TURNING JAPANESE: HOW WILL THE CONCEPT OF JAPANESE IDENTITY SHIFT TO ACCOMMODATE THE COUNTRY’S GROWING NEED FOR FOREIGN WORKERS? By Kira Thomas A thesis presented to the faculty of the University of Mississippi in partial fulfillment of the requirements for completion of the Bachelor of Arts degree in International Studies Croft Institute for International Studies Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College University of Mississippi University, Mississippi Spring 2012 Approved: __________________________________ Advisor: Dr. Noell Wilson __________________________________ Reader: Dr. William Schenck __________________________________ Reader: Dr. Peter Frost THOMAS 2 Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................................................. 3 INTRODUCTION: KARAOKE AND CONNECTIONS ............................................................................ 4 FRAMING THE LABOR SHORTAGE ..................................................................................................................................... 6 ZAINICHI KOREANS ............................................................................................................................................................... 8 NIKKEI BRAZILIAN JAPANESE ......................................................................................................................................... 10 JAPANESE IDENTITY ........................................................................................................................................................... 12 RESEARCH AIMS .................................................................................................................................................................. 15 CHAPTER 1: FOREIGN LABOR, THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM ............................................... 17 THE POPULATION DIAMOND ........................................................................................................................................... 17 HOW MANY FOREIGNERS, AND WHAT KIND? ........................................................................................................... 20 FOREIGNERS AS SECOND-CLASS CITIZENS ................................................................................................................. 22 THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM ......................................................................................................................................... 24 CHAPTER 2: THE CASE OF ZAINICHI KOREANS .............................................................................. 25 A HISTORY IN LIMBO ......................................................................................................................................................... 25 NATIONALITY REVOKED: THE FATEFUL 1950S ......................................................................................................... 27 NEITHER JAPANESE NOR KOREAN ................................................................................................................................. 29 THE UNAWARE “OTHER” .................................................................................................................................................. 31 WHAT THE ZAINICHI EXPERIENCE SAYS ABOUT FOREIGNERS IN JAPAN ........................................................ 32 CHAPTER 3: THE CASE OF NIKKEI BRAZILIANS ............................................................................. 35 ITTEKURU (TO GO AND COME BACK) ........................................................................................................................... 35 DISTINCTION, DISCRIMINATION, ISOLATION ............................................................................................................. 38 EVENTUAL ASSIMILATION? ............................................................................................................................................. 39 TOWARD A PERMANENT FUTURE .................................................................................................................................. 41 CHAPTER 4: OBSERVING OPINION AMONG JAPANESE UNIVERSITY STUDENTS .......... 45 JAPANESE AND THE OTHER .............................................................................................................................................. 45 METHODOLOGY AND HYPOTHESES ............................................................................................................................... 45 PART ONE: WHO IS JAPANESE? ...................................................................................................................................... 48 PART TWO: ATTITUDES TOWARD NON-JAPANESE .................................................................................................. 52 THIS SURVEY AS A SPRINGBOARD ................................................................................................................................. 56 CONCLUSION: FLEXIBILITY IN BOTH JAPANESE IDENTITY AND GOVERNMENT? ....... 57 APPENDIX A: TRANSCRIPT OF SURVEY QUESTIONS (ENGLISH TRANSLATION) ............ 65 THOMAS 3 Acknowledgements This work is indebted to the many people who have offered their guidance over the course of my research. I would like to thank Dr. Noell Wilson, my advisor, for her continued advice and support; Dr. Minjoo Oh, who was in part responsible for sparking my interest in this topic; Dr. Kaoru Ochiai, for her tireless efforts in my Japanese education over the past several years; Dr. Frost for his abundant guidance; Dr. Abby Loebenberg for having aided in my analysis of the survey results; and Dr. William Schenck for his valuable suggestions. I would also like to express my gratitude toward my family and friends, as well as Jack Thornber of the University of Edinburgh, who never ceased to encourage me at every turn. Finally, I am thankful for those professors and students at Ritsumeikan University, as well as other Japanese friends of mine, who helped me understand on a deeper level the many factors that influence the intricate concept of Japanese identity. THOMAS 4 Introduction: Karaoke and Connections On one of my last nights in Kyoto in August of 2011, I visited a karaoke box with three fellow study abroad students, and was informed by the man in charge of the front desk that there were no spaces open. In front of us, there were a number of visibly empty rooms (this karaoke box did not take reservations). One of my friends, an Australian, asked him, in polite, nearly fluent Japanese, why we would not possibly be able to rent one of the rooms we could quite easily recognize as vacant. The man looked flustered; it was unclear whether he was more surprised by my friend’s ability to speak Japanese coherently or embarrassed that his thinly veiled attempt to turn us away had been so easily exposed. After a moment of what appeared to be a fierce internal struggle, the man showed us to one of the empty rooms, and gave us the standard, scripted, and extremely polite explanation that we would be able to stay until the standard closing time, at which point we should be careful not to forget any of our belongings. This experience, while ultimately inconsequential, was the first and only time I ever felt as if I had encountered outright discrimination in Japan. I had grown accustomed to being stared at on trains, having my appearance discussed openly under the assumption that I did not speak Japanese, and hearing middle school children shout, “Hello!” in a Japanese accent as I rode by them on my bicycle. Yet unlike these relatively harmless and well-meaning encounters, my experience at the karaoke box meant that based on the way I looked, I might have been refused at a business, albeit one that did not have a profound effect on my livelihood. At around the same time that the karaoke incident occurred, I remember hearing the news that one of my Japanese friends had just acquired Japanese citizenship. His family has been living in Japan since his great grandparents’ generation, and while his great grandparents may THOMAS 5 have spoken Korean, his only language is Japanese (along with some broken English), his name is Japanese, and until he casually mentioned that he was, in fact, Zainichi (resident) Korean, I was not aware that he was anything other than what I thought of as “Japanese.” He is, however, a member of a part of Japanese society that faces discrimination on a regular basis. My experience as a foreigner in Japan, along with my observation of Japanese society’s relationship with existing minority groups, developed ties with some of my formal studies of Japanese society. As I read article after article on the growing labor shortage presented by Japan’s low-birthrate and aging population, I began to wonder why Japan had not yet pursued an aggressive campaign to increase the number of educated foreigners in its workforce. It became clear to me that this lack of decisive policymaking likely had something to do with Japanese identity and Japan’s apparent reluctance to acknowledge its multicultural past and present; if Japan avoided admitting to multiculturalism in the past and at present, it seemed unlikely that it would encourage a multicultural, multiracial future. My research explores the question of how Japanese identity will shift to accommodate the country’s growing need for foreign workers. I believe that whether Japanese identity expands to form a more inclusive