material culture of the homealso embodies the tensions and contradictions of the lives of its inhabitants(Daniels 2001a; 2001b). Engimono are often gifts that invite good luck for thereceiver, but their accumulation in the home also points to the strains andpressures associated with exchange. Across multiple transactions engimonoacquire an agency beyond the intentionality of the people involved.The inter-dependency between people, and between people and other entities that arenot necessarily human, is a central feature of Buddhist, Taoist, and Confucianthought. Kretschmer has argued that one of the main motivations for return-ing old objects to religious centres where they are purified in special rites(kuyô) is ‘a desire to do the proper thing’, based on the recognition that allthings are interrelated (Kretschmer 2000: 333-4).

My ethnography of the consumption of engimono in the home provides evi-dence that, in practice, the flow of engimono between religious centres andurban homes is frequently blocked. Consumers are active in inscribing theirown meaning onto these artefacts which have been filled with a range ofpotentialities by their producers and distributors. Within the domestic arena,practices surrounding engimono become more complex and more diverse. Engi-mono may or may not be turned into significant domestic items. Their mereexistence in the home does not necessarily mean that they matter. Often thecontext of giving is more important than their place of production or distri-bution, and in other cases people may value their metaphorical importance.Throughout their various trajectories engimono retain a certain kind of inde-pendence and agency. This autonomy is grounded in their materiality. Themain physical attribute that influences the efficacy of engimono is not the mate-rials of which they are made; it is rather their form which is endowed withagency through homophones, that is, embodied words. Thus the materialityof objects and words is given similar importance within this process of reli-gious embodiment.

Any scoop, rake, or zodiac animal-shape can bring about luck, but in thedomestic arena contextual considerations, such as social hierarchy, style, andtaste, also play a role. Some physical attributes of engimono, such as their sizeor the materials of which they are made, may be employed to create distinc-tions.An example of this is large hand-crafted rice-scoops made of rare woodsthat can function as markers of a certain taste or knowledge and appreciationof traditional Japaneseness (Daniels 2001a; 2001b).38 Moreover, engimono of thiskind are frequently turned into long-term possessions. By placing them inspecific locations in the home, such as the decorative alcove or the hallway,people can further express the significance which they attach to engimono andthe values that these objects embody.

The power attributed to engimono through homophonic association isgrounded in everyday embodied activities, such as scooping, raking, or beck-oning. Engimono belong to a category of objects that blur the distinctionbetween use and symbolic value, and they therefore question the assumptionthat commodified familiar objects cannot be invested with spiritual value. JohnCalvin (1509-64) and, more famously, Marx expressed a concern about thefetishization of objects based on the conceived contradiction between themateriality of everyday used things and the (spiritual, exchange) value whichthey acquire upon consecration or circulation (Kibbey 1986: 52).39 The fact


that Marx (1976 [1867]), in accordance with ideas generally held at the time,considered manufacture the main area for the creation of human value partlyexplains why he believed the circulation of commodities (or consecration ofobjects) to be negative.This article shows, by contrast, that the circulation andconsumption of commodities can play a significant role in the construct ofvalue. It therefore has larger consequences for the understanding of the rela-tionship between people and objects.

My Japanese case study is firmly situated within the anthropological litera-ture that re-examines principal dualisms, such as ‘the gift versus the com-modity’, ‘the spiritual versus the economic’, and ‘the material versus linguistic’(Coleman 2000; Keane 1997; Munn 1986; Strathern 1988). These literaturessuggest that powerful dialectical tensions drive the object in its various rela-tionships with people. Similarly, this article attests to a more fundamentaldialectic which does not try to reduce what is happening to subjects andobjects or human as opposed to material agency. Essentially, it shows that thespiritual and the material, the symbolic and the functional, in other words,the subject and object worlds, are inextricably linked.

NOTES

I would like to thank Daniel Miller, Russell Belk, and Simon Coleman for their thoroughand critical reading of this article. I am also grateful to the members of the Material Culture Study Group at University College London for useful comments on earlier drafts.Thisproject was supported by a Matsushita Foundation research grant.The article was revised whileI was a Research Fellow of the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science at the Inter-national Research Center for Japanese Studies in Kyoto. I also acknowledge the generosity ofmany people in Japan whose hospitality and support made my research both pleasant and fruitful.

