Thurs. March 1

Further on down the column - on March 10 - we write about the Japanese rock invasion at T.T. the Bear's. Perhaps you'd like to warm up for that - or just gain insights into the country and its pop culture - with a panel discussion called "Cool Japan" at the Harvard Coop Thursday March 1 at 12:30 p.m. At the table: Susan Napier (in photo), from Tufts, the author of "Anime: From Akira to Howl's Moving Castle." She'll also discuss her forthcoming book, "From Impressionism to Anime: Japan as Fantasy and Fan Cult in the Western Imagination." Roland Kelts, from the University of Tokyo, is the author of "Japanamerica: How Japanese Pop Culture Invaded the US," so he'll bring that to the table. And Ian Condry, of MIT and Harvard," has written "Hip-Hop Japan: Rap and the Paths of Cultural Globalization." (Have you noticed absolutely every book written these days that is not a novel has a colon in the title?). Join the fray. It's free.
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