Social Identity of Minority in Japan

Social identities of minority others inJapan: listening to the narratives ofAinu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreans

TIN TIN HTUN

Abstract: Although the existing literature on minorities in Japan offers differ-ent explanations as to why ethnic minority groups are invisible in Japan at thestructural level, a framework for analyzing and interpreting the position of mi-norities at the intergroup and individual levels has been lacking until now. Inthis article, I examine the narratives of Ainu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreans inJapan to understand what it may mean to be a minority in a so-called mono-ethnic society. I explore how individuals from different minority groups positionthemselves within a particular historical and socio-political context in Japan, howthey voice their own minority identity and their capacity to act in their socialworld. I then analyze the narratives of the fourteen participants in the researchfrom a social identity theory perspective to interpret how individual members ofminorities from socially disadvantaged groups in Japan deal with their minoritysocial identity and lead their lives as minority others.

Keywords: Ainu, Buraku, Zainichi Koreans, minority, social identity theory

Japan as a mono-ethnic society is a prevalent and dominant discourse, despite thefact that the pre-war Japanese empire was made up of an assortment of differentethnic groups Ainu, Okinawans, Koreans and Taiwanese (e.g. Morris-Suzuki1998, Lie 2001, Oguma 2002) and despite recent works that contend Japan isa multi-cultural and multi-ethnic society (Murphy-Shigematsu 1993, Lie 2001,Weiner 2009). Efforts to unify Japan have been the central political objective inboth pre-war and post-war Japan, but for different purposes. In pre-war Japancolonial expansion was accompanied by rigorous assimilation polices and aimedto unify different ethnic groups under the rule of the emperor in order to solidifyand strengthen the country as an imperial power that could compete with andbe protected from domination by the West. However, stripped of its colonies,post-war Japan reduced ethnic diversity, and Japan as a mono-ethnic nationbecame the prominent discourse in reinventing Japan and in its distancing itself

Japan Forum 24(1) 2012: 122 ISSN: 09555803 print/1469932X onlineCopyright C 2012 BAJS http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09555803.2011.637635

2 Social identities of minority others

from pre-warmilitarism and imperialism (seeMorris-Suzuki 1998,Oguma 2002).The post-war re-invention of Japan as a mono-ethnic society effectively made theexistence of minority groups invisible and rendered it a non-issue in Japanesesociety:

On the one hand, the concept of a tanitsu minzoku (mono-ethnic or ethnichomogeneity) can mean that the Japanese are ethnically or culturally ho-mogeneous; on the other, it can mean that Japan contains few obvious visibleminorities. It has thus helped to erase from public consciousness the pres-ence of peoples with different histories (Ainu, Okinawans, Koreans) within theJapanese archipelago and to encourage a common perception that Japan (unlikeother parts of the world) does not have a race problem.

(Morris-Suzuki 1998, p. 107)

The erasure of minority issues in public discourse can be noted in the wayJapan deals with minorities. Japan has been criticized time and time again for itsreluctant and minimal acknowledgement of the existence and the rights of minor-ity groups (e.g. CERD 2001; Diene 2006; Human Rights Committee 2008). Inthe third Japanese Government Periodic Report on the International Covenanton Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Japan for the first time acknowledgedAinu people as minorities (Takano 1993, pp. 34, Teshima 1993, pp. 2930),but until then the Japanese government had denied the existence of minorities.However, in the same report, Korean residents (Zainichi Koreans) who have beenliving in Japan for four generations were categorized as foreigners (Takano 1993,p. 20), and Buraku were de-historicized as residents of dowa districts where thegovernment had enacted the Special Measure Law to improve the living environ-ment (Tomonaga 1993, p. 7). In the 2008 ICCPR Human Rights Committeereport, the committee expressed its concern about Japans failure to recognize theAinu and the Ryukyu/Okinawa as indigenous peoples entitled to special rightsand protection in domestic legislation.The existing literature has provided historical, socio-cultural and political

frameworks for analyzing and understanding why Japan is constructed and pre-dominantly represented as a mono-ethnic society (Howell 1996, pp. 171172, Lie1996, 2001, Morris-Suzuki 1998). These offer different explanations as to whyethnic minority groups are invisible in Japan at the structural level, but what hasbeen lacking until now is a framework for analyzing and interpreting the positionof minorities at the intergroup and individual levels.1 There is, in fact, a com-plete absence of research on minority groups in Japan from a social psychologicalperspective that focuses on howminority individuals perceive their changing posi-tions in Japanese society. Such a perspective is needed because it can help us buildour understanding of how individuals respond to the structural ordering that isimposed on them and how individuals themselves relate to the different societalgroups that they are categorized in and that they themselves identify with. In

