Ee ja nai ka

ええじゃないか was a complex of carnivalesque religious celebrations and communal activities, often understood as social or political protests, which occurred in many parts of Japan from June 1867 to May 1868, at the end of the Edo period and the start of the Meiji Restoration. Particularly intense during the Boshin War and Bakumatsu, the movement originated in the Kansai region, near Kyoto. In West Japan, ee ja nai ka appeared at first in the form of dancing festivals, often related to public works, rain magic, or dances for the dead. When sacred amulets were said to have fallen from heaven, thanksgiving celebrations for these amulets were added that could last for several days and effectively took whole rural and urban communities away from everyday life. Gifts were exchanged, youth groups organized mass dances which included cross-dressing, elaborate costumes, or not wearing clothes at all. To express their gratitude towards the kami or buddhas who had given them the amulets, many people went on pilgrimages to local or regional sanctuaries. The term was a refrain in popular songs performed during these activities and was therefore later chosen as their title. The phrase's meaning is also both defiant and fatalistic, and it translates as "Who cares?", "Why not?" or "What the hell?", along the lines of "Who cares if we take our clothes off?", "Who cares if we have sex?". The great diversity and rivalry of religious practice in pre-modern Japan helped shape the range of events. It has been suggested that religious activists, such as priests and itinerant preachers, played a major role in fabricating the "amulet showers", and some suspects were even caught in action by alert officers. Youth interested in celebrating parties, or in becoming spiritual leaders, were also suspected and in some cases convicted. was not linked to any specific political platform, though it is often understood "as a form of political protest when other ways [were] blocked", in reaction to the crumbling Tokugawa shogunate.