Sports sites of memory in Japan's cultures of remembrance and oblivion: Collective remembrance is like swimming - in order to stay afloat you have to keep moving

Wehave been asked to provide a summarizing article on the role of sports in memorizing the Japanese nation. Each of the three dimensions of memory evoked and revealed in the studies that are contained in this issue demonstrate the promise of, and purchase that, a focus on sport and lieu de mémoire provides to scholars of sport and Japanese society. We draw a tentative conclusion that the articles in this issue demonstrate that historical studies of sports can open a window onto the topology of Japanese symbolism. Amongst the questions we need to continue to ask are to what degree pre-modern societies have actually shared and nourished the 'living memory', the loss of which has been bemoaned by Nora. Also we must take issue with the notion of 'collective memory' as an absolute, all-encompassing, entity, since it is important to consider opportunities for the investigation of counter-memory and counter-memorialization.