Tin Tin Htun 3

short, this kind of bottom-up perspective on the voices of minority individualswill assist us in better understanding the social identities of minority others inJapan.With regard to social identity and social categorization, one major approach in

social identity theory is to construe social relations as organized on the basis ofhow the individual is categorized, and categorizes him- or herself, into collectivecategories (Reicher and Hopkins 2001, p. 383). This approach posits that iden-tifying with particular categories is what individuals do to define their collectiveself-categories in society and, as a result, to envision what possible actions theycan take in their lives (Reicher and Hopkins 2001, pp. 383384). These cate-gories reflect social reality in the sense that an individual, by identifying with aparticular category or group, places themselves in that group and at the same timecreates social relationships with people in other groups or other social categoriesoutside their own self-designated group(s). Social identities act as models of apersons position in a system of social relations along with the forms of actionthat are possible and proper given that place (Reicher andHopkins 2001, p. 398).Thus, social identity theory lets us draw out connections between social identityand individual and collective action. Such social identification is not just an in-dividual act of positioning, however. Individuals may also be placed in particularcategories or groups by others, and, over time, this othering of individuals inparticular groups can have powerful effects on a persons social identity and theirrelationship to their social world. Within the context of Japan, people may identifywith or reject collective categories such as Japanese or non-Japanese/minorityas they try to (re-)negotiate their social identities over the course of their lives. Byexamining the social realities of minority group identification in Japan, i.e. howmembers of minority groups perceive their position in Japanese society and howthey define or redefine their own minority category in relation to other collectivecategories, we can take some small but important steps forward in understandingthe complex interaction of social relationships between majority Japanese andminority groups in contemporary Japan.In this article, I examine the narratives of members of longstanding minority

groups in Japan to understand what it may mean to be a minority in a so-calledmono-ethnic society and to consider what kind of identity work individuals mustengage in when they find themselves in aminority/invisible group. Inwhat follows Iexplore how individuals from different minority groups position themselves withina particular historical and socio-political context in Japan and how they voice theirown minority identity and their capacity to act in their social world. Althoughresearch onminority groups usually focuses on one specific minority group, in thisstudy I focus on three main well-established minority groups in Japan, namely theAinu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreans. Their long history as minorities in Japanesesociety makes the stories of individuals from these groups particularly significantfor developing a critical understanding of the social identities of minority others.Rather than generalizing the findings across the groups, I wanted, by researching


three groups simultaneously, to draw the contours of each groups psycho-socialposition in the context of Japanese society, so that a broader view and deeperunderstanding of minority-majority relationships would emerge from this study.The histories and stories that are presented in this article are based on in-

terviews with fourteen minority individuals. I will first give a brief backgroundsketch of Ainu, Buraku, and Zainichi Koreans in Japanese society as a way ofcontextualizing each minority groups collective category. I will then analyze thenarratives of the fourteen participants in the research from a social identity the-ory perspective to interpret how individual members of minorities from sociallydisadvantaged groups in Japan deal with their minority social identity and leadtheir lives as minority others.

The background of Ainu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreansin contemporary Japanese society

Ainu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreans are three long-established minority groupsin Japanese society whose histories are largely ones of social disadvantage anddiscrimination. Their current socio-economic status in Japanese society is offundamental importance for understanding the social backdrop against whichindividuals conceptualize and voice their minority social identities.

Ainu

The Ainu are the indigenous people of northern Japan and are estimated tonumber over 23,000 in Hokkaido.2 Traditionally the Ainu are significantly dif-ferent from Japanese in their culture, religion and language. However, due toenforced assimilation, many Ainu today are not significantly different from non-Ainu Japanese in their culture, religion and language. Japanese territorial expan-sion resulted in the loss of the Ainus land (Hokkaido) and the total subjugationof the Ainu in 1789 (see Siddle 2008) for a detailed background account of theAinu). Made to use the Japanese language and pressed into forced labor in farm-ing and fishing, the Ainu were subjected to forced assimilation after the loss oftheir land.Compared to the average national population, the Ainu still fare poorly today

in terms of education, employment and health; they also face greater poverty.According to an October 2008 survey covering 2903 Ainu households conductedby the Hokkaido University Center for Ainu and Indigenous Studies and theAinu Association of Hokkaido, the average annual income for an Ainu householdis around 3.56 million. This is 60 per cent of the national average. As foreducation, less than 70 per cent of those surveyed had completed high school;the survey further revealed that only 20.2 per cent of Ainu advance to collegeeducation compared to 42.2 per cent for the national average. Even if Ainu do goto college or university, the drop-out rate is comparatively high, with one in five

Tin Tin Htun 5

failing to graduate. In 2006, about 5.2 per cent of Ainu households were foundto be on welfare compared to 2.1 per cent nationwide (Hirano, 2009). Morethan 60 percent of respondents to the 2008 survey did not have any experienceof preserving their language and culture (Hirano 2009). Yet, in recent years,with increasingly strong human rights and minority rights movements, especiallyamong minority women, and the efforts of some young Ainu (such as a groupcalled Ainu Rebels) to revive their culture in a positive light, Ainu culture andthe general socio-economic situation of the Ainu have become more frequentlyportrayed in Japanese media than before and better acknowledged at the officiallevel. In June 2008, the Diet passed a resolution recognizing the Ainu as anindigenous people of Japan who have their own language, culture and religion.This move was believed to bemotivated by the upcoming thirty-fourthG8 summitin Hokkaido in July 2008. Although discrimination against Ainu and subsequentdisadvantages were acknowledged at that time, many were skeptical about whatbenefit the resolution might have, particularly in light of its weak acknowledgmentof historical facts and of past abuses against the Ainu (Ito 2008). In summary,the Ainu people still face a long struggle ahead to become part of the normaleveryday awareness of the Japanese public.

