Steve Rabson
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824835347
- eISBN:
- 9780824871772
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824835347.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
The experiences of Okinawans in mainland Japan, like those of migrant minorities elsewhere, derive from a legacy of colonialism, war, and alien rule. Okinawans have long coped with a society in which ...
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The experiences of Okinawans in mainland Japan, like those of migrant minorities elsewhere, derive from a legacy of colonialism, war, and alien rule. Okinawans have long coped with a society in which differences are often considered “strange” or “wrong,” and with a central government that has imposed a mono-cultural standard in education, publicly priding itself on the nation's mythical “homogeneity.” They have felt strong pressures to assimilate by adopting mainland Japanese culture and concealing or discarding their own. Recently, however, a growing pride in roots has inspired more Okinawan migrants and their descendants to embrace their own history and culture and to speak out against inequities. Their experiences, like those of minorities in other countries, have opened them to an acute and illuminating perspective, given voice in personal testimony, literature, and song. Although much has been written on Okinawan emigration abroad, this is the first book in English to consider the Okinawan diaspora in Japan. It begins with the experiences of women who worked in Osaka's spinning factories in the early twentieth century, covers the years of the Pacific War and the prolonged U.S. military occupation of Okinawa, and finally treats the period following Okinawa's reversion to Japan in 1972. Throughout, it examines the impact of government and corporate policies, along with popular attitudes, for a compelling account of the Okinawan diaspora in the context of contemporary Japan's struggle to acknowledge its multiethnic society.Less
The experiences of Okinawans in mainland Japan, like those of migrant minorities elsewhere, derive from a legacy of colonialism, war, and alien rule. Okinawans have long coped with a society in which differences are often considered “strange” or “wrong,” and with a central government that has imposed a mono-cultural standard in education, publicly priding itself on the nation's mythical “homogeneity.” They have felt strong pressures to assimilate by adopting mainland Japanese culture and concealing or discarding their own. Recently, however, a growing pride in roots has inspired more Okinawan migrants and their descendants to embrace their own history and culture and to speak out against inequities. Their experiences, like those of minorities in other countries, have opened them to an acute and illuminating perspective, given voice in personal testimony, literature, and song. Although much has been written on Okinawan emigration abroad, this is the first book in English to consider the Okinawan diaspora in Japan. It begins with the experiences of women who worked in Osaka's spinning factories in the early twentieth century, covers the years of the Pacific War and the prolonged U.S. military occupation of Okinawa, and finally treats the period following Okinawa's reversion to Japan in 1972. Throughout, it examines the impact of government and corporate policies, along with popular attitudes, for a compelling account of the Okinawan diaspora in the context of contemporary Japan's struggle to acknowledge its multiethnic society.
Annmaria M. Shimabuku
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780823282661
- eISBN:
- 9780823285938
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823282661.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
The Conclusion re-engages the words of the so-called “father of Okinawan studies,” Ifa Fuyū, who wrote shortly before his death in 1947 that he was not in a position to “command [his] descendants to ...
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The Conclusion re-engages the words of the so-called “father of Okinawan studies,” Ifa Fuyū, who wrote shortly before his death in 1947 that he was not in a position to “command [his] descendants to be in possession” of the ability to “determine their own fate.” Although this text is usually read as a lamentation of Okinawa’s inability to exercise self-determination, the Conclusion instead repositions it as a problem of how to think about the Okinawa’s alegality, or life unintelligible to the state. Specifically, it considers mixed-race life that was targeted as inimical to the monoethnic Japanese state (Chapter 1), and along with the contention surrounding the circumstances of its birth, continued to haunt Okinawa’s struggle with political representation from 1945 to 2015. It examines Ariko Ikehara’s essay on a mixed-race story in which a grandmother, by proxy of her daughter, claims her mixed granddaughter as a child of Okinawa. She exercises an autonomy irrespective of state recognition, and by doing so, reclaims an Okinawan life that matters.Less
The Conclusion re-engages the words of the so-called “father of Okinawan studies,” Ifa Fuyū, who wrote shortly before his death in 1947 that he was not in a position to “command [his] descendants to be in possession” of the ability to “determine their own fate.” Although this text is usually read as a lamentation of Okinawa’s inability to exercise self-determination, the Conclusion instead repositions it as a problem of how to think about the Okinawa’s alegality, or life unintelligible to the state. Specifically, it considers mixed-race life that was targeted as inimical to the monoethnic Japanese state (Chapter 1), and along with the contention surrounding the circumstances of its birth, continued to haunt Okinawa’s struggle with political representation from 1945 to 2015. It examines Ariko Ikehara’s essay on a mixed-race story in which a grandmother, by proxy of her daughter, claims her mixed granddaughter as a child of Okinawa. She exercises an autonomy irrespective of state recognition, and by doing so, reclaims an Okinawan life that matters.
Mamoru Akamine
Robert Huey (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780824855178
- eISBN:
- 9780824872953
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824855178.003.0010
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
The author summarizes Ryukyu’s historical position in East Asia, noting how its own changes reflected the broader changes East Asian was going through. He argues that, though part of Japan today, ...
