A preliminary report of “whale flensing performance” held in the Showa era in Japan

Ishikawa Hajime

doi:10.5181/cetology.0.24_1

<p>“Whale flensing performance” is one of the show businesses held in a bargain sale of local shopping center and supermarkets, or local festivals from 1970’s to 1980’s. In the performance, a flesh carcass of 4-5 m length whale (usually, short-finned pilot whale was used) was flensed by expert persons (contractor) with explanation of an emcee (host of the event) in front of crowd, and followed by a sale of flensed whale meat. The contractor of the whale flensing performance was responsible for preparation, transport and flensing of the whale in a package deal. As the host was responsible for the sale of whale meat, this performance was more profitable than other entertainments to gather customers because income of the sale belonged to the host. The whale flensing performance had become popular to attract customers or crowds in various business events because people those especially live in city or inland areas had seldom opportunity to see real “whale” even if they ate whale meat commonly in that time. However, it died out until late 1980’s when commercial whaling of large whales was banned by the decision of the International Whaling Commission. It resulted in sudden rise in meat price of small toothed whales as substitute for large baleen whales meat and cost of the whale flensing performance became expensive. Although it was popular and memorable event in that time, the record or description of the whale flensing performance was very few in a whaling literature or a cultural history. The Whale Laboratory is gathering the information of the whale flensing performance.</p>

A preliminary report of “whale flensing performance” held in the Showa era in Japan

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