Buraku

The Buraku (hamlets or villages in Japanese) people are descendants of outcastcommunities whose occupations (such as butchers, executioners, undertakers ortanners) were considered polluted by being connected with death or ritual im-purity. In the seventeenth century, the social status system was established andBuraku people were placed at the bottom of society as Eta (extreme filth) andHinin (non-human). Buraku people traditionally lived in their own designatedareas; however, many people of Buraku descent left their communities, and todaypeople who do not have a Buraku background also live in Buraku communities(see Neary (1989) for a comprehensive background account of Buraku commu-nities).It is estimated that there are today about two to three million Buraku people and

6000 communities all over Japan (Headquarters of Buraku Liberation League,2005). These communities are both urban and rural: the cities of Osaka andKyotoin western Japan and Fukui prefecture have large Buraku communities, for exam-ple. The concentration of Buraku communities in western Japan can be attributedto the consequences of economic and political developments in the late Tokugawaera in western Japan which involved the growth of commodity production andcapitalism that led to the control of growing lower socio-economic classes andcommunities (Ruyle 1979, p. 60) Although the caste system was officially abol-ished in 1871, Buraku people still suffer social discrimination due to their lowerliving standards and the Japanese family registration system (koseki). The kosekisystem reveals the ancestral home address of an individual, and, although special


measures taken by the government from 1969 to 2002 have considerably improvedthe conditions of Buraku people, they still face many problems regarding livingconditions, education and employment, and marriage (Neary 2009, pp. 7374).A survey carried out by the Tottori Prefectural Government in July 2005 showedthat 19.7 per cent of families in Buraku districts received public assistance, whichwas three times higher than the average for all municipalities (Tomonaga 2008).The same survey reported that 55.6 per cent of Buraku district residents hadpermanent employment and a total of 21.1 per cent were in unstable employ-ment. Compared to prefectural averages, the permanent employment figure was8.7 points lower, while the unstable employment figure was almost twice as high(Tomonaga 2008).Results from a different survey of 5000 Buraku people living in Osaka in 2001

show that intermarriage between Buraku and non-Buraku people has increased.Despite this increase, one in three intermarriage couples below 39 years old en-countered greater marriage discrimination than older couples aged between 40and 60 years old (Morgan 2007, p. 37). A partners Buraku origins are still notwidely accepted by many people and their families in choosing a future spouse(Tomonaga 2008). In the same survey it was found that nearly four out of tenpeople thought it natural to consider the family lineage of a potential spouse(Tomonaga 2008). Human rights consultation and educational training servicesare provided at Buraku community centers to help Buraku people deal with day-to-day living matters as well as discrimination issues that they face, but suchassistance is now being downsized due to reductions in funding and municipalstaff3 (Johnston 2006; Tomonaga 2008). A final point is that there is an emerginggeneration gap in terms of dealing with Buraku discrimination issues. AlthoughBuraku people still experience discrimination today, many in the younger Burakugeneration appear less interested in fighting for their rights than previous genera-tions were. Some use the expression neta ko o okosuna (Dont wake the sleepingchild) to characterize this detachment, implying that, were Buraku issues to beleft quietly alone, they might go their own course and silently disappear.

Zainichi Koreans: Koreans resident in Japan

Zainichi literally means staying in Japan. However, the term usually refersspecifically to Zainichi Koreans because of their long-term presence in Japanesesociety following Japanese colonization of Korea in the early twentieth century.Korea was annexed by Japan in 1910, and forced assimilation led to Koreanshaving to adopt Japanese names, as well as follow a Japanese curriculum andused the Japanese language in Korean schools. Large numbers of Koreans wereforced to migrate to Japan because of Japans need for cheap labor in wartime.After the Second World War, two-thirds of the Koreans in Japan returned toKorea. Those who remained were stripped of their Japanese citizenship under the1952 San Francisco Peace Treaty. It was not until 1991 that special permanent

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residency was given to Korean residents and their descendants in Japan whohad lost their nationality under the San Francisco Treaty. Based on the JapanImmigration Bureaus statistics, there were 593,489 Zainichi Koreans in Japanin 2007 (Ministry of Justice 2008). This figure did not include those who haveadopted Japanese citizenship. According to the 2005 figures, there were 515,570with permanent resident status (general and special categories) and 284,840 withnaturalized Japanese citizenship (Korean Overseas Information Service 2006).The increased in naturalization reflects changes in Zainichi Koreans situation.Relaxation of the naturalization laws in 1985 and the heightened political tensionbetween North Korea and Japan due to abduction issues has partly contributed toincreased naturalization. In addition, many third and fourth generation ZainichiKoreans were born and have lived in Japan all through their lives, been raisedin Japanese culture and speak only Japanese. Thus, for the younger genera-tion of Zainichi Koreans, adopting Japanese nationality is probably a pragmaticstep towards having a future in Japan, the only home they know. Moreover, forsome, the identity of Zainichi is not limited to having a (South or North) Koreannationality. In fact, for some with a Japanese parent, adopting Japanese nationalityis their birthright.Although only 14.2 per cent of Koreans in Japan were South Korean nationals

