Bibliography

Notes on Methodology

For qualitative media content analysis, I consulted two Japanese broadsheet national newspapers Yomiuri Shimbun and Asahi Shimbun as my main primary sources for newspaper reports. There were several advantages in the selection of these two papers. Firstly, the Yomiuri and the Asahi are the best-selling (7.4 million copies per day in 2021) and second-best selling (4.9 million per day in 2021) newspapers in the country respectively (Yomiuri Shimbun 2021). They are therefore indicative of the general tone and direction of national media discourse. Secondly, the Yomiuri is a leading conservative paper, while the Asahi is known for its progressive agenda: comparing the two enabled me to see how different political leanings shaped reactions to the Aum Affair as expressed through their editorials and news reports. Thirdly, on a more practical note, both papers were accessible through online digital archives, making archival work in the UK considerably easier than it would have been otherwise.

As additional sources, I have included articles from the national newspapers Mainichi Shimbun and Sankei Shimbun, and some contemporary affairs magazines such as AERA and Bungei Shunjū, limiting the analysis to editorials in the first month after the Tokyo attack (March to April 1995). Both Mainichi and Sankei are widely read national newspapers: Mainichi has a daily circulation of 2.1 million copies, while Sankei has 1.2 million daily readers as of 2021 (Yomiuri Shimbun 2021). They have contrasting political stances, with the Mainichi widely regarded as a centrist and liberal newspaper, while the Sankei is the most right-wing of major national papers. Due to time constraints during my fieldwork, these newspapers comprise a small sample of the overall data, but nonetheless provide useful comparisons to the Yomiuri and the Asahi.

For each newspaper, I searched for articles containing key words in Japanese such as ‘Aum Shinrikyō’, ‘Sarin’, ‘Matsumoto Sarin Incident’ and ‘Subway Sarin Incident’. Given the massive number of media reports on the Aum Affair, I narrowed down the date range of search for each topic to recover the most relevant articles. For initial reports on the Matsumoto Sarin Incident (which occurred on 27 June 1994) and Subway Sarin Incident (which occurred on 20 March 1995), I covered the period between June 1994 and December 1995. I then looked at commemorative media coverage of the Matsumoto Sarin Incident in June between 1996 and 2015, and in March between 1996 and 2015 for the Tokyo Subway Sarin Incident. This enabled an extensive but still manageable collection of articles. Many of the articles that I included were general news reports from the ‘society’ (shakai) section, editorials and opinion columns, letters to the editor, and special reports. All the articles were written in Japanese, and all translations are my own.

A unique aspect of Japanese newspapers is that different regional offices have a degree of editorial independence. This means that there is some variation in how regional editions print stories. For instance, cover stories may have different lengths depending on the relevance to the region and may have different layouts. There are also stories printed only in regional editions. In principle, I have privileged articles printed in ‘national’ editions. However, where there have been detailed reports on Aum in region-only editions, I have chosen to include them to demonstrate possible regional variations in media coverage of the Aum Affair.

One of the drawbacks of relying on online archives was the removal of visual data in the archival format. Visual information – such as photographs, cartoons, tables and figures, and diagrams – is a key component of print media, and especially so for newspapers, which rely on eye-catching headlines and photographs as part of their storytelling. Due to the storage format of archived articles as well as copyright issues, visual data presented in newspapers had to be omitted from the analysis, and where possible, I have considered other forms of visual media, such as magazines, television, and film.

Primary Sources

Interviews

Date	Name (surname/first name)	Title/Occupation
18 March 2015	Shimada Hiromi	Independent scholar, Religious Studies
25 March 2015	Inoue Nobutaka	Academic, Religious Studies
27 March 2015	Nagaoka Hiroyuki	Anti-Aum activist, survivor of an assassination attempt by Aum
30 March 2015	Noda Naruhito	Former leader of Aleph
31 March 2015	Ōta Toshihiro	Academic, Religious Studies
6 April 2015	Takahashi Shizue	Spokesperson for Subway Sarin Incident Victims’ Society
10 April 2015	Kōno Yoshiyuki	Survivor and widower of Matsumoto Sarin Incident
8 July 2016	Aoki Yumiko	Freelance book editor
20 July 2016	Mori Tatsuya	Film director; writer
24 July 2016	Jōyū Fumihiro	Leader, Hikari no Wa. Formerly leader of Aleph
29 July 2016	Anonymous	Former member of Aum/Aleph
29 July 2016	Hirosue Akitoshi	PR spokesperson for Hikari no Wa