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The author summarizes Ryukyu’s historical position in East Asia, noting how its own changes reflected the broader changes East Asian was going through. He argues that, though part of Japan today, Okinawa is still different, and he calls that difference the “its heritage from the Ryukyu Kingdom and its ‘Asian experience.’” Chinese elements in Okinawan culture, for example, are not just the result of centuries of trade and diplomatic contact, but also come from the Kingdom’s conscious effort to “sinify” in the seventeenth century. As for Okinawan’s status today, the author notes that Okinawa’s sovereignty is still seen as an open question by China.Less
The author summarizes Ryukyu’s historical position in East Asia, noting how its own changes reflected the broader changes East Asian was going through. He argues that, though part of Japan today, Okinawa is still different, and he calls that difference the “its heritage from the Ryukyu Kingdom and its ‘Asian experience.’” Chinese elements in Okinawan culture, for example, are not just the result of centuries of trade and diplomatic contact, but also come from the Kingdom’s conscious effort to “sinify” in the seventeenth century. As for Okinawan’s status today, the author notes that Okinawa’s sovereignty is still seen as an open question by China.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This book is a study of an Okinawan diasporic community in South America and Japan. Under extraordinary conditions throughout the twentieth century, Okinawans left their homeland and created various ...
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This book is a study of an Okinawan diasporic community in South America and Japan. Under extraordinary conditions throughout the twentieth century, Okinawans left their homeland and created various diasporic communities around the world. Colonia Okinawa, a farming settlement in the tropical plains of eastern Bolivia, is one such community that was established in the 1950s. Although they have flourished as farm owners in Bolivia, thanks to generous support from the Japanese government since Okinawa's reversion to Japan in 1972, hundreds of Bolivian-born ethnic Okinawans have left the Colonia in the last two decades and moved to Japanese cities to become manual laborers in construction and manufacturing industries. This book challenges the unidirectional model of assimilation and acculturation commonly found in immigration studies. In its depiction of the transnational experiences of Okinawan-Bolivians, the book argues that transnational Okinawan-Bolivians underwent the various racialization processes—in which they were portrayed by non-Okinawan Bolivians living in the Colonia and native-born Japanese mainlanders in Yokohama and self-represented by Okinawan-Bolivians themselves—as the physical embodiment of a generalized and naturalized “culture” of Japan, Okinawa, or Bolivia. Racializing narratives and performances ideologically serve as both a cause and result of Okinawan-Bolivians' social and economic status as successful large-scale farm owners in rural Bolivia and struggling manual laborers in urban Japan. The book is a critical examination of the contradictory class and cultural identity (trans)formations of transmigrants; a qualitative study of colonial and postcolonial subjects in diaspora, and an attempt to theorize racialization as a social process of belonging within local and global schemes.Less
This book is a study of an Okinawan diasporic community in South America and Japan. Under extraordinary conditions throughout the twentieth century, Okinawans left their homeland and created various diasporic communities around the world. Colonia Okinawa, a farming settlement in the tropical plains of eastern Bolivia, is one such community that was established in the 1950s. Although they have flourished as farm owners in Bolivia, thanks to generous support from the Japanese government since Okinawa's reversion to Japan in 1972, hundreds of Bolivian-born ethnic Okinawans have left the Colonia in the last two decades and moved to Japanese cities to become manual laborers in construction and manufacturing industries. This book challenges the unidirectional model of assimilation and acculturation commonly found in immigration studies. In its depiction of the transnational experiences of Okinawan-Bolivians, the book argues that transnational Okinawan-Bolivians underwent the various racialization processes—in which they were portrayed by non-Okinawan Bolivians living in the Colonia and native-born Japanese mainlanders in Yokohama and self-represented by Okinawan-Bolivians themselves—as the physical embodiment of a generalized and naturalized “culture” of Japan, Okinawa, or Bolivia. Racializing narratives and performances ideologically serve as both a cause and result of Okinawan-Bolivians' social and economic status as successful large-scale farm owners in rural Bolivia and struggling manual laborers in urban Japan. The book is a critical examination of the contradictory class and cultural identity (trans)formations of transmigrants; a qualitative study of colonial and postcolonial subjects in diaspora, and an attempt to theorize racialization as a social process of belonging within local and global schemes.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.003.0002
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter outlines the modern history of the Okinawan diaspora in three sections: (i) the history of Okinawan immigration to Bolivia in the prewar and postwar periods; (ii) the foundation and ...
