Search

In the field of Migration Studies, understandings of national attachment and nationalism are often located at the individual and collective boundaries of difference between migrant groups and a host, national Other. Such studies deny the extent to which the existence of differences within migrant groups may reflect the cultural complexity and specificity of particular nationalisms. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with Brazilian nationals living in Japan, this paper explores these differences through the lenses of personhood, national ideology and social relationships. Through their engagement with the Brazilian ideals of 'person' and 'individual', I demonstrate the extent to which such people embody a nationally constituted 'double code' of being open and yet closed to the values, relations and substances of Other Brazilians. By considering the significance of calor humano (human warmth) and saudades (yearning, homesickness) in people's lives in Japan, this article sheds fresh light on the links that exist between ideals of personhood, national ideology and contemporary processes of movement and migration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers a critical engagement with multiculturalism and pluralisation in Japan. While recent efforts to introduce multicultural policies such as ‘domestic internationalisation’ policies and the textbook reform movement are encouraging, I suggest that they are limited as they fail to address notions of exclusivity—those founded on the ideology of nihonjinron—that shape Japanese identity. Moreover, mere recognition of minority populations works to entrench rather than undermine ethno-cultural hierarchies. That is, if official engagements with the ethno-cultural ‘Other’ simply reinscribe notions of exclusivity, exceptionality and even superiority, the hierarchalised distinctions drawn between inside/outside and ‘Japanese’/foreigner will continue to persist and minority populations will be relegated permanently to a second-class citizenry. Therefore, this contribution turns to the recently opened Kyushu National Museum as a means of addressing multiculturalism and pluralisation in Japan. Themed ‘Ocean Ways, Asian Paths’, the Kyushu National Museum is actually a transnational museum as it focuses not on artefacts specific to Japanese identity, but instead on the variegated ways in which Japan is inextricably connected with and indebted to its Asian neighbours. Thus, by exhibiting the miscegenated character of Japan's national origins, the Kyushu National Museum stands as a concrete example whereby notions of exclusivity are refashioned into a more accommodating, and perhaps ethical, engagement with alterity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study examines whether support for multiculturalism is compatible with an ethno-national identity in Japan. Multiculturalism discourses have centred on the issue of how to treat cultural diversity within a society. In Japan, the concept of multiculturalism has become popular over the past decade. However, some researchers think that the Japanese maintain their privileged position by essentialising cultural differences in the name of multiculturalism. My study therefore investigates the relationship between ethno-national identity, the endorsement of multiculturalism and supportive attitudes toward the equal rights of ethnic minorities by employing Japanese data from an international public-opinion survey. It was found that ethno-national identity has positive effects on the endorsement of multiculturalism, while having negative effects on the endorsement of equal rights between ethnic majorities and ethnic minorities. This means that the Japanese do not regard multiculturalism as antithetical to the maintenance of ethnic homogeneity within a 'nation'; rather, the endorsement of multiculturalism stems from belief in the uniqueness of 'Japaneseness'. The theoretical and political implications of this study's results are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]