in 1950, the number increased to 67 per cent in 1994 (Ishikida 2005, p. 49)due to increased political tensions between North Korean and Japan. Over three-quarters of Zainichi Koreans were born in Japan by the mid-1970s (Lie 2001,p. 109) and 90 per cent of Zainichi Korean children went to Japanese schools(Kim 2002, p. 56). Several well-known public figures in sports and entertainmentJapan are Zainichi Koreans, but, due to their status as foreigners, Korean residents(Zainichi Koreans) in Japan are excluded from many government positions andface informal barriers in corporate careers (Lie 2001, p. 108). According tothe 1985 Osaka prefecture census, substantially more Korean males were self-employed (34.2 per cent) than Japanese males (13.7 per cent). However, the rateof employment for younger-generation Koreans (60.8 per cent in their 20s) wasfound to be somewhat closer to that for their Japanese peers (82 per cent) in a1993 survey of young Koreans (Ishikida 2005, pp. 6768). As with the Buraku,there is something of a generation shift in the position that younger Zainichiare taking to their minority identity, but the change is different because Zainichirepresent a diaspora rather than an indigenous group. On the whole, the youngergeneration of Zainichi Koreans suffers less discrimination compared to previousgenerations; in general terms, Zainichi are increasingly naturalizing as majorityJapanese. Although they are phenotypically indistinguishable from their majorityJapanese cohort, the twist is this: if they reveal their origins, the lines are oftenre-drawn, and they find themselves put back in an out-group category.This contextualization of the socio-economic status of Ainu, Buraku and

Zainichi Koreans in contemporary Japan clearly indicates how these groups arein disadvantaged positions compared to majority Japanese. The disadvantages


that minorities face stem from deep-rooted structural and institutional exclusionof these groups from access to mainstream societal resources which include hous-ing, education and employment, and also through indirect state control systemssuch as koseki. They also suffer social exclusion in day-to-day social relationships(with neighbors and friends) and marriage discrimination. Such exclusion hasthe effect of polarizing social groups in Japanese society into a broad in-group(majority Japanese) and different minority out-groups. This in-group/out-groupcategorization is socially and historically constructed, and in-group favoritismand out-group discrimination (Tajfel 1982, pp. 79) are common consequencesof such long-rooted collective polarization. A social identity perspective invitesus to consider what happens to members of an out-group when they are iden-tified as an out-group by a social majority, and when they themselves see theirown self-identification with their minority out-group as undesirable. Althoughstructural categorizations can explain the general nature of prejudice and dis-crimination against minorities in Japan, it is also necessary to understand howindividuals from minority out-groups perceive and respond to the categories thatare imposed on them. Tajfel (1978) stresses the importance of understandingthe subjective social realities of minorities, since subjective social realities reflecthistorical and contemporary social, economic and other differences between so-cial groups. Thus, exploring minority individuals perceptions of their positionsin Japanese society can illuminate how the subjective social realities of minorityindividuals mediate not only the social conditions in which Japanese and minoritygroups live, but also the effects of these conditions on minority individuals andsocial change. As members of a minority group, minority individuals have to dealwith a difficult psychological conflict between maintaining a positive sense of selfand dealing with the psychological and social restrictions imposed upon them asa result of their being minority group members (Tajfel 1978, pp. 153154). Socialidentity theory is a theory that attempts to highlight the possibilities for adaptationand the different adaptive strategies that minority individuals employ to deal withtheir (devalued) identities. Thus, a social identity theory perspective lets us movebeyond focusing only on minority group individuals ascribed identities as passiveobjects or victims. It allows us to recognize their agency in negotiating spaces totransform their social world in a society where they have been made to be othersand to remain invisible.

Methodology

A total of fourteen interviews, with six Ainu (five women, one man), three Buraku(one woman, two men) and four Zainichi Korean (all females: one ZainichiNorth Korean and three Zainichi South Koreans) were carried out.4 The agesof participants ranged from 24 to 70 (Ainu participants: 2650; Buraku: late20s30s; Zainichi Koreans: 2470).

Tin Tin Htun 9

I approached personal contacts who were active in minority activities or whoknew participants they could introduce to me. Although my Ainu and Burakucontacts were actively involved in minority activities, not all the participants Iinterviewed were activists. The interviews were conducted from June 2007 toMarch 2008. All the interviews except one were conducted in Japanese. All theAinu participants, two Buraku and one Zainichi Korean participant were fromTokyo; the remaining three Zainichi Koreans participants were from Nagoyaand one Buraku participant was from Osaka. The interview questions can beroughly divided into five sections: 1) perception of ones minority identity and itssignificance; 2) experience of discrimination; 3) gender discrimination within thegroup; 4) expectations regarding treatment of minorities from Japanese society;5) how the present research can contribute to improving the situation of minoritiesin Japan.I used the voice-centered relational method developed by Brown and Gilligan

(cited in Mauthner and Doucet 1998, p. 125). Since I am trying to present thevoices of groups that are considered as others in Japan, the voice-centered re-lational method is a suitable approach for analyzing the interview data: it letsthe researcher explore how individuals perceive themselves in terms of theirrelationship to the people around them and their relationships to the broadersocial, structural and cultural contexts within which they live (Mauthner andDoucet 1998, p. 126). In this study, voice means how the participants narratetheir experience. I followed four steps from the voice-centered relational method(Mauthner & Doucet 1998, pp. 126132) in analyzing the interviews. First, Iread the transcripts of the interviews and listened to the whole story being toldby the participants. Second, I read and listened to each story and focused on howthe participant talked about her/himself. Here I tried to find personal pronouns(I, we or you) and looked at how the participants talked about their relationshipswith significant others (parents, siblings, friends, partners, other important peoplein their lives). Finally, I examined how the participants placed their experiencesin broader contexts (cultural, political, societal, historical).The narratives that follow focus on how individual minorities experience