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This chapter outlines the modern history of the Okinawan diaspora in three sections: (i) the history of Okinawan immigration to Bolivia in the prewar and postwar periods; (ii) the foundation and transformation of Colonia Okinawa in eastern Bolivia; and (iii) the factors and processes of Okinawan-Bolivians' dekasegi migration to urban Japan since the 1980s. It shows that Okinawan immigration and settlement in Colonia Okinawa and dekasegi migration to Yokohama are not merely population movements driven by local and global political economies but an illuminating case of the continuing displacement and struggle of colonial and postcolonial subjects. The chapter contextualizes the prewar and postwar waves of Okinawan emigration to Bolivia within this turbulent history of Okinawa and the Okinawan diaspora, and describes in detail the postwar Okinawan migration to Bolivia, which was planned and sponsored by the US military administration and the US-backed Okinawan government during the occupation. From the 1950s to the 1980s, Okinawan settlers in Colonia Okinawa increasingly defined themselves as “Japanese,” rather than “Okinawan,” subjects, vis-à-vis non-Nikkei “Bolivians,” as they asserted themselves as powerful upper-class patrones (large-scale farm owners). The chapter ends with a discussion of various contributing factors to the dekasegi migration since the 1980s, despite the Okinawan-Bolivians' privileged class position in Colonia Okinawa, against the backdrop of changing socioeconomic conditions surrounding Colonia Okinawa, Bolivia in general, and Japan.Less
This chapter outlines the modern history of the Okinawan diaspora in three sections: (i) the history of Okinawan immigration to Bolivia in the prewar and postwar periods; (ii) the foundation and transformation of Colonia Okinawa in eastern Bolivia; and (iii) the factors and processes of Okinawan-Bolivians' dekasegi migration to urban Japan since the 1980s. It shows that Okinawan immigration and settlement in Colonia Okinawa and dekasegi migration to Yokohama are not merely population movements driven by local and global political economies but an illuminating case of the continuing displacement and struggle of colonial and postcolonial subjects. The chapter contextualizes the prewar and postwar waves of Okinawan emigration to Bolivia within this turbulent history of Okinawa and the Okinawan diaspora, and describes in detail the postwar Okinawan migration to Bolivia, which was planned and sponsored by the US military administration and the US-backed Okinawan government during the occupation. From the 1950s to the 1980s, Okinawan settlers in Colonia Okinawa increasingly defined themselves as “Japanese,” rather than “Okinawan,” subjects, vis-à-vis non-Nikkei “Bolivians,” as they asserted themselves as powerful upper-class patrones (large-scale farm owners). The chapter ends with a discussion of various contributing factors to the dekasegi migration since the 1980s, despite the Okinawan-Bolivians' privileged class position in Colonia Okinawa, against the backdrop of changing socioeconomic conditions surrounding Colonia Okinawa, Bolivia in general, and Japan.
Steve Rabson
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824835347
- eISBN:
- 9780824871772
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824835347.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This chapter focuses on Okinawa and its relations with mainland Japan during the postwar years up to the present. The end of American military occupation marking the first Reversion Day in 1972, at a ...
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This chapter focuses on Okinawa and its relations with mainland Japan during the postwar years up to the present. The end of American military occupation marking the first Reversion Day in 1972, at a time when Japan's so-called miracle of super-high growth was starting belatedly to show effects in Okinawan communities on the mainland, instilled greater self-confidence among residents and jumpstarted economic and cultural developments, culminating in an “Okinawan Boom”—the increasing mainland fascination with Okinawa. The chapter recounts the mixed blessings arising from these developments, and comments on the lingering discrimination in postwar Japan, the responses to this prejudice—particularly from the children of Okinawan migrants—as well as the connections established between Okinawa and the mainland and the changing social relations between Okinawans and mainland Japanese concurrent with these events.Less
This chapter focuses on Okinawa and its relations with mainland Japan during the postwar years up to the present. The end of American military occupation marking the first Reversion Day in 1972, at a time when Japan's so-called miracle of super-high growth was starting belatedly to show effects in Okinawan communities on the mainland, instilled greater self-confidence among residents and jumpstarted economic and cultural developments, culminating in an “Okinawan Boom”—the increasing mainland fascination with Okinawa. The chapter recounts the mixed blessings arising from these developments, and comments on the lingering discrimination in postwar Japan, the responses to this prejudice—particularly from the children of Okinawan migrants—as well as the connections established between Okinawa and the mainland and the changing social relations between Okinawans and mainland Japanese concurrent with these events.
Elyssa Faison
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520252967
- eISBN:
- 9780520934184
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520252967.003.0006
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter explores issues of ethnicity, status, and citizenship in Japan's textile factories. Beginning in 1920, a number of mills began to employ increasingly large numbers of Korean and Okinawan ...
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This chapter explores issues of ethnicity, status, and citizenship in Japan's textile factories. Beginning in 1920, a number of mills began to employ increasingly large numbers of Korean and Okinawan women and girls. Partly this move was tied to wage-cutting strategies involved in the process of rationalization and as such reflected the globalization of Japan's capitalist system. But it also signaled company strategies for preempting labor conflict associated with the better organized and more demanding workers who traditionally came from Japan's countryside. This chapter offers a more detailed analysis of how ethnicity functioned in the construction of various “womanhoods” (Japanese and colonial) in the textile industry, and how the taxonomies of race, class, and gender produced through colonial policy and ideology were vital to such constructions. It examines companies, such as Kishiwada Cotton Spinning, that employed large numbers of Korean or Okinawan workers.Less
This chapter explores issues of ethnicity, status, and citizenship in Japan's textile factories. Beginning in 1920, a number of mills began to employ increasingly large numbers of Korean and Okinawan women and girls. Partly this move was tied to wage-cutting strategies involved in the process of rationalization and as such reflected the globalization of Japan's capitalist system. But it also signaled company strategies for preempting labor conflict associated with the better organized and more demanding workers who traditionally came from Japan's countryside. This chapter offers a more detailed analysis of how ethnicity functioned in the construction of various “womanhoods” (Japanese and colonial) in the textile industry, and how the taxonomies of race, class, and gender produced through colonial policy and ideology were vital to such constructions. It examines companies, such as Kishiwada Cotton Spinning, that employed large numbers of Korean or Okinawan workers.
