A Japanese Santa Claus: A Nikkei Subject and Lévi-Strauss’s Gift Theory in Through the Arc of the Rain Forest

Japanese American writer Karen Tei Yamashita’s first novel, Through the Arc of the Rainforest (1990), portrays protagonist Kazumasa Ishimaru as “a Japanese Santa Claus”, depicted as having a plastic ball spinning in front of his face. Yamashita presents this magic realist hero as a satire of Japan in the 1990s, which became the developed nation needed to support the developing world under the new Marshall Plan. Focusing on Kazumaza’s participation in charity, this essay explores the gift economy embodied by this Japanese immigrant character. Inspired by Claude Lévi-Strauss’s 1952 essay “Burned-out Santa Claus”, Kazumasa’s Nikkei subject position not only criticizes American capitalism but also Brazil’s postcolonial mentality. Supporting the idea that Lévi-Strauss sympathizes with Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s concept of innocence, the last part of the essay probes the idea of Kazumasa as an innocent subject who challenges the dichotomy between American capitalism and postcolonial Brazil.