Suicide and Brain Death: a Study of Contemporary Japanese Spirituality and Identity

This article discusses the spiritual crisis facing contemporary Japanese people. The author explores how modernization has pervaded Japanese people & how it has affected their attitude toward religion, as well as their identity in the context of history. The author then explores Japanese spirituality & the sense of self, which is characterized by the coexistence of Buddhism & Shintoism. A discussion of suicide & brain death follows in order to examine how these problems throw into doubt both Japanese identity & the values of highly modernized contemporary society. (15 refs)