Japanese Weddings Essay

618 Words3 Pages
Weddings in Japan have greatly changed throughout the modernization of the world. Japanese weddings have become greatly commercialized and manipulated. There have been many new additions and changes to the Japanese wedding ceremony. A few factors contribute to these changes, two major factors are the westernization of the weddings, and the building of wedding halls. The traditional Japanese wedding has become such a commercialized event mainly because of the rapid growth of the wedding hall industry. The appearance of wedding halls came in the 1950s. Most commonly before that they were held in homes however after the war many people began to get married in the new and popular way of wedding halls. The industry grew so fast because it painted a picture to the bride and groom of “the best day you could dream of.” It made something that may have special and simple, into something that was elaborate and complex. One other contributing factor to the growth were advertisements that stated things like “Splendid Wedding” and “Paint your brightest day beautiful” (page 9, Modern Japan Through Its Wedding). Along with the huge growth of wedding halls came many new additions to the traditional Japanese wedding ceremony. The entire event became more intricate and expensive. Most of these additions were things that have been around for a long period of time in western culture’s weddings. The wedding hall industries manipulated the symbols and rituals of the traditional wedding by gearing those traditional aspects forward to more modern styles, and requiring more financing in the switch between old and new. One thing that right off the bat made the “new” wedding more expensive was the fact that they were held in wedding halls. If you were having a traditional Japanese wedding, it would most likely be held at home where you would not pay to use your own house. The
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