and negotiate their minority identity. Through the narratives, we can also un-derstand identity not in essentialist terms, but rather as multidimensional andintertwined with particular historical, cultural and social contexts. Since socialidentity is a socially shared self or group self with others who have the same sociallocation and intergroup history, narrative inquiry is an appropriate tool for inquir-ing how an individual formulates his/her position and acts in a social world thatdefines him/her in particular historical, cultural and social locations. That is to say,narratives have elements that are unique to an individuals experience as well asshared cultural and historical perspectives that an individual draws upon to makesense of his or her experiences (see Smith and Sparkes 2008). Since identities aresocially constructed, they are subject to change depending on the social context(Deaux and Ethier 1998). Thus, narratives offer an ongoing account of identities


that are open to transformation, variation and contradiction. Above all, narrativesenable us to access and explore individual identities by exploring the ways socialactors actively construct and present themselves to others (Miller 2005, p. 11).Although these narratives can represent only individual voices from the minoritygroups and cannot be claimed to be generalizable, they do illuminate a range ofdifferent, at times contradictory and often unexpected, perspectives on being aminority in Japanese society.

Dealing with minority identity

Psychological analyses of minority identity in Japan tend to portray minorities aspassive recipients of discrimination whose personalities and identities are left in-delibly scarred (e.g. De Vos and Wagamatsu 1966, 2006). This kind of analyticalpositioning, which describes and examines identity as internalized and stable, iscommon in discussions of the devalued identity of minority groups (Crocker andQuinn 2003, p. 238). The narratives of the participants in the present study sug-gest that other interpretations are possible. The majority of individuals centeredon agency and change in their orientation rather than on seeing themselves astrapped or as victims. Regardless of having experienced discrimination or not,all the participants were keen not to describe themselves from discriminated orvictimized positions. They did not voluntarily talk about discrimination unlessthey were specifically asked. Moreover, they actively negotiated their ascribed mi-nority identity in terms of publicly claiming a minority identity or asserting thattheir ethnic identity is just one part of their whole identity:

Its a part of me and its my root. I cant live separately from it [being Ainu]. Itis very important for me and I dont want anyone to defile it. Well, what can Isay, except that it is very important.

(Ainu female participant)

It isnt an issue of choice. I didnt choose to be born as a Buraku. Being bornas a Buraku is the cause of discrimination. But when I start thinking about mybeing born as a Buraku, there is a meaning to it. . . . In fact, thinking aboutit [discrimination], doing something about it gives me what it means to be aBuraku. I take it [my origin] positively.

(Burakumale participant)

Its [being a Zainichi Korean] just only one part of me.

(Zainichi Korean female)

The active voice of the participants was also evident in their responses tothe question What kind of treatment do you expect from Japanese society asAinu/Buraku/Zainichi?:

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I dont expect anything from Japanese society. I dont expect Japanese societyto grant Ainu rights or enact laws for Ainu. If Ainu can change themselves,changes in society will follow.

(Ainu male participant)

I dont expect or demand material/physical changes. I want our group to bea righteous voice for Japanese society and politics. We would like to voice ourideas, solutions for various problems, not getting money or things. . . . Whatwe wish is to have an equal-level dialogue with [Japanese society].


I would like minority groups to have more voices to point out the mistakesJapanese society has made. Dont just listen to our voices, but let us helpJapanese when they are in trouble. Although we were supposedly in a weakposition [as a minority], we have lived this position with strength.

(Zainichi Korean female participant)

Some of the participants had difficulty dealing with their minority status and feltnegatively about their origins, but they overcame such difficulties and acceptedtheir origins as part of their social identity. The meaning of minority identityto the participants ranged from significant, central and the most valued part ofthemselves to just one part of their identity. Why were these minority individualsable to accept their devalued social identities? Social identity theory helps usanswer this question. Social identity is defined by Tajfel as the part of individualsself-concept which derives from their knowledge of their membership of a socialgroup (or groups) together with the value and emotional significance of thatmembership (1974, p. 69). According to social identity theory, an individual willalways strive to emphasize the positive attributes of his/her social identity sinceidentifying with a particular group should have beneficial value and emotionalsignificance. According to social identity theory, if the group with which oneidentifies fails to provide a positive identity, the individual will try to leave thegroup or pass from one (inferior) group to a superior group. However, whenpassing or leaving the group is impossible, the individual will attempt to changethe structure of the group (thus engaging in acts of social change) or search for orcreate a new dimension that can enhance their positive social identity (be sociallycreative). Although some of the participants did move away from their group atone point in their lives (for example, moving out of a community that suffereddiscrimination) to pass as a Japanese, not every participant attempted passing.Some have openly lived as minorities all their lives while some hid or deniedtheir minority background at one point in their lives; still others neither hide nordisclose their origin. Since minorities in Japan share phenotypical features withJapanese, they can mix with Japanese in general without being questioned abouttheir origin. (This is true of some Ainu too.5) The issue for them is not so much


