Kickboxing Geishas: Chapter 3

1. Kickboxing Geishas: Chapter 3 By: Chris Thomas and Dani Peyton Japan in the Modern World May 6, 2015

2. Main Ideas of Chapter: • There is a struggle for Japanese women to balance traditional business careers with pursuits of married life and motherhood. • The most glaring difference between men and women is that few women occupy professional positions. • Primary question of the chapter: “Is there an actual movement or is it just a few women getting ahead, on their own terms, in their own way?” (pg.59) Chapter 3- “Tea and Sympathy: Working women in japan”

3. 5 million women have joined the workforce since the Equal Opportunity Act of 1985 was established. • The number of women in management positions remains unchanged. • According to a Ministry of Labor study, 48% of business leaders felt women do not have knowledge, experience, or judgement to serve as senior executives and 35% said women do not stay with companies long enough to receive a senior position. • A 2005 Cabinet Office survey found that more than 63% of companies have no intention of even hiring women. According to Data…

4. Issues within the Japanese workplace

5. “Businessman” is the English-inspired salary man • No equivalent for a businesswoman • Instead, women are referred to as “office ladies” • Office ladies make copies, clean the kitchen, and pour tea. Businessman vs office lady

6. There are no career clothes for women, only ladies who lunch or “the first blue suite for the post-university job interview.” (pg.60) • Rochelle Kopp, author of The Rice Paper Ceiling, says that women “need to be more conscious of the image you’re putting across,” (pg.60). Costume culture

7. There is no good way for women to speak to male subordinates • Kopp says, “Just as in the Meiji era when the introduction of Western ideas meant the creation of all new words, Japan is going to have to be just as creative about language and women’s roles in the workplace,” (pg.60). Limitations on Language

8. A sexual minefield • Groping on the subways • Commutes of 1-2 hours • Trains are packed full • Pornographic magazines sold at newsstands Getting to Work

9. Japan Rail Company offered female-only cars • Men were arrested more often for assaulting women • 2,201 arrests in 2004 from 778 arrests in 1996 Response to Women’s complaints

10. Life experiences of the Japanese workplace

11. Founder and President of Boom, Inc. • Built her own company after being an office lady for 11 years • Makes teenage girls her full-time job • “Joshi Kosei”- Voracious shoppers with a quirky eye for fashion and an uncanny ability to start trends • These girls came up with Tamagotchi and sassy lingo • Currently 8,000 girls are employed by Boom, Inc. • Relied on the development of products such as soft drinks and cosmetics • Schoolgirl style created by Uchira and Osoro Generations Yasuko Nakamura

12. 40 year old producer/director/writer • “Our generation has more freedom in doing anything, but also I think that even though we have more freedom, if women want to survive in a career they have to work hard-probably twice as hard as the men. Only the strongest can survive in this society.” (pg.66). • His wife, Akiko Oku, worked for labor division of the government where she was primarily asked to serve tea. • She categorizes women into three fields: • Career women who have high positions in a company or have established their own companies. • Office ladies working for the company without hopes of gaining higher positions. • Freelancers who are outsiders doing what they wish. Yoshitaka Yano

13. Office ladies are powerful because they continue to work and figure out how to have both a career and a family unlike women 20-30 years ago who quit once they got married or had children. Yoshitaka Yano Continued

14. Senior executive at the traditional, copier giant company, Canon • She holds herself higher than the “girls” who work at the reception desk • She was one of, if not the first to reach executive rank at a Japanese company • She had the rare opportunity to have a female mentor in the workplace • She overcame the tea challenge • Once married, she kept her maiden name as an act of power, control, and authority • She believes Japanese women are the nation’s most precious wasted asset Masako Nara

15. On the vanguard of Japanese working women. • CEO of her own design firm. • Largely regarded as one of the leading industrial designers in the world. • Only woman dressed for work wearing jeans. • Only female from her graduating class to succeed in industrial design. • Her way to success was by winning design competitions to show her competency to future clients. • Believes Japans herd mentality only hold women back Fumie Shibata

16. Additional Information

17. Collective amnesia regarding housewife roles • Belief used to be that women played the role of “Okusan” or “person in the back of the house.” • However, women have always been productive, especially in farming communities. • The high infant mortality rate and low life expectancy rate of 50 years old forced women to have many babies in order for a farm to survive. The role of Housewife

18. Daughters career ambitions directly related to how they viewed their mothers situations • If mom was a happy housewife, the daughter would want to follow in her footsteps • If mom was limited, the daughters would seek careers • Yuki Yamashiro • Foreign Relations • Mother was a housewife, and it is the reason that Yuki pushes herself in her career Daughters of Pre-Bubble Economic Boom

19. “Perhaps because Japan is not, by nature, a country of individualists, the role model question gets a lot of blank stares.” • Japan is more group oriented, there is no place to think of individuals, when their careers are about the bigger picture. • “I don’t aspire to famous women because, really, I don’t know their lives or how they really work or what they really are like as bosses.” –Mina Takahashi, Mori Art Museum Role Models

20. Despite challenges of corporate Japan more and more young women are pursuing careers. • “A japan labor institute survey of men conducted in 1991 revealed that the most common view of women colleagues is as ‘considerate supporters’ the same survey showed that only 26 percent of men regard women as ‘able partners’ an amazing 15 percent said they have no impression of women whatsoever”– SumikoIwao, The New Lifestyles of Japanese Women • This type of thinking is why Japanese women choose to pursue careers overseas • Women who have had overseas experience are having profound effects on Japanese culture when they return. Perseverance

21. Chambers, Veronica. (2007). Kickboxing Geishas: How Modern Japanese Women Are Changing Their Nation. Simon & Schuster, Inc. New York, NY. Sources