Pictures. A high school student in a dark skirt, white blouse,
black shoes and baggy white socks waits for a train. A university co-ed in flared-jeans,
a T-shirt and platform shoes walks down the Shinsaibashi Shopping Arcade. An aspiring
rock musician sings from a stage of up-turned milk-crates in Osaka Castle Park,
her face framed by bleached-blond hair. A serious looking woman in a practical
navy blue suit hurries to a job interview. A woman drops a child off at a nursery
before hurrying to work. An office worker in a pink and gray uniform eats lunch
with her similarly clad colleagues. A mother pushes a child in a stroller to a
neighborhood park.
Each of these pictures is repeated in thousands of variations everyday. Are they
the same? No way! Just as it is difficult to characterize the "average"
person in any age group, anywhere, it is difficult to pin-point "typical"
characteristics of young Japanese women today. If there is a picture an "average"
16- to 25-year-old Japanese woman, she exists only as an amalgam.
According to an informal survey of 25 non-Japanese, English-speaking women living
in the Kansai area, young Japanese women are as diverse as women anywhere. Their
interests, attitudes, ethics, and lifestyles are as individual as each woman's
fingerprint.However, in spite of the overwhelming diversity shown by young Japanese
women, the respondents, themselves citizens of eight different countries, also
commented that there are certain age-related, or perhaps culturally-related, characteristics
which do emerge.
One of the most commonly cited impressions of young Japanese women today is their
continued fascination with "cute" in the products they purchase and
use. Add to any of the pictures a portable telephone or pager with appropriately
cute character figures and you might have a picture of the "typical"
Japanese woman between 16- and 25-years-old. According the survey respondents,
the "cute" image favored by Japanese women ranges from a small pink
cat attached to a "handy phone," to a bright green frog on a make-up
case. All respondents reported they were constantly amazed by the appearance of
cute animals even carried by otherwise elegantly dressed women.
This, however, is not the only impression young Japanese women make. According
to one respondent, a long-time resident of Japan, young women today seem to have
a more serious attitude toward their lives than those of 10 or 20 years at the
same age. She attributes this awareness to the increased number of opportunities
for women today as well as the increase in "internationalization" in
Japanese education and society.
Other respondents, who have lived in Japan for periods of 3 months to more than
30 years, echoed similar comments. Japanese women, especially young women, have
moved beyond the stereotype of housewife or "office flower" willing
to serve tea and follow directions. While Japan is still male-dominated in many
areas, the respondents noted that with increasing numbers Japanese women are moving
forward with their lives as they envision them. They no longer wait for permission
and instead have taken the initiative and control of their futures. In other words,
Japanese women want as much from their lives as woman in other countries.
What emerged from the survey was a picture of an increasingly independent woman,
one not afraid to say what she thinks, do what she wants, and participate in work,
home, or community life in the way she wishes. She is her own woman. No single
picture will suffice. |
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