Ryokichi Higashionna, Gilbert Ikehara, and Leslie Matsukawa
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824835804
- eISBN:
- 9780824868529
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824835804.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Pacific Studies
This chapter features the lives of Okinawans in Hawaiʻi. Though the evolution of the Okinawan people of Hawaiʻi has occurred, there is evidence of the persistence of possibly hardwired biological ...
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This chapter features the lives of Okinawans in Hawaiʻi. Though the evolution of the Okinawan people of Hawaiʻi has occurred, there is evidence of the persistence of possibly hardwired biological characteristics, traits, and behaviors that have been retained, leading to hardiness and a resilience of body, mind, and spirit. Okinawans are known for their longevity and good health into their old age. Yuimaru, a spirit of working together for the benefit of all, and ichariba chode, seeing everyone as brothers and sisters, are two of the persisting values that are very similar to Hawaiian values that opened doors for the Okinawans settling in the Islands and hold them in good stead today.Less
This chapter features the lives of Okinawans in Hawaiʻi. Though the evolution of the Okinawan people of Hawaiʻi has occurred, there is evidence of the persistence of possibly hardwired biological characteristics, traits, and behaviors that have been retained, leading to hardiness and a resilience of body, mind, and spirit. Okinawans are known for their longevity and good health into their old age. Yuimaru, a spirit of working together for the benefit of all, and ichariba chode, seeing everyone as brothers and sisters, are two of the persisting values that are very similar to Hawaiian values that opened doors for the Okinawans settling in the Islands and hold them in good stead today.
Rebecca Forgash
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- January 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781501750403
- eISBN:
- 9781501750427
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501750403.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This book examines intimacy in the form of sexual encounters, dating, marriage, and family that involve US service members and local residents. The book analyzes the stories of individual U.S. ...
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This book examines intimacy in the form of sexual encounters, dating, marriage, and family that involve US service members and local residents. The book analyzes the stories of individual U.S. service members and their Okinawan spouses and family members against the backdrop of Okinawan history, political and economic entanglements with Japan and the United States, and a longstanding anti-base movement. The narratives highlight the simultaneously repressive and creative power of military “fencelines,” sites of symbolic negotiation and struggle involving gender, race, and class that divide the social landscape in communities that host US bases. The book anchors the global U.S. military complex and US–Japan security alliance in intimate everyday experiences and emotions, illuminating important aspects of the lived experiences of war and imperialism.Less
This book examines intimacy in the form of sexual encounters, dating, marriage, and family that involve US service members and local residents. The book analyzes the stories of individual U.S. service members and their Okinawan spouses and family members against the backdrop of Okinawan history, political and economic entanglements with Japan and the United States, and a longstanding anti-base movement. The narratives highlight the simultaneously repressive and creative power of military “fencelines,” sites of symbolic negotiation and struggle involving gender, race, and class that divide the social landscape in communities that host US bases. The book anchors the global U.S. military complex and US–Japan security alliance in intimate everyday experiences and emotions, illuminating important aspects of the lived experiences of war and imperialism.
Annmaria M. Shimabuku
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780823282661
- eISBN:
- 9780823285938
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823282661.003.0005
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
The period between 1958 and 1972 marks the full-fledged emergence of the movement to revert to the Japanese administration along with the emergence of the New Left both globally and in Okinawa. This ...
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The period between 1958 and 1972 marks the full-fledged emergence of the movement to revert to the Japanese administration along with the emergence of the New Left both globally and in Okinawa. This chapter shows how the New Left developed useful critiques of the Old Left’s ethno-nationalism, but once again, failed to account for the radical heterogeneity of base town workers who were immune to the class-based politics of the “Japanese proletariat.” Some critical Marxist activists such as Kawada Yō and Matsushima Chōgi questioned middle-class assumptions implicit in the “Japanese proletariat.” Paying attention to Okinawa’s historical exclusion from the biopolitical state, Matsushima defined the “Okinawan proletariat” as the condition of a class that constantly fails to be represented by the state. Reading this insight alongside Spivak’s distinction between Darstellung and Vertretung, this chapter presents an allegorical reading of sex workers in reportage and film, and asks the ways it is possible to hear them speak. Instead of making their voices intelligible in terms of state representation, it reads them in the quality of their alienation from the state. It was in this quality that these purportedly “pro-American” collaborators turned against their clients and instigated the Koza Riot in 1970.Less
The period between 1958 and 1972 marks the full-fledged emergence of the movement to revert to the Japanese administration along with the emergence of the New Left both globally and in Okinawa. This chapter shows how the New Left developed useful critiques of the Old Left’s ethno-nationalism, but once again, failed to account for the radical heterogeneity of base town workers who were immune to the class-based politics of the “Japanese proletariat.” Some critical Marxist activists such as Kawada Yō and Matsushima Chōgi questioned middle-class assumptions implicit in the “Japanese proletariat.” Paying attention to Okinawa’s historical exclusion from the biopolitical state, Matsushima defined the “Okinawan proletariat” as the condition of a class that constantly fails to be represented by the state. Reading this insight alongside Spivak’s distinction between Darstellung and Vertretung, this chapter presents an allegorical reading of sex workers in reportage and film, and asks the ways it is possible to hear them speak. Instead of making their voices intelligible in terms of state representation, it reads them in the quality of their alienation from the state. It was in this quality that these purportedly “pro-American” collaborators turned against their clients and instigated the Koza Riot in 1970.
