The BBC had an interesting item the week about the creation of a monument to the souls of insects killed by humans at a Buddhist Temple in Kamakura (the same town Satsuki Kawano report on in her study of Japanese ritual practices you were assigned!).
The sponsor of the monument at Kenjochi Temple "hopes the monument will console the souls of the insects he has collected, and also send an environmental message. "I hope people will be fully aware what kind of an era it would be without insects."
Did I mention that my PhD in biology was spent in an insect lab which sacrificed hundreds of thousands of these creatures for research? I actually built a small alter in honor of the insets we killed in that lab, placed there for the 6 years I spent (mainly butterflies, moths, and ants). Given that, this news item resonated with me!
When we go the tie Shingon Buddhist site, Koya-san, keep your eye out in the cemetery for a large monument to termites erected by a pest control company.
Lafcadio Hearn, one of the first westerners to live in Japan and write extensively about it in the 1800s, once observed:
‘In old Japanese literature, poems upon insects are to be found by thousands...What is the signification of the great modern silence in Western countries upon this delightful topic?’
What does this tell us about the Japanese sensibility ro sense of aesthetic? You might also enjoy these related links:
Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWBoYIXg7uk
Why the West Fears Insects while Japan Reveres Them
http://aeon.co/magazine/society/why-the-west-fears-insects-while-japan-reveres-them/http://aeon.co/magazine/society/why-the-west-fears-insects-while-japan-reveres-them/
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