Something that I have notice since I got here is how big the difference is between the genders. Even though women have come a long way on the equality scale it's hard to tell how far they have come in Japan. Especially if you count how many female students there are at the university. If you pay attention (not in a dirty way of course) you can easily spot that there are way more female Japanese students than there are men. Have this in mind, that many of these students are studying to become teachers. What I have noticed is that usually men are dressed in suits in the commercials and well dressed but on other billboards or ads, usually the women are dressed in a more light manner. In my first picture, you can see how women usually are portrayed when it comes to popular culture.
When I went to a theme restaurant called The Lockup in Kyoto, we were greeted by this girl, dressed as a policewoman. This is of course not a authentic police outfit, especially if you look at her skirt (please do not think I am a pervert now), which is short. So how are the woman portrayed?
In one issue of TIMEasia Magazine they discuss about how hard it is for a woman to be taken seriously and how hard it is to climb up in the career ladder when you are a woman. She discusses how women are expected to act at the workplace. For an example are the women not as involved as the men are at the workplace. The article is about woman who worked her way up at a American company.
"Because Japanese women are expected to quit their jobs when they have children, a record number are foregoing marriage altogether. Today, one in four Japanese women in their early 30s is single, up from 14% a decade ago. As a consequence, Japan's fertility rate fell to a record low of 1.29 in 2004 compared to 2.13 in the U.S., giving it one of the lowest birth rates in the world. Demographers predict that the country's population will actually start declining in 2007. If present trends continue, Japan will shrink from a nation of 127 million today to 64 million by the end of this century—and from 2010 onward, the declining population will adversely affect the economy." /TIMEasia Magazine
In the article from TIMEasia Magazine she discusses how this is affecting the population in Japan. This is becoming a big problem in Japan. Because women are trying to get careers ahead of families, but if women focus on families, then the unequality will continues. This is quite the paradox.
So after all, the gender unequality is a big problem, but it is a problem that is being worked on, but because the problem have existed for so long, it might be too late to work on it too much without big consequenses. In the long run, tradition and culture wins.
Sources
Article: http://www.time.com/time/asia/covers/501050829/story.html
- TIMEasia Magazine.
/Quangus
3 comments:
I'm not sure it is accurate to say that most women in pop culture are presented as in the first picture. Where does the picture come from? The picture is of a particular fashion style. Do you know what it is?
How are you using the second picture? The Lock Up is a theme izakaya based on fantasy. So she is a fantasy police woman rather than a representation of reality, right?
well, the first picture is a typical picture in a purakura place. And this is often, from what I have seen how the girls are portrayed, and also on the singers.
When it comes to the 2nd picture, the meaning by using that picture is even though it is a theme restaurant on a fantasy, it's still how they expect the women the dress. How women are portrayed in fantasy, have now become reality.
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