Imagining and Living the Family: Attitudes from Young-ish Adults in Urban Japan

February 27, 12:00pm - 1:00pm
Mānoa Campus, Joihn A. Burns Hall, Room 3012 (3rd floor) Add to Calendar

The Research Program presents this noon-time seminar with Glenda S. Roberts, Professor at the Graduate School of Asia-Pacific Studies, Waseda University.

In recent decades, Japan has become a rapidly aging, low birthrate society. Late marriage and no marriage have also become commonplace. With the prolonged recession, stable, regular employment declined, wages declined, and the prototypical ‘salaryman’ male of the postwar period took a beating. In this milieu, how do young adults feel about gender roles in marriage? Have attitudes changed in regard to marriage and childrearing, and if so, how? How do the unmarried imagine themselves in the future, and how do the married wish to rear their children? Through this interview study we can discern a range of diverse views, but those in regard to childbearing and rearing in particular remain fairly conservative. Furthermore, expectations that women should take on the ‘double shift’ of household labor and caregiving upon marriage, as well as continued discrimination against women in the workplace, underlie the hesitancy young adults experience in acting on their dreams in the recessionary economy. The data from this work in progress come from a qualitative survey of eight men and eight women ages 23-39, as part of a larger survey research project of the East-West Center’s Population and Health Research Program on Family Change in Asia.

Glenda S. Roberts is a socio-cultural anthropologist specializing in gender, work, family, and migration. She is Professor at the Graduate School of Asia-Pacific Studies, Waseda University. Among her most recent publications are, co-edited with Satsuki Kawano and Susan Long, Capturing Contemporary Japan: Differentiation and Uncertainty (University of Hawaii Press, 2014), and “Salary Women and Family Well-Being in Urban Japan,” in Marriage & Family Review, 47:571-589.

Primary Contact Info:
Name: Minja K. Choe
Email: mchoe@hawaii.edu
Phone: 808-944-7475


Event Sponsor
East-West Center, Mānoa Campus

More Information
Minja K. Choe, 944-7475, mchoe@hawaii.edu

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