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a tuna may battle the fisher for four or five hours. newly rewired circuitry of global cultural and eco-
Some tuna literally fight to the death. For some fish- nomic affairs, Japan is the core, and the Atlantic
ers, the meaning of tuna-the equation of tuna with seaboard, the Adriatic, and the Australian coast are all
Japanese identity-is simple: Tuna is nothing less distant peripheries. Topsy-turvy as Gilbert and Sulli-
than the samurai fish! van never imagined it.
Of course, such mystification of a distant market's Japan is plugged into the popular North American
motivations for desiring a local commodity is not imagination as the sometimes inscrutable superpower,
unique. For decades, anthropologists have written of precise and delicate in its culinary tastes, feudal in its
"cargo cults" and "commodity fetishism" from New cultural symbolism, and insatiable in its appetites.
Guinea to Bolivia. But the ability of fishers today to Were Japan not a prominent player in so much of the
visualize Japanese culture and the place of tuna with- daily life of North Americans, the fishers outside of
in its demanding culinary tradition is constantly shaped Bath or in Seabrook would have less to think about in
and reshaped by the flow of cultural images that now constructing their Japan. As it is, they struggle with
travel around the globe in all directions simultaneously, unfamiliar exchange rates for cultural capital that
bumping into each other in airports, fishing ports, compounds in a foreign currency.
bistros, bodegas, and markets everywhere. In the And they get ready for next season. El

[ Want to Know More?}]

Theodore C. Bestor is the author of a new book, Tokyo's Marketplace (Berkeley: University of Cal-
ifornia Press, 2001), an ethnography of the auctions at Tsukiji market.

The Book of Sushi, by Kinjiro Omae and Yuzuru Tachibana (New York: Kodansha International,
1981), is an authoritative (and well-illustrated) introduction to the fundamentals of sushi appreci-
ation. Donald Richie's A Taste ofJapan (New York: Kodansha International, 1985), offers elegant
vignettes on sushi and its cultural and historical milieus. Richard Hosking's A Dictionaly ofJapan-
ese Food (Rutland: Tuttle, 1996) is an entertaining and essential reference on the cultural background
of Japanese culinary ingredients.

Giant Bluefin, by Douglas Whynott (New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1995), follows tuna fish-
ers from the Gulf of Maine to Cape Cod. In early 2001, Giant Bluefin Tuna, a documentary pro-
duced by Natio~zal Geographic, will air on CNBC'S Natio~zal Geographic Explorer. At the New Eng-
land Aquarium, Dr. Molly Lutcavage studies the population biology of bluefin tuna in collaboration
with fishing groups in New England. Details of her research are posted on the aquarium's Web site.
The Tuna Research and Conservation Center is jointly sponsored by the Monterey Bay Aquarium
and Stanford University's Hopkins Marine Station. Its Web site links to several research projects on
tagging and tracking bluefin and raising them in captivity.

The Tsukiji wholesale seafood market in Tokyo has an English-language Web site with basic infor-
mation about the marketplace and links to some of the major trading companies involved in the tuna
auctions. Fish is Our Life!, a video documentary by Peregrine Beckman, focuses on the working lives
of Tsukiji's auctioneers and fishmongers. The International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic
Tunas (ICCAT) maintains a Web site with technical information on fishing quotas and regulations.

TRAFFIC, a Web collaboration between the World Wide Fund for Nature and the World Con-
servation Union, publishes information on trade in endangered species. TRAFFIC also posts occa-
sional reports on the activities of ICCAT.

>>For links to relevant Web sites, as well as a comprehensive index of related FOREIGNPOLICY
articles, access www.foreignpolicy.com.