about being able to pass as Japanese, but about when, how and to whom theindividual can reveal his/her minority origin. The minority individuals who optedto leave their communities or pass as majority Japanese found later that the act ofleaving was not that helpful and took up their minority identity again. Althoughsome of the participants in this study were actively involved in social change bybeing members of a group focused on minority issues or by setting up their owngroup to raise awareness of minority issues, not every participant took the socialchange route. In fact, the participants, especially younger participants, seemedquite wary of being involved in any formally established organization. Young Ainuand Zainichi participants expressed their discontent with established minorityorganizations, commenting, for example, that these organizations didnt meettheir needs. Buraku participants who were involved in the Buraku LiberationLeague (BLL) also voiced their concern over diverse reactions towards Burakuissues and the future direction of the BLL. This can be attributed to a generationalgap in the perception of how minority issues should be pursued to bring aboutsocial change, as well as to the different experiences that members of the olderand younger generations have of being minorities in Japan.If social change and social mobility are not such helpful options, do minority

individuals then develop social creativity to see themselves positively as a memberof a devalued group? Although Tajfels position regarding minorities and the cre-ation of a sense of positive social identity is a promising framework for examiningthe social identity of minority groups in Japan, it does not have an exact fit withthe narratives of these individuals. The great majority of participants (eleven outof fourteen) described their minority identity in positive terms, but there were ex-ceptions in each group. One Ainu participant admitted that, even though she haddecided to live as an Ainu, she found it difficult to see her Ainu origins positively.As a young woman, she had hidden her Ainu identity from others. In her late40s, she decided to take on an Ainu identity publicly by being involved in Ainucultural activities. It took this individual about two years to become comfortablein her own skin as an Ainu when she made this identity change:

Being Ainu is like having something that fertilizes the way you live. I dontmean a motivation for life. Whatever you do to it, it wont die. . . . I dont feel Ihave pride as an Ainu, but I dont hate Ainu. I always wanted to do somethingAinu, but wasnt able to do it. . . . But when I wear an Ainu costume, I reallyfeel that I am Ainu. I think to myself Wow! Thats Ainu!


A young Zainichi Korean participant recounted that she could finally accepther Zainichi origins and feel proud as a Zainichi, but there were times when shesaw her Zainichi minority identity as an obstacle:

I am proud of having a different background from ordinary Japanese. I finallyfelt that I am okay as myself. Being a Zainichi is individuality. . . . However,

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sometimes I feel my being a Zainichi is an obstacle. I want to be Japanese. Iconsider myself as a Japanese person, but I cant say I am Japanese because mynationality is (South) Korean.

(Zainichi female participant)

As a group, the Buraku have a reputation for a strong group orientation; how-ever, a Buraku participant who grew up in a Buraku majority town stressed thatshe considers herself an individual and questioned why being a Buraku should bean issue.

I dont feel anything particular about my Buraku origins. I take it as an ordinarything. . . . I dont see it (being a Buraku) as undesirable or (think like) thisshouldnt be happening to me. I dont worry about such things. My motherwas born there (a big Buraku community in Western Japan), got married, and Iwas born there. Society may see me as a person of Buraku descent. I dont haveanything to say back about that or any objection to raise about this view. . . . Idont have any answer when I think of why I was born in a particular year, whyI was born in this prefecture. You cant choose these things. So I take it [beinga Buraku] normally . . . I just think of myself as Hisa.6

(Buraku female participant)

The above responses show that not every minority individual is striving to attaina positive social identity. These individuals stories highlight the contradictionsand emotional complexities involved in dealing with minority identity. As in theyoung Zainichi Korean womans case, an attribute that a person takes as uniquecan become an obstacle depending on the context in which the issue of socialidentity is raised. On the other hand, the Ainu womans voice tells us that a personmay not feel particularly positive about being who they are, but at a certain timeand in a certain context they may experience an intense sense of pride in theirminority identity. From early on, Buraku people are taught to deal with theirdiscriminated identity and are encouraged to be proud of who they are. However,if a minority group itself is a majority in a particular context (for example, acommunity where there are many Buraku and few Japanese), Buraku identityis unlikely to become a salient issue. What these cases of exception do showis that context and time are important in understanding minority individualsevolving perceptions of their own social identity. Whether this identity is seenas positive from the start or whether an individual searches for a positive socialidentity for themselves, these individuals accepted their minority status and couldself-categorize themselves publicly as Ainu, Buraku or Zainichi Koreans.One important implication is that, as members of (devalued) minority groups

in Japan, minority individuals try to determine at a personal level the significanceof the group identity ascribed to them, rather than seeking a positive social identityas the ultimate goal. Once they discover the extent of the significance of these


ascribed identities for themselves, they can then choose to attach emotional sig-nificance and value to them. That is to say, minority individuals who discovera central significance in their minority identity are likely to have more positivefeelings about their origins and have stronger identification with their group,compared to those who realize that their minority identity is not that significantto them. Social identity theory holds true here in the sense that individuals willidentify with the social group that gives them emotional and value significance(Turner 1975, p. 7). However, achieving a positive social identity might not bethe goal that minority individuals are aiming for. Rather, feeling positive aboutones own minority identity is consequent on the degree to which an individualattributes significance to their minority identity. Examining minority identity atindividual level highlights the fact that identities and their meanings are fluidand evolving depending on positions and interpretations of the individual in aparticular context. This also implies that individuals posses active agency andself-determination in resisting or accepting minority identity.

