The festival of Setsubun in Japanese Family These Days in Ishikiri Osaka

Abstract

Setsubun is a festival symbolized as the change of four seasons. The tradition has
existed since the era of Nara which has a purpose to dispel the bad spirits and hope for the
lucks. The study aims to describe the understanding of Japanese people regarding the
Setsubun festival and to describe the forms of the change which occurs in the festival these
days in Ishikiri Osaka.
The culture change is a process of dislocation, diminishing, enhancing and
development of elements in a culture. Simply, the dislocation of culture is a dynamics that
happens due to collision among the culture elements (Koentjaraningrat 2005:142). Gillin and
Gillin (in Soekanto Soerjono 1990: 337) states that the social change is a change as a
variation of life ways that has been accepted. It can be due to the change of geographical,
material culture, composition of population, ideology, or even due to the diffusion or the new
innovations in the society.
The type of the study is descriptive qualitative. The object in this study is the
describing toward the Setsubun festival phenomenon these days in the Japanese family in
Ishikiri Osaka. The data collecting techniques were conducted by using: (a). the library
research, and (b) the questionnaire. The data analyzing techniques were conducted by (a) the
data classification such as classifying the data, (b) analyzing the data, and (c) concluding the
data.
According to the analysis results of the data and discussion, it was found that there are
a few changes that are not quite significant among the Japanese generally and them who live
in Ishikiri Osaka. (a) Found that there is a similarity on average of Japanese people who have
chosen to not longer display Yaikagashi in the Setsubun festival these days, (b) looked to the
purpose of the Setsubun festival in every districts and Buddha temples, they have their own
ways and functions in holding the festival, and (c) for the place or location to hold the
Setsubun festival in Ishikiri 4 Chome, it is mostly held in the house. Based on the results,
those can be concluded that the festival of Setsubun in Japanese society, Ishikiri 4 Chome to
be exact, is still held until today. Although there is a difference if it is seen through the
function, place, and instrument, however it does not change the meaning and the tradition that
have existed in the festival these days.
Keywords: Setsubun Festival, Culture Change, Social Change, Ishikiri