1 Statman (1993) investigates the notion of luck within Western philosophy.2 Pentecostalist churches in Ghana (Meyer 1997: 13-14) and Word of Life Christians in

Sweden (Coleman 2000: 191-2) are other examples of the successful linking of spiritual andmaterial worlds.

3 The Japanese constitution, which was drafted on the model of that of the United Statesafter the end of the Second World War, enshrines the principle of a strict separation betweenthe realms of religion and state. It also guarantees freedom of religion; virtually any group istherefore able to register as a religious corporation. The Religious Corporation Law of 1951gave institutions the legal capability to maintain and use property in carrying out their activ-ities and enabled them to engage in profit-making enterprises (Tamaru & Reid 1996: 121).Today, there is a small Christian community in Japan, as well as a diverse array of thriving newreligions.

4 I do not distinguish between (Shinto) shrines and (Buddhist) temples because their mate-rial culture and religious practices are highly syncretistic (Gellner 1996; Grapard 1998).

5 Economic activities are essential to the well-being and continued practice of religion andthe distinction between religion and commerce has always been blurred in Japan. (See Covell[2001: 225-97], Hur [2000: 59-61], and Ito [1995: 172-3] for historical examples.) Religiousinstitutions have continuously reinvented themselves to respond to changing needs (Reader &Tanabe 1998: 206-33). For example, the prohibition of state support and the growing compe-tition from new religions after the Second World War, as well as the growing immigration oflocal populations to urban areas, meant that established religious institutions had to developnew money-making operations. Some used their land to build car parks; others organized cul-tural events. Sponsorship from companies was also common (Nakamaki 1995).

6 Priests play a role in these personal activities in that they sacralize the media used to com-municate with the deities.


7 In theory, all purchases have similar results, but priests will encourage people to spend moreand generosity is linked with sincerity (Reader & Tanabe 1998: 185-7).

8 The exterior and many elements of the interior of Japanese houses are standardized, butmy informants employed small decorative items in a variety of ways to create an identity fortheir homes (Daniels 2001b).

9 Stays of four weeks in the homes of three families in the Kansai area (Osaka, Kobe, andKyoto) and with two families in Hiroshima Prefecture were backed up with data collectedduring shorter visits to the homes of fifty families in both areas. All the families studied ownedtheir two-storeyed detached houses. Like some 90 per cent of the country’s population, theyconsidered themselves to belong to a broadly defined and generally undifferentiated Japanesemiddle class (Taira 1993: 169). However, in Japan, as elsewhere, social distinctions and hierar-chies exist. Class-consciousness is principally constructed around consumption which is ‘seenas a process, a continuous activity of self-construction, of relationship maintenance and sym-bolic competition’ (Clammer 1997: 101). The consumer market is highly segregated accordingto gender and age (Skov & Moeran 1995). See Daniels (1999) for a bibliographical review ofJapanese consumption.

10 Unlike these recent studies of Japanese consumption, my research focuses on the processof objectification within religion. It addresses issues such as the impact of commercializationupon religious forms and the link between formal religion and the everyday life of the household.

11 In the 2001 national census, 59.2 per cent of respondents said that they visited a shrineor temple during the New Year period, and 85.3 per cent reported that they ate toshikoshi-soba(buckwheat noodles eaten for prosperity in the coming year) on New Year’s Eve. Anothernation-wide survey conducted by the Asahi weekly newspaper in 1995 concluded that 76 percent of those questioned bought good fortune papers (omikuji) during the New Year period,while 46 per cent said they worried about unlucky days throughout the year.

12 Of my informants, 85 per cent kept a hamaya in their home.13 The Gregorian calendar was adopted in Japan in 1872 as part of the government-led mod-

ernization process (Uchida 1981: 177-80), but the lunar calendar is still regularly consulted todetermine lucky and unlucky periods (Kiba 1997: 106).