Context and minority identity

The articulations of identity that the Ainu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreans in thisresearch gave voice to are embedded within particular socio-historical contexts;thus, individuals own sense of social identity intersects with other discoursesaround their respective minority group as a collective. Each group has its ownmeta-discourse about its collective identity. The Ainu participants emphasizedlearning about Ainu culture, history and language as necessary acts in becomingauthentic Ainu, whereas the Buraku explained their identity with prominentreference to human rights, discrimination and the leading role of the BLL. Onthe other hand, Zainichi Korean participants centered their accounts on the rea-sons for their existence in Japan. Older Zainichi participants saw their existenceas a historical legacy of colonialism, whereas younger Zainichi (third or fourthgeneration) focused more on what being Zainichi means in Japan at present.These different inter-group discourses reflect the socio-historical conditions ofeach minoritys group relationship to the majority Japanese.

Because I hid being Ainu before, I wanted to like being Ainu first when Idecided to take on my Ainu side. But I think more and more that I need toknow Ainu history and culture. . . . Last year I met the indigenous peoplesfrom Canada. I felt they are very cheerful and a lot of fun. I listened to theirCD and thought they were cool. They sing in their own language. I felt thatthey are the real activists. They are full of confidence and take pride in whothey are. When I listen to them, I feel that I am not a real Ainu. I still cant dowhat they are doing. I am not Ainu at all. I am still a Japanese. I would like tobecome Ainu. I would like to be like the aborigines from Canada. . . . I would

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like to sing in Ainu language. I would like to give the same kind of inspirationI got from them.


Being a Buraku gives me courage, not just because I am a Buraku, but becauseI belonged to a big organization that is at the forefront of human rights issuesin Japan. Being a member of the organization gives a sense of responsibilityand pride. I am not alone. If I am discriminated I have several fellow members[who will protect me].


I have the image of being a Zainichi as the evidence of history. . . . The dif-ference between Koreans and Zainichi Koreans is that Zainichi Koreans wereborn out of politics. . . . For me nationality doesnt really matter. You can beany nationality, but one thing I cant do is becoming a Japanese national. Wemustnt forget about the War. We are here because of the War. We cant losewhat our ancestors had kept and being Zainichi Koreans is very important.

(Zainichi Korean female participant)

As Taylor and McKirnan (1984, p. 292) have indicated, the socio-historicallystaged development of the majority and minority relationship is crucial in under-standing disadvantaged minority status. According to their particular historical,socio-political relationship with the Japanese, each minority group has developedits own distinct public discourse in demanding its rights. For the Ainu, it is oneof preserving and promoting culture, tradition and language that have been lostto most Ainu due to the aggressive policies and positions of the Japanese state;for the Buraku, it is a question of promoting human rights and eliminating dis-crimination against Buraku; for the Zainichi, the public discourse revolves aroundthe historical legacy of being colonized and brought to Japan; questions of eth-nicity and diaspora permeate this discourse. Just as the public discourses of eachminority group provide a legitimate position for that group in Japanese society,the legitimacy that is achieved also helps individuals to articulate who they are asindividuals in a group and societal context.The present research furthermore shows that social context plays an important

role for individuals in determining and discovering the significance of their socialidentity. The different narratives reveal the impact that context has on rejectingor accepting minority identity. In particular, a shift in actual physical location(a change of living environment or circumstances) makes salient certain identityattributes (Deaux and Ethier 1998, p. 305). This process of salience comes intoplay, for example, when an individual moves away from a context of discrimina-tion. Such moves can have a tremendous impact on perceiving a minority groupin more positive ways.


An Ainu male participant who was the son of a well-known Ainu activist hatedbeing Ainu in Hokkaido. However, this negative view of Ainu changed once hemoved to Tokyo.

When I came here [Tokyo], my connection with Ainu had increased. My fatherdid a lot of Ainu movements here and a lot of his friends were here. When Imet his old friends, they talked a lot about Ainu. I didnt feel ashamed of beingAinu in front of my fathers friends. I could listen to their talks normally. Then Iwanted to know more about Ainu and started reading a lot of books on history.While I was learning Ainu history, I realized [being] Ainu was nothing to beashamed of, and my view of Ainu started to change slowly.

On the other hand, an Ainu female participant who grew up in Tokyo and hidher Ainu background changed her view towards being Ainu when she went to anAinu ceremony in Hokkaido.

It was the first time I participated in an Ainu ceremony. I met other Ainuwho were not my family or my relatives. It was as if I was in another world. Iwore Ainu costume for the first time and participated in the ceremony. Untilthen, I avoided Ainu ceremonies and distanced myself from Ainu. However, Ididnt feel any resistance being at the ceremony. I met a lot of people there, andsome of them were Japanese, but I didnt know it at that time. Although, these[Japanese] people knew that I was an Ainu, they were friendly and nice to me.This made me think: why did I hide being Ainu and couldnt tell others that Iwas Ainu until then?. . . . I felt liberated after meeting them.

These two accounts indicate that even the same context (here Hokkaido) canhave different effects on different individuals. For the Ainu male participant,Hokkaido in general is associated with negative side of being an Ainu, whereas forthe female participant Hokkaido is a place where she felt liberated from negativeimages of Ainu.A Buraku male participant realized for the first time that he was of Buraku

descent when his father took him to his hometown. Although his parents divorcedwhen he was 5, his mother (who is not a Buraku) let him participate in Burakuactivities all through his life, but he did not realize he was a Buraku until the tripto his fathers birthplace. There, he could make a complete sense of who he was:I dont think I changed after going to my fathers hometown. I think it is more ofI met my real self there. I realized something I always wanted to do, something Iwanted to live for there.A third-generation Zainichi female participant whowas born and raised in Japan

all her life found herself tormented about her identity. Although she thought moreof herself as a Japanese, her Zainichi background and her nationality as a Koreanprevented her from claiming herself as a Japanese. When she went to South Koreafor a short study trip, she realized that South Korea was not her country and shewas not a Korean. She was Japanese.

