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The paper explores why US authors of the cyberpunk genre imagined a future rich in Japanoid imagery in their fiction. By tracing the zeitgeist of the 1980s, which was characterized by the prevalence of affordable Japanese technology in everyday US life - often associated with fears of an economic threat from Japan - it is possible to explain why cyberpunk fictions explicitly depict Japanese technology. Furthermore, mechanisms of techno-orientalism that link high-tech to images of premodern Japan and thus diminish this specific cultural environment as subordinate to modern Western societies are evident within cyberpunk fiction. Analyzing Ridley Scott's Blade Runner (1982) as a founding text of cyberpunk and the recent computer game Cyberpunk 2077 (2020) as well as the subsequent anime series Cyberpunk Edgerunners (2022) as examples of contemporary fiction, I argue that Japanoid images continue to be employed in a condescending manner within the cyberpunk genre, affirming an inherently Western perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the Asia Pacifi c War (1937-1945), the Japanese Imperial Army forced women in Japanese East Asian colonies to work as so-called “comfort women” (sex workers). The justice movement for these women is an international intersectional alliance of feminists from Japanese ex-colonies in East Asia, the former colonial power Japan, and other societies, such as Australia, Germany, and the USA. This long-term feminist justice movement has campaigned for an apology and compensation from the Japanese government, as well as for recognition of “comfort women‘s” suff ering and of sexual violence in war in cultural memory. Through researching this justice movement from a processual intersectionality perspective, this paper shows that it gained power and legitimacy from refl ecting and working on its internal intersectional inequalities. This included refl ecting on the class hierarchies between many former “comfort women”, who had power of defi nition, and intellectual feminist activists, as well as on the postcolonial divide between former Japanese colonies and the former colonial power Japan, leading it to develop horizontal cooperation and practices. Following an overview, the paper outlines the movements in South Korea, Japan, and Germany, and highlights the different postcolonial constellation between East Asia and Germany, the main actors, and their aims. While the Japanese government rejected the justice movement‘s demands and the right wing mobilised against it, has been able to infl uence cultural memory to widely recognize sexual violence in war and the dignity of the “comfort women”. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Copyright of Zeitschrift für Soziologie is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article discusses government regulation of prostitution during the early Allied occupation of Japan as well as laws and policies designed to curb the spread of sexually-transmitted infections among members of the American armed forces who consorted with prostitutes. The influence of Japanese imperialism on the prostitution industry is examined, the reinforcement of traditional gender roles and heterosexuality in Japanese government policy is described, and analysis is offered of the symbolism of women's bodies, soldiers' bodies, and the Japanese national body.

Copyright of International Review of Education / Internationale Zeitschrift für Erziehungswissenschaft is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)