14 Some people are aware of quite a long list of unlucky years for both men and women,but the most significant time of unluckiness for women is their thirty-third birthday; for menit is their forty-second year. Many visit religious centres to pray for protection on these twoinauspicious birthdays.

15 The number four, for example, is considered unlucky because its pronunciation, shi, canalso mean death. As a result, many car parks, hotel rooms, and lifts have omitted this number.

16 The production and distribution of mobile objects invested with the power of the divineis closely linked with the historical development of pilgrimages. However, studies of pilgrim-age tend to stress the ‘rootedness’ of the holy at the expense of its mobility. Geary (1986),Starrett (1995), Inglis (1999), and Pinney (2001) have demonstrated the significance of mobile objects invested with spirituality within different cultural contexts.

17 Some engimono that were never strongly associated with a particular site, such as magicarrows, are produced and distributed nation-wide by wholesalers specializing in religious goods(Reader & Tanabe, 1998: 222-5).

18 Engimono often have kaiun (‘to open up better fortune’) written on them in Chinese char-acters. Through Buddhism, the Japanese adopted the Chinese writing-system and the use ofpictograms, a notable example of embodied language.

19 Recently, engimono have also become available in portable forms, for example as key-holders. The popular maneki-neko, or beckoning cat, used to invite luck into businesses is notplaced in the home. They are displayed on engidana, special altars for charms in commercialenterprises, but more commonly on shop-counters or in shop-front windows (Daniels 2001a:205-6). Today, figures of beckoning cats are common in commercial outlets the world over(Kikuchi & The Japanese Maneki-neko Club 2001).

20 Rituals in front of home altars, such as the offering of food, are most commonly per-formed by women (Martinez 1995). Similar examples can be found in many other societies(Hirschon 1993; Turner 1999).

21 The standard kamidana consists of a flat wooden shelf on which a miniature Shinto shrineis placed. Inside stands a rectangular piece of white paper or wood (ofuda) with the name ofthe deity and/or the shrine of its origin written on it. Several ofuda may be placed together,


and statues or printed images of deities may be enshrined as well. In front of the shrine thereare two ceramic containers, one for offering water and the other for sake.A miniature entrance-gate (torii) with a sacred rope made from straw (shimenawa) demarcates the sacred space. Thisis the typical layout of a kamidana, but the shelves can differ greatly in their content.

22 The small community living on the island has retained a rural feel, but an efficient trans-port network give inhabitants access to the same information and goods available elsewhere inJapan.

23 For 200 years the Miyadas family business has produced rice-scoops. At first, they weretaken home as engimono by pilgrims to the Itsukushima shrine, the main sanctuary on the island.However, as the reputation of the scoops grew, the Miyadas found that they could successfullydistribute them throughout Japan via several wholesale networks. In recent years, the companyhas modernized and expanded its range of products to kitchen utensils of all sorts (Daniels2001a: 80-5).

24 The television doubles as a display area in many other cultural contexts. For examples inFrance and England, see Chevalier (1995); for the United States, see Halle (1993).

25 Moeran gives a detailed account of the history of the television and the growth of tele-vision networks in Japan (1996: 12-15). I have discussed elsewhere the central position of thetelevision in the everyday lives of many Japanese (Daniels 2001b). Kelly points out that thetelevision has replaced the decorative alcove in many rural homes (Kelly 1992: 84).

26 Masu were traditionally used to weigh uncooked rice. There are strong historical correla-tions between rice and ideas of plenty in Japan (Ohnuki-Tierney 1993), and a number of uten-sils previously employed in the production, preparation, and consumption of rice have survivedas engimono.

27 The twelve-year zodiac cycle (jûni-shi), based on a series of animal signs, was introducedthrough Taoism from China (Uchida 1981).

28 New Year cards depicting zodiac animals are probably the largest quantity of zodiac imagesthat enter the home. Of the respondents of the 2001 census, 90.1 per cent said that theyexchanged New Year cards. Similarly, all my informants stressed the importance of sending thesecards for the consolidation and continuation of past and present social and business ties.