Annmaria M. Shimabuku
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780823282661
- eISBN:
- 9780823285938
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823282661.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This chapter examines the post-reversion era from 1972 to 1995. Along with reversion came the enforcement of the anti-prostitution law and the demise of Okinawa’s large-scale sex industry. The first ...
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This chapter examines the post-reversion era from 1972 to 1995. Along with reversion came the enforcement of the anti-prostitution law and the demise of Okinawa’s large-scale sex industry. The first generation of mixed-race individuals came of age and started speaking for themselves instead of allowing themselves to be spoken for. This was also a time when Okinawans started to look past the unfulfilled promises of the Japanese state for liberation and to conceptualize different forms of autonomy in the global world. This chapter reconsiders self-determination as a philosophical concept. In place of the imperative for a unified self and unified nation as the precondition for entry into selfhood and nationhood (i.e., the capacity for “self-determination”), this chapter revisits Matsushima Chōgi’s concept of the “Okinawan proletariat” to rethink the theoretical implications of Okinawa, as a borderland of the Pacific, where humans and non-human objects circulate. It appeals to Tosaka’s anti-idealist attempt to assign a different kind of agency to morphing matter and reads Tanaka Midori’s mixed-race memoir, My Distant Specter of a Father, for an example of a life that fails to unify before the state, but nonetheless continues to matter or be significant in the quality of its mutability.Less
This chapter examines the post-reversion era from 1972 to 1995. Along with reversion came the enforcement of the anti-prostitution law and the demise of Okinawa’s large-scale sex industry. The first generation of mixed-race individuals came of age and started speaking for themselves instead of allowing themselves to be spoken for. This was also a time when Okinawans started to look past the unfulfilled promises of the Japanese state for liberation and to conceptualize different forms of autonomy in the global world. This chapter reconsiders self-determination as a philosophical concept. In place of the imperative for a unified self and unified nation as the precondition for entry into selfhood and nationhood (i.e., the capacity for “self-determination”), this chapter revisits Matsushima Chōgi’s concept of the “Okinawan proletariat” to rethink the theoretical implications of Okinawa, as a borderland of the Pacific, where humans and non-human objects circulate. It appeals to Tosaka’s anti-idealist attempt to assign a different kind of agency to morphing matter and reads Tanaka Midori’s mixed-race memoir, My Distant Specter of a Father, for an example of a life that fails to unify before the state, but nonetheless continues to matter or be significant in the quality of its mutability.
Rebecca Forgash
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- January 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781501750403
- eISBN:
- 9781501750427
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501750403.003.0006
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter looks into strategies that military-Okinawan couples employ to navigate life across the fencelines and achieve acceptance for themselves and their children. It describes active-duty ...
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This chapter looks into strategies that military-Okinawan couples employ to navigate life across the fencelines and achieve acceptance for themselves and their children. It describes active-duty couples living in central Okinawa, especially young Okinawan women, who make use of military family services and successfully integrate into the U.S. military community. The stories in the chapter illustrate how couples struggle to balance commitments to the military, extended family, and local community that conform to American and Okinawan cultural expectations and contend with challenges to their relationship from both sides of the fences. It talks about factors that affect long-term chances for intimate relationships and popular attitudes toward military dating and marriage, biracial children, and broader formulations of Okinawan and U.S. military community. It also investigates several stories that demonstrate people engaging in intimate relationships across military fencelines that have the capacity to influence U.S. military–host community relationships and politics in even the most contentious locales.Less
This chapter looks into strategies that military-Okinawan couples employ to navigate life across the fencelines and achieve acceptance for themselves and their children. It describes active-duty couples living in central Okinawa, especially young Okinawan women, who make use of military family services and successfully integrate into the U.S. military community. The stories in the chapter illustrate how couples struggle to balance commitments to the military, extended family, and local community that conform to American and Okinawan cultural expectations and contend with challenges to their relationship from both sides of the fences. It talks about factors that affect long-term chances for intimate relationships and popular attitudes toward military dating and marriage, biracial children, and broader formulations of Okinawan and U.S. military community. It also investigates several stories that demonstrate people engaging in intimate relationships across military fencelines that have the capacity to influence U.S. military–host community relationships and politics in even the most contentious locales.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.003.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the book's main themes. This book examines the racialized belongings of Okinawan-Bolivians in a transnational context. It considers multiple ...
