JAPAN - GENDER

Contradictions in Gender/Society/Culture Sun Goddess – Amaterasu, Shrine at Ise Shintoism, women power – mikos (shaman) Tale of Genji authored by a woman Current 8 million part-time workers, 90% women, women earn average 44% of men Civil Code 1898 – women forbid re-marry until 6 months after divorce

Child born within 300 days of divorce cannot be registered in family register of biological father until divorced husband testifies child not his Efforts to change law, resisted by conservative politicians, Diet. 3,500 kids/year not registered –No national benefits/ passport/ medical benefits Abortion legal since 1948 Anti-abortion backlash in 1970s. Feminism – 1911 Seito (magazine) - Bluestocking

Art 14 of Japanese Constitution 1947 – no discrimination on basis of sex Art 4 Labor Standards Law 1947 – mandates equal pay for equal work1986 – Equal Employment Opportunity law (EEOL)

1999 – first legal sex change operations conducted in Japan Psychic identity, cultural constructions of masculinity and femininity, legal structures, women excluded from political participation Female body – reproduction, sexuality, impurity/ public sphere

1980s – term jenda (gender) begin appearing Womens studies – joseigaku Dominant formulations on Gender Capitalism and Gender relations Globalization/Internationalization Feminism

distinctive roles, distinct division of labor Private/public Role of women valorised, not de-valued as in West maternal society bosei shakai Ueno Chizuko – reverse orientalism Feminism - West/non-west

Nihonjinron – theory of Japanese uniqueness Doi Takeos Amae no kozo (The Anatomy of Dependence) Kawai Hayaos Bosei shakai Nihon no byori (Psychiatry of the mother – dominated society).

1986 EEOL ippan shoku/shogo shoku (part- time/comprehensive work) Gender equity. Choice Critics say no bosei hogo – motherhood protection

Oriental men feminized (Orientalism) Japanese women doubly feminized Japanese men have been gradually deprived of their masculinity since the samurai were disarmed Japanese economic orgnaization – feminization of men Bubble economy – 1990s – de-stabilization of Japanese masculine identity

Fathers lose jobs Crisis in male centred corporate world. Maternal society? Motherhood and maternal love /nation-state Reproductive function, home/ national goal of technological modernization Domesticity/consumption mai homu shugi ideology of home ownership Mass consumer society

Idealization of US middle class life style My-home/work gender divisions of labor Home professional wives modern and rational home management, children, education Hataraki bachi (working bee) father Transform transform traditional patriarchal family

Domestic sphere – private. Separate women autonomous space Doi – amae Bureaucratic rationality/economic management Nation- matricentirc domesticity Kyoiku mama (education Mama) Nation/women/economy

Sumiko Iwao – recognition of different but equal roles (unlike inferior status of womens role in US) Shinjinrui – new species of man High consumption – individualistic Kuniko Miyanaga – creative individualism? Relationship between consumption and gender in Japan

Asada Akira 1980s Japan infantile capitalism - maternal Female wage labor supplementary to family income – supply of female part-time labor and discrimination of female workers in general could be sustained Japan – colonial modernity Imperial subjects Women good wives, wise mothers ideology of familialism

Feminism Consumption site of identity formation Marriage – foreigners