Date	Name (surname/first name)	Title/Occupation
18 March 2015	Shimada Hiromi	Independent scholar, Religious Studies
25 March 2015	Inoue Nobutaka	Academic, Religious Studies
27 March 2015	Nagaoka Hiroyuki	Anti-Aum activist, survivor of an assassination attempt by Aum
30 March 2015	Noda Naruhito	Former leader of Aleph
31 March 2015	Ōta Toshihiro	Academic, Religious Studies
6 April 2015	Takahashi Shizue	Spokesperson for Subway Sarin Incident Victims’ Society
10 April 2015	Kōno Yoshiyuki	Survivor and widower of Matsumoto Sarin Incident
8 July 2016	Aoki Yumiko	Freelance book editor
20 July 2016	Mori Tatsuya	Film director; writer
24 July 2016	Jōyū Fumihiro	Leader, Hikari no Wa. Formerly leader of Aleph
29 July 2016	Anonymous	Former member of Aum/Aleph
29 July 2016	Hirosue Akitoshi	PR spokesperson for Hikari no Wa

Television programmes

Broadcaster	Title	Original Air Date
Fuji Terebi	Tsumayo! Matsumoto sarin jiken hannin to yobarete … Kazoku o mamorinuita 15 nen	26 June 2009
Fuji Terebi	Chikatetsu sarin jiken 15 nen me no tatakai	20 March 2010
Fuji Terebi	Gekido! Seiki no daijiken Oumu Shinrikyō to tatakatta ‘kazoku no zenkiroku’	20 March 2015
NHK	Ningen Dokyumento. Tsuma Shizue san no haru: Chikatetsu sarin jiken izoku no hibi	15 April 2005
NHK	Mikaiketsu jiken File No.2 Oumu Shinrikyō Jiken	26, 27 May 2012
TV Tokyo	Hōdō sukūpu purojekuto Oumu wa imamo ikiteiru: sōryoku tsuiseki! Chikatetsu sarin jiken 20 nen	7 March 2015
Yomiuri Terebi	NNN Dokyumento Ashiato Matsumoto sarin jiken 20 nen	30 June 2014

Broadcaster	Title	Original Air Date
Fuji Terebi	Tsumayo! Matsumoto sarin jiken hannin to yobarete … Kazoku o mamorinuita 15 nen	26 June 2009
Fuji Terebi	Chikatetsu sarin jiken 15 nen me no tatakai	20 March 2010
Fuji Terebi	Gekido! Seiki no daijiken Oumu Shinrikyō to tatakatta ‘kazoku no zenkiroku’	20 March 2015
NHK	Ningen Dokyumento. Tsuma Shizue san no haru: Chikatetsu sarin jiken izoku no hibi	15 April 2005
NHK	Mikaiketsu jiken File No.2 Oumu Shinrikyō Jiken	26, 27 May 2012
TV Tokyo	Hōdō sukūpu purojekuto Oumu wa imamo ikiteiru: sōryoku tsuiseki! Chikatetsu sarin jiken 20 nen	7 March 2015
Yomiuri Terebi	NNN Dokyumento Ashiato Matsumoto sarin jiken 20 nen	30 June 2014

Films

Kumai, K. (2000) Nihon no Kuroi Natsu: Enzai. Drama, Nikkatsu.

Mori, T. (1998) A. Documentary, “A” Production Committee.

Mori, T. (2001) A2. Documentary, “A” Production Committee.

Laws

1995.

Sarin tō ni yoru jinshin higai no bōshi ni kansuru hōritsu.

21 April. Act No. 78.

Month:	Total Views:
February 2023	2
March 2023	4
April 2023	1
May 2023	2
August 2023	1
October 2023	2
January 2024	9
June 2024	1
July 2024	1
August 2024	1

Contents

Bibliography

Notes on Methodology

Primary Sources

Interviews

Television programmes

Films

Laws

Publications by Aum Shinrikyō/Aleph

Secondary sources

Email alerts

This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only