The University of Pittsburgh's Department of Anthropology will host Dr. Akiko Takeyama and her talk on her 2016 book Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club on February 10.
In Tokyo host clubs, ambitious young men seek their fortunes by selling love, romance, companionship, and sometimes sex to female consumers for exorbitant sums of money. Takeyama reveals a world where all intimacies and feigned feelings are fair game and theorizes the aspirational mode: seducing one another out of the present and into a hopeful future, in Japan’s service-centered economy.The talk begins at 3:00 pm in 3106 Posvar Hall (map) and is free and open to the public.