Yasunosuke Gonda (権田保之助 Gonda Yasunosuke ) (17 May 1887 - 5 January 1951) was a Japanese sociologist and film theorist who played an important role in the study of popular entertainment and helped pioneer statistical studies of everyday life in Japan.
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Born in the Kanda area of Tokyo, Gonda was early attracted to the socialism of Isoo Abe, and his early political activities earned expulsion from Waseda High School.[1] He later studied at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies and Tokyo University where he was influenced by German statistical sociology.[1] His first book, The Principles and Applications of the Moving Pictures (Katsudō shashin no genri oyobi ōyō), was published in 1914, and was the first full-length monograph in Japan studying the medium of cinema.[1] His later research on lower class life and popular play focused on how popular culture was generated from the bottom up and challenged top-down notions of national or modern culture.[2]