Once upon a time, I did a series of posts on Tumblr that profiled Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples in Japan: their locales, their enshrined deities, and some of their lore. It got a lot of traffic: the masterpost that indexed them has 346 notes as of 29 March 2019, the original post went up in 2015. So it’s gotten some positive feedback and support, but along with much else, it had to go on hold between finishing grad school and getting after job hunting. Since then, I’ve developed new interests– and it seems to me that one of them is particularly suited to this project!

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宮城県名取市・県道３９号の道端から：佐倍乃神社（笠島道祖神社）の道標。 #戻ります様に Road signs for Saeno-jinja (also known as Kasashima Doso-jinja) in Natori, #MiyagiPrefecture . . . #natori #tohoku #hometown #sendaigram #miyagigram #travel #roadside #roads #nature #shinto #shrines #神社巡り #寺社巡り #イラスト好き #イラスト練習 #イラスト好きな人と繋がりたい #名取 #宮城県 #県道　#東北 #イラスト #シャープペンシル #landscapes #佐倍乃神社 #笠島道祖神社 #mechanicalpencil #artistsoninstagram

A post shared by Nyri Bakkalian (@nyribakkalian) on Mar 24, 2019 at 11:04am PDT

It seems like things are coming into order, with my recent employment, so it’s at last time to revisit this– the art and the shrine profiles together, because these things seem made for each other.

It’s going to be a little different, this time, though.

• I’m going to focus on northeastern Japan first, in order to keep to my most ready pool of source material. I have less access to an academic library now that I’m no longer a graduate student, but I have periodic access, so I need to plan better. Since I have my own personal library– and a range of digitized sources– which focus on the northeast, I’m going to start there. As I build both my experience, my source access, and my income, I’ll build out from there in terms of geographic coverage. For the purposes of this series, I’m defining the northeast as the Tohoku region– meaning, Fukushima, Miyagi, Iwate, Aomori, Akita, and Yamagata.
• Unlike the original series, I’ll just be focusing on shrines rather than including Buddhist temples. There’ll be some overlap, though, because of shinbutsu-shugo, and how the line between the two used to be blurred.
• There’ll be new (or extra) material included in the new version! Aside from the drawings, I’m also going to make a point of including maps and more expansive reference lists. Addresses are fine, yes, but a point on a map is better– especially if you happen to be in the neighborhood and are trying to get there.

What’s my schedule right now? I’m hoping to get the first profile live and posted sometime in mid-April. It’ll be on one of the shrines from before, but revised and expanded.

That’ll be something to look forward to for your mid-April. Meanwhile watch this space! And remember: sign up to my Patreon at http://www.shiogamawaves.com to support this and the rest of my content– and for early access and bonus material!