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In this paper, I demonstrate how long-term multigenerational minorities and Japanese residents engage in the current socio-political discourse of "multicultural coexistence" society (tabunkakyōsei shakai), which had not previously been integral to the vocabulary of national rhetoric in Japan until the 2000s. I argue that the lack of clear definition and goals of multicultural coexistence by the current Japanese government generates obstacles in the attempt to build a multicultural society. While local municipalities' programs, such as multilingual services and lifestyle support, are certainly needed, long-term foreign residents with linguistic and cultural competence are suspicious of the concept of multicultural coexistence due to their own embodied marginalized positions. Taking a local municipality's intercultural event as a point of reference, this paper explores how long-term minority residents perceive their positions at the crossroads of seemingly paradoxical forces of multicultural trends and an ongoing national identity founded upon ethnic homogeneity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dealing with cultural diversity is one of the key challenges in contemporary societies, with Japan being no exception. However, relatively little is known about how minority group members are viewed by members of the dominant group. The current paper presents a study that evaluated three hypotheses that are related to these issues with a survey of 210 Japanese adult participants. The study also examines moderating roles of national identities in acculturation expectations and psychological functioning in the dominant group. Perceived security about the society in terms of national culture, and personal conditions in a multicultural society predict the most tolerant form of acculturation expectation. This association is mediated by one's multicultural ideology. Although acculturation expectations are not predictive of psychological functioning, particular national identity (i.e., internationalism) alleviates the negative effect of the closest form of expectation (exclusion) on psychological problems. The study implies the need for analysis on culture-specific constructs of multicultural society in perceptions and attitudes in the dominant group in Japanese society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the end of World War II, the Kuomintang (KMT) (Guomindang) government has erased all traces of Japanese rule from public space, deeming them "poisonous" to the people in Taiwan. This frenzy, often termed "de-Japanization" or qu Ribenhua in Chinese, included the destruction and alteration of Japanese structures. Yet, with democratization in the 1990s, the Japanese past has been revisited, and many Japanese structures have been reconstructed and preserved. This paper examines the social phenomenon of preserving Japanese heritage in present- day Taiwan. It mainly investigates religious/ spiritual architecture, such as Shinto shrines and martial arts halls (Butokuden), war monuments and Japanese statues and busts. A close investigation of these monuments finds that many of them are not restored and preserved in their original form but in a deformed/ transformed one. This finding leads the paper to conclude that the phenomenon is a postcolonial endeavour, rather than being "pro-colonial", and that the preservation of Japanese heritage contributes to the construction and consolidation of a Taiwancentric historiography in which Taiwan is imagined as multicultural and hybrid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates Japan's multicultural policy, introduced as an extension of the internationalisation scheme under the banner of tabunka kyōsei (multicultural coexistence). I first review the framework of tabunka kyōsei as it is expressed in the policy documents, highlighting its apolitical ideas of coexistence, and then explore its local reception, impact and practice, drawing from the narratives of people involved in multicultural programmes. The delivery of Japanese language classes by volunteers in the Aichi Prefecture is used as a case study. The participants' accounts reveal that the multicultural policy is evaluated by the public as poor, and its intent is questioned. For volunteers, the framework has had both positive and negative impacts on the work they perform. Their practices, although limited and localised, demonstrate independent engagement with the local authorities and expose the current multicultural framework as both ambiguous and ambivalent in its concern for the social and political rights of migrants. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In the last ten years or so, interest among the Japanese in their Korean neighbour has increased significantly. Yet, before the Korean Wave hit Japan in the early 2000s, Kusanagi Tsuyoshi, member of popular Japanese boy-band SMAP, had already debuted and gained popularity as Chonangang, his Korean alter-self. From releasing a Korean pop-music single to interviewing South Korean Presidents on Japanese national television, it is undeniable that Kusanagi (and Chonangang) has brought Korea closer to the hearts of the Japanese. In this paper, I argue that Kusanagi's performances of and as Chonangang create a polyglotic, hybrid identity that functions as a 'third space' through which notions of an underlying, essential Japanese (and Korean) identity can be destabilised. Beyond mere entertainment, Kusanagi's adoption of an identity position that is neither Japanese nor Korean, yet also both Japanese and Korean, enables the articulation of difference and hybridity which, I contend, has direct relevance to Japan-Korea and Japanese-resident Korean relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses countertransference in therapeutic relationships involving therapist and client from the same ethnicity. A case illustration of a Japanese adolescent and a Japanese therapist is used to develop the thesis that obvious similarities in race, or culture may lead to invalid assumptions about shared beliefs and values and subtle countertransference manifestations which have the potential to disrupt or prevent the development of a working relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]