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This introductory chapter provides an overview of the book's main themes. This book examines the racialized belongings of Okinawan-Bolivians in a transnational context. It considers multiple contradictions that Okinawan-Bolivians (Okinawan settlers, or Issei, and their offspring in Colonia Okinawa, and Okinawan-Bolivian dekasegi migrants in urban Japan) faced in Bolivia and Japan. First, how did Okinawan-Bolivians experience and make sense of paradoxical socioeconomic class positions they occupied in a transnational social field? Second, how did educational institutions, such as community schools in Colonia Okinawa, shape Nisei and Sansei (third-generation) Okinawan-Bolivian youth's identities and behaviors? Finally, how did Okinawan-Bolivians interpret and negotiate their historical and cultural distinctiveness as Okinawans, whose past as the colonized subjects under imperial Japan still stirred ambivalent feelings toward Japan among Okinawans in Okinawa Prefecture and the Okinawan diaspora abroad? This study, then, is an attempt to understand the contradictory processes of class and cultural identity formation of transmigrants; an ethnography of postcolonial subjects in diaspora; and an effort to theorize race, class, and culture in a transnational context.Less
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the book's main themes. This book examines the racialized belongings of Okinawan-Bolivians in a transnational context. It considers multiple contradictions that Okinawan-Bolivians (Okinawan settlers, or Issei, and their offspring in Colonia Okinawa, and Okinawan-Bolivian dekasegi migrants in urban Japan) faced in Bolivia and Japan. First, how did Okinawan-Bolivians experience and make sense of paradoxical socioeconomic class positions they occupied in a transnational social field? Second, how did educational institutions, such as community schools in Colonia Okinawa, shape Nisei and Sansei (third-generation) Okinawan-Bolivian youth's identities and behaviors? Finally, how did Okinawan-Bolivians interpret and negotiate their historical and cultural distinctiveness as Okinawans, whose past as the colonized subjects under imperial Japan still stirred ambivalent feelings toward Japan among Okinawans in Okinawa Prefecture and the Okinawan diaspora abroad? This study, then, is an attempt to understand the contradictory processes of class and cultural identity formation of transmigrants; an ethnography of postcolonial subjects in diaspora; and an effort to theorize race, class, and culture in a transnational context.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.003.0003
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter examines the visible signs of Okinawan-Bolivians' economic and social status in Colonia Okinawa and Tsurumi. It focuses on the labor market and the workplace as “critical sites” of ...
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This chapter examines the visible signs of Okinawan-Bolivians' economic and social status in Colonia Okinawa and Tsurumi. It focuses on the labor market and the workplace as “critical sites” of racialization, in which Okinawan-Bolivians' ambiguous belonging in Colonia Okinawa and urban Japan were embodied and performed. It sketches the labor market structures in Bolivia and interventions by state institutions, such as JICA and the government of Okinawa Prefecture, both of which played critical roles in shaping Okinawan-Bolivians' subject positions. It portrays everyday encounters between Okinawan-Bolivians and non-Nikkei Bolivians and Japanese Naichi-jin at their workplaces, such as farm fields and cattle ranches, in Colonia Okinawa. Okinawan-Bolivians' contradictory class positions in the rural Colonia Okinawa community and in the larger (urban) Bolivian society are reflected in their racialized stereotypes of themselves and various non-Nikkei Bolivian groups within and outside Colonia Okinawa.Less
This chapter examines the visible signs of Okinawan-Bolivians' economic and social status in Colonia Okinawa and Tsurumi. It focuses on the labor market and the workplace as “critical sites” of racialization, in which Okinawan-Bolivians' ambiguous belonging in Colonia Okinawa and urban Japan were embodied and performed. It sketches the labor market structures in Bolivia and interventions by state institutions, such as JICA and the government of Okinawa Prefecture, both of which played critical roles in shaping Okinawan-Bolivians' subject positions. It portrays everyday encounters between Okinawan-Bolivians and non-Nikkei Bolivians and Japanese Naichi-jin at their workplaces, such as farm fields and cattle ranches, in Colonia Okinawa. Okinawan-Bolivians' contradictory class positions in the rural Colonia Okinawa community and in the larger (urban) Bolivian society are reflected in their racialized stereotypes of themselves and various non-Nikkei Bolivian groups within and outside Colonia Okinawa.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.003.0004
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter describes the experiences of Okinawan-Bolivian dekasegi migrants in Japan, most of whom were Nisei children of affluent Issei farm owners in Colonia Okinawa. It outlines the labor market ...
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This chapter describes the experiences of Okinawan-Bolivian dekasegi migrants in Japan, most of whom were Nisei children of affluent Issei farm owners in Colonia Okinawa. It outlines the labor market structure in the construction industry in Japan and locates the dekasegi migrant workers within it. Ethnographic snapshots of the dekasegi workers' working conditions at construction sites; the physically demanding tasks they performed in a hazardous environment; the spatial isolation (and autonomy) they maintained; and the interactions among themselves and with other workers, such as Japanese Naichi-jin and Nikkei-jin migrants from other South American countries, indicate how their subject positions in Japan were shaped and experienced. The dekasegi migrants often interpreted and performed their subject positions within the larger economic structures and daily working situations in Japan through racialized stereotyping of others and themselves. Their various narratives on their structural positions within the Japanese labor market and the ways in which different groups of workers act and interact were reminiscent of Issei's and Nisei's racialized (overgeneralized and naturalized) explanations of the labor relations between non-Nikkei Bolivian laborers and Okinawan-Bolivian farm owners in Colonia Okinawa and of the economic structure of Bolivia at large.Less
This chapter describes the experiences of Okinawan-Bolivian dekasegi migrants in Japan, most of whom were Nisei children of affluent Issei farm owners in Colonia Okinawa. It outlines the labor market structure in the construction industry in Japan and locates the dekasegi migrant workers within it. Ethnographic snapshots of the dekasegi workers' working conditions at construction sites; the physically demanding tasks they performed in a hazardous environment; the spatial isolation (and autonomy) they maintained; and the interactions among themselves and with other workers, such as Japanese Naichi-jin and Nikkei-jin migrants from other South American countries, indicate how their subject positions in Japan were shaped and experienced. The dekasegi migrants often interpreted and performed their subject positions within the larger economic structures and daily working situations in Japan through racialized stereotyping of others and themselves. Their various narratives on their structural positions within the Japanese labor market and the ways in which different groups of workers act and interact were reminiscent of Issei's and Nisei's racialized (overgeneralized and naturalized) explanations of the labor relations between non-Nikkei Bolivian laborers and Okinawan-Bolivian farm owners in Colonia Okinawa and of the economic structure of Bolivia at large.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.003.0005
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter focuses on educational institutions that actively sought to foster Okinawan-Bolivians as culturally hybrid subjects by infusing them with objectified and naturalized cultures. ...
