Japanese Numbers Game (Nissan Institute/Routledge Japanese Studies)

The Japanese Numbers Game provides a general study of the whole field of Japanese popular numeracy. It introduces the reader to a world of numbers in which fortune-telling, the abacus, games involving numbers as well as curious numerical names (of both people and places) illustrate a popular obsession with systems of counting, calculation and forecasting. Thomas Crump meticulously explores the cultural roots of attitudes toward numbers and suggests the contemporary implications of a culture in which mechanical numeracy (and number obsession) is commonplace but the highest levels of academic mathematics still fall short of world standards. Crump's analysis of this cultural phenomenon moves beyond generalization to reveal the often contradictory love affair between the Japanese and the number system.