29 The following are examples of engimono distributed through commercial networks in theKyoto area during the first days of January 2003, the year of the sheep. On 1 January, the Seiyusupermarket chain offered soap in the shape of a sheep to its first 200 customers.The Shimizupharmacy chain gave a toothpick-holder in the shape of a sheep to the first 200 customerswho spent more than 1,000 yen in their shop. Fuji Colour photo-shops in the region organ-ized a New Year lottery: the first prize was a cushion in the shape of a sheep and the secondprize a photograph frame decorated with sheep.

30 The geomancy rules applied in contemporary Japanese house construction reflect a con-tinuing belief in the need to purify and protect the transient spaces of external doorways andhouse entrances (Kiba 1997: 117-18).

31 Oni are two-horned demons with long hair and tiger-skin loincloths. They appear inlegends, folk tales, and children’s stories as ambivalent characters who can be both destroyersand protectors.

32 During the Doll Festival or Girls’ Festival (hina matsuri) on 3 March, people pray for thehappiness and health of girls. To mark this event, families with young daughters might set upa display of dolls wearing costumes of the imperial court during the Heian period (794-1192)around mid-February. Elaborate displays might depict a noble wedding complete withentourage, musicians, and miniature utensils on a tiered platform, but it is more common todisplay only the marriage couple.

33 During the Tokugawa period (1600-1868), such alcoves were characteristic of elite (samurai,aristocratic, and merchant) households: they typically contained only a few choice objets d’artwhich signalled the cultivation and refined taste of such families to the wider world. Today,these alcoves are more widespread; their contents vary greatly, but generally such spaces arecluttered with small decorative objects (Daniels 2001b).

34 Hendry (1995) has discussed the circulation of small, cheap towels as a means by whichJapanese create social links.

35 My research is influenced by the large body of anthropological literature about exchangerelations, especially those studies focusing on Melanesia (Munn 1986; Strathern 1988). Muchof this work in turn draws from the way in which Marcel Mauss’s (1967) work on gift exchangechallenges the Marxist productivist view while extending Marx’s work on value.


36 Religious institutions provide bins to dispose of these items throughout the year, but specialcollections are held during the New Year period.

37 When a wish is fulfilled, people commonly visit religious centres to make an offering ofmoney, food, or drink to thank the deities for their assistance.

38 Discussions of modernity frequently take the form of a Western/Japanese dichotomy. Pro-motional talk in souvenir shops, for example, draws on these discourses to promote certain engi-mono (Daniels forthcoming) as traditional Japanese objects. However, in practice Japaneseconsumers draw freely on both Western and Japanese elements to create a feeling of ‘Japaneseness’. In the context of the home this is, for example, reflected in the use of carpetson top of tatami mats in Japanese-style rooms.

39 Marx, drawing on Feuerbach, argues that in religion, ‘the products of the human brainappear as autonomous figures endowed with a life of their own, which enter into relationsboth with each other and with the human race’ (Marx 1976 [1867]: 165).

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Pelles à riz, râteaux et porte-bonheur : chance, action etinterdépendance des hommes et des objets au Japon

Résumé

L’auteur s’intéresse à la circulation et à la consommation, au Japon, de biens d’usage courantinvestis d’une spiritualité informelle et familière que l’on peut traduire par « chance » ou« bonheur ». Tambiah affirme que la dissémination du pouvoir spirituel incarné par lesamulettes bouddhistes thaïes rend compte de la « distribution différentielle du pouvoir » etdu « contrôle social » mis en place dans une société laïque hiérarchisée. Mon étude de casjaponaise suggère quant à elle que la marchandisation des biens religieux aboutit à une dif-fusion plus démocratique de la spiritualité. Ni sacrés, ni séculiers, les porte-bonheur remet-tent en question la dichotomie que l’on veut voir, dans les objets, entre valeur esthétique etutilité. Ils s’inscrivent dans des réseaux élargis d’agents humains et non-humains mais, à traversleurs trajectoires diverses, ils conservent également une part d’action qui fait partie intégrantede leurs propriétés matérielles.

Royal College of Art, Critical & Historical Studies, Kensington Gore, London SW7 [email protected]


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