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This chapter focuses on educational institutions that actively sought to foster Okinawan-Bolivians as culturally hybrid subjects by infusing them with objectified and naturalized cultures. Specifically, it examines Okinawan-Bolivian schools in Colonia Okinawa, where most Nisei and Sansei children received Japanese language education and learned about the Japanese and Okinawan cultures. In portraying the various school events in Colonia Okinawa, such as the school track meet and Japanese-language speech contest, the chapter demonstrates the ways in which these educational institutions enabled, even encouraged, Okinawan-Bolivian youth to form, nurture, and embody their identities through the terms and images of essentialized and naturalized (Japanese, Okinawan, and Bolivian) cultures. These educational institutions in effect shaped Okinawan-Bolivian youth into transnational subjects who have developed an ambiguous sense of belonging in either Bolivia or Japan.Less
This chapter focuses on educational institutions that actively sought to foster Okinawan-Bolivians as culturally hybrid subjects by infusing them with objectified and naturalized cultures. Specifically, it examines Okinawan-Bolivian schools in Colonia Okinawa, where most Nisei and Sansei children received Japanese language education and learned about the Japanese and Okinawan cultures. In portraying the various school events in Colonia Okinawa, such as the school track meet and Japanese-language speech contest, the chapter demonstrates the ways in which these educational institutions enabled, even encouraged, Okinawan-Bolivian youth to form, nurture, and embody their identities through the terms and images of essentialized and naturalized (Japanese, Okinawan, and Bolivian) cultures. These educational institutions in effect shaped Okinawan-Bolivian youth into transnational subjects who have developed an ambiguous sense of belonging in either Bolivia or Japan.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.003.0006
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter turns to gender and family relationships among Okinawan-Bolivians, which often underwent drastic transformations during their migrations between Colonia Okinawa and urban Japan. In ...
More
This chapter turns to gender and family relationships among Okinawan-Bolivians, which often underwent drastic transformations during their migrations between Colonia Okinawa and urban Japan. In Colonia Okinawa, gender relationships among Okinawan-Bolivians were defined and practiced in the public, communal, and domestic spheres through subtly yet strictly defined male and female gender roles and codes of behaviors at workplaces, in community functions, and in homes. The gender division was further complicated by sociospatial segregation of Okinawan-Bolivians and non-Nikkei Bolivian men and women coexisting in these settings. Once Okinawan-Bolivians moved to a Japanese city, the gender divergence among Okinawan-Bolivians was often challenged by the radically different economic and social responsibilities assigned to the migrants in these urban settings, where both men and women worked as manual laborers and often earned a comparable amount of income. The chapter also sheds light on intermarriages between Okinawan-Bolivians and non-Nikkei Bolivians, and between Okinawan-Bolivians and Japanese Naichi-jin. These couples not only faced changing gender roles and codes of behavior in Colonia Okinawa and urban Japan, but also dealt with highly racialized and sexualized stereotypes of “Bolivians” held by other Okinawan-Bolivians and of “South Americans” held by Japanese Naichi-jin in-laws.Less
This chapter turns to gender and family relationships among Okinawan-Bolivians, which often underwent drastic transformations during their migrations between Colonia Okinawa and urban Japan. In Colonia Okinawa, gender relationships among Okinawan-Bolivians were defined and practiced in the public, communal, and domestic spheres through subtly yet strictly defined male and female gender roles and codes of behaviors at workplaces, in community functions, and in homes. The gender division was further complicated by sociospatial segregation of Okinawan-Bolivians and non-Nikkei Bolivian men and women coexisting in these settings. Once Okinawan-Bolivians moved to a Japanese city, the gender divergence among Okinawan-Bolivians was often challenged by the radically different economic and social responsibilities assigned to the migrants in these urban settings, where both men and women worked as manual laborers and often earned a comparable amount of income. The chapter also sheds light on intermarriages between Okinawan-Bolivians and non-Nikkei Bolivians, and between Okinawan-Bolivians and Japanese Naichi-jin. These couples not only faced changing gender roles and codes of behavior in Colonia Okinawa and urban Japan, but also dealt with highly racialized and sexualized stereotypes of “Bolivians” held by other Okinawan-Bolivians and of “South Americans” held by Japanese Naichi-jin in-laws.
