TOKYO: While their governments have had a love-hate relationship for 150 years, Japanese embrace US entertainment icons and civil rights ideas while Americans have learned there is more to Japan than the stereotyped image, analysts say.
Since Japan and the United States established formal relations under the March 31, 1854, Treaty of Peace and Amity, official bilateral ties have finally matured after periods of confrontation and coordination, Japanese scholars and researchers said.
"Japanese have always had an allergy to American gunboat policy, which at times has triggered anti-US sentiment and hatred," said Makoto Iokibe, professor of history at Kobe University in western Japan.
"But America has also shown its flexibility with pragmatic solutions to deal with Japanese protest against the Vietnam War and complaints about managed trade and demands for equal partnership," he said.
The two nations have also come a long way towards understanding each other on the cultural front considering that they speak completely different languages and practise social norms which often appear alien to each other. Until recently, Japan meant nothing more than Mount Fuji, cherry blossoms, geisha girls, sushi and tempura to most Americans.
Japanese played baseball, admired Hollywood film and rock stars and eagerly consumed iconic American products such as McDonald's hamburgers, Coca Cola and Lucky Strike cigarettes.
But American awareness of the breadth of Japanese culture has reached new levels in the past few years, said Toshihiro Nakayama, a research fellow at the Japan Institute of International Affairs.
Just as elsewhere in the world, there is huge American demand for Japanese computer games, "anime" cartoon films and "manga" comics, which have served as the inspiration for Hollywood films like "The Matrix".
Two of Major League Baseball's superstars - Seattle Mariners' Ichiro Suzuki and New York Yankees' Hideki Matsui - are Japanese. -AFP