Taku Suzuki
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833442
- eISBN:
- 9780824870775
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833442.003.0007
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This concluding chapter draws together the data on Okinawan-Bolivians' contradictory subject positions in Bolivia and Japan in order to theorize the meaning of racialization in a transnational ...
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This concluding chapter draws together the data on Okinawan-Bolivians' contradictory subject positions in Bolivia and Japan in order to theorize the meaning of racialization in a transnational context. The various subject-makings of Okinawan-Bolivians—as “Japanese” farm owners in Colonia Okinawa and as “South American” manual laborers in Yokohama, as “good Bolivians of Japanese descent” in educational institutions in Bolivia, and as part of an “Okinawan” diasporic brotherhood and sisterhood across the globe—exemplify a social process of citizenship, conferring individuals with different degrees and modes of belonging in the respective locales. This study reiterates that, in studying and theorizing race, class, and culture in the globally interconnected world today, anthropological techniques can be used to discern the ways in which political, economic, and social institutions and everyday practices of individuals shape and reshape the meanings and expressions of these concepts.Less
This concluding chapter draws together the data on Okinawan-Bolivians' contradictory subject positions in Bolivia and Japan in order to theorize the meaning of racialization in a transnational context. The various subject-makings of Okinawan-Bolivians—as “Japanese” farm owners in Colonia Okinawa and as “South American” manual laborers in Yokohama, as “good Bolivians of Japanese descent” in educational institutions in Bolivia, and as part of an “Okinawan” diasporic brotherhood and sisterhood across the globe—exemplify a social process of citizenship, conferring individuals with different degrees and modes of belonging in the respective locales. This study reiterates that, in studying and theorizing race, class, and culture in the globally interconnected world today, anthropological techniques can be used to discern the ways in which political, economic, and social institutions and everyday practices of individuals shape and reshape the meanings and expressions of these concepts.
Lily Anne Yumi Welty
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814770733
- eISBN:
- 9780814770474
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814770733.003.0008
- Subject:
- Sociology, Race and Ethnicity
This chapter examines the multiracial American Japanese who grew up in Okinawa and the U.S. during the post-World War II period through to the 1970s. Multiracial Okinawans did not fit into the ...
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This chapter examines the multiracial American Japanese who grew up in Okinawa and the U.S. during the post-World War II period through to the 1970s. Multiracial Okinawans did not fit into the available racial categories in Okinawa because they were not accepted as Japanese, nor as Okinawans, even though many could not even speak English, but rather spoke Uchinaguchi (the Okinawan-Ryûkyûan indigenous language) or Japanese. These people were considered as an unsettling reminder to other Okinawans of the ever-present U.S. occupation, and as such they occupied a cultural third space that could be defined either on or off of the military bases. Within this third space, there were two tiers: those who could speak English and might have connections to the military bases, and those without access to the opportunities English and the bases provided.Less
This chapter examines the multiracial American Japanese who grew up in Okinawa and the U.S. during the post-World War II period through to the 1970s. Multiracial Okinawans did not fit into the available racial categories in Okinawa because they were not accepted as Japanese, nor as Okinawans, even though many could not even speak English, but rather spoke Uchinaguchi (the Okinawan-Ryûkyûan indigenous language) or Japanese. These people were considered as an unsettling reminder to other Okinawans of the ever-present U.S. occupation, and as such they occupied a cultural third space that could be defined either on or off of the military bases. Within this third space, there were two tiers: those who could speak English and might have connections to the military bases, and those without access to the opportunities English and the bases provided.
Richard Pearson
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824837129
- eISBN:
- 9780824870980
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824837129.003.0006
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter discusses the development of exchange systems in the Amami and Okinawa Islands. Kinoshita Naoko proposed four stages—Yayoi Period, Kofun Period, the seventh to ninth centuries AD, and ...
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This chapter discusses the development of exchange systems in the Amami and Okinawa Islands. Kinoshita Naoko proposed four stages—Yayoi Period, Kofun Period, the seventh to ninth centuries AD, and the ninth to fifteenth centuries AD—of exchange of Ryukyu shells. She said that abundant cowrie shells, particularly Cypraea moneta, especially abundant in the Shang dynasty of north China but also found in sites from various time periods, were collected from the Ryukyus by traders from China. Such contact would explain the development of Okinawan bone ornaments decorated with bilaterally symmetrical motifs not found in the Jōmon or Yayoi cultures of the Japanese main islands. Dating to the first and second millennia BC, these artifacts have always been a puzzle in Okinawan archaeology.Less
This chapter discusses the development of exchange systems in the Amami and Okinawa Islands. Kinoshita Naoko proposed four stages—Yayoi Period, Kofun Period, the seventh to ninth centuries AD, and the ninth to fifteenth centuries AD—of exchange of Ryukyu shells. She said that abundant cowrie shells, particularly Cypraea moneta, especially abundant in the Shang dynasty of north China but also found in sites from various time periods, were collected from the Ryukyus by traders from China. Such contact would explain the development of Okinawan bone ornaments decorated with bilaterally symmetrical motifs not found in the Jōmon or Yayoi cultures of the Japanese main islands. Dating to the first and second millennia BC, these artifacts have always been a puzzle in Okinawan archaeology.