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The importance of social context is especially evident in the different spacesprovided by new support groups and organizations when individuals move. Lit-erally speaking, the new social context offers secure physical and psychologicalspaces where minority individuals can be themselves and differently re-locatetheir identity in space and time. Individual narratives revealed how communitychildrens clubs organized by the BLL, a support group for Ainu children and thechurch in the case of Zainichi and other (minority) peer groups provided suchsupport.

When I was in primary school, I used to go to an Ainu childrens study groupwhere Ainu children gathered twice a week and study. We didnt study at all.We played, did camping and had a Christmas Party. I felt really safe there.At school we couldnt say who we are, and we tried very hard not to standout. . . . Everyone [in the childrens study group] understood that we are Ainu,and we could relax and play.


I had a great time going to the childrens club. The minder taught us variousgames. We went camping in summer and hiking in winter. . . . Other Burakuchildren came along to the club and we felt safe and secure and we had a goodtime there.

(Buraku male participant)

Kondo (1990, p. 29) observed that, depending on the context, Japanese speak-ers use different Is to present themselves and their identities. Different uses of Ipronouns were also observed in the narratives of the present study and indicatethe changing social identities of the participants in terms of time and context. Allthe participants tended to use jibun or jibunjishinn (myself/one) to reflect on whothey were in a different time and context (that is, what had happened to themin the past in relation to the present) or to describe their own reflections andrealizations in a particular context, whereas ore (informal I for male) or watashi (Ifor both male and female) were mainly used to describe facts about themselvesand likes and dislikes (or, in other words, unchanging aspects of themselves).

When I think about it now, I [jibun] am a Buraku and involved in the BurakuLiberationMovement. I met a lot of people through themovement, and I [jibun]have begun to develop my own views and I [jibun] have begun to change. Untilnow [I] didnt pay much attention to social issues and believed that they wereto do with politics and not my [ore] concern. Now [I] think more and moreof them [social issues] as my [jibunjishin] problems and feel more and more ofthem as my [jibunjishin] problem.



The above interview extract shows the participant uses jibun to reflect his chang-ing position towards Buraku discrimination, as well as his increasing identificationwith the Buraku movement. Similarly, an Ainu female participant used jibun todescribe an important shift in her identity together with a change in time andcontext.

In 2006 before going to the Ainu ceremony, I [jibun] rejected my Ainu side andlived as a Japanese. But when I went to the ceremony there was Ainu inside me[jibun no naka], [I am] not Japanese, but an Ainu. [I] wanted Ainu to the frontof me [jibun]. Until then I hid being Ainu, but I wanted to like myself [jibun] asAinu. Until then I liked myself [jibun] as a Japanese, not as Ainu. But now, [I]have become to like myself [jibun] as Ainu.


A different Ainu female participant described her conflicting identities(Japanese and Ainu) in a different context using different Is:

In Hawaii, I [watashi] was told many times that I do not look like Japanese,because my [jibun] skin color is different [from Japanese]. I [watashi] am notJapanese in Hawaii, but [I am] with Japanese. The people I was with wouldprobably think that Ami [not her real name] isnt Japanese even if she is inHawaii, she is Ainu and her face is different from us. Although I [jibun] wantto forget about it [being Ainu], the other people didnt let me.

She expected that in a different context (Hawaii) her Ainu identity might notbe an issue that she would have to deal with, but the very opposite happened. Wecan notice how she used watashi to describe the actual situation she was in andthe fact that she was not seen as a Japanese in Hawaii. At the same time, she usedjibun to express how she felt about her Ainu identity and her interpretation of thesituation in that particular context.In overall terms, different social contexts lead us into broader but more sensi-

tized understandings of dealing with minority social identity in Japan. The socio-historical background of each minority group provides a context where minorityindividuals can locate themselves to articulate their minority identity. On the otherhand, the physical and social contexts provide physical as well as psychologicalspaces for minority individuals to explore, at different periods in their lives, thesignificance of their minority identity. The use of different Is provides indicatorsof evolving identity stories, as well as helping to pinpoint moments of conflict-ing identity in different contexts. These findings indicate that social identity is aprocess that is embedded in social contexts and social relationships. The socialidentity of minorities cannot be described in a static sense of what it is (Tajfel1974, p. 76); rather, it is a process that can be understood within the social,cultural and historical contexts in which it is shaped.

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Conclusion

Examining the identity narratives of Ainu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreans gives usa diverse, complex and evolving picture of the social identity of minority groups inJapan. The shared and different patterns that we find within each minority groupcan best be understood in terms of their socio-historical relationship with themajority Japanese group.Whereas previous research focused on only one minoritygroup at a time, the comparison in this article between three long-establishedminority groups in Japan highlights important differences and similarities betweenminorities in terms of dealing with their social identity. Here, social identity theoryas an analytical framework is particularly useful for understanding the socialidentity of Ainu, Buraku and Zainichi Koreans not only at an inter-group level,but also at a personal level. This theoretical tool presents us with a perceptive andsensitive social psychological understanding of minority groups (Hutnik 1991,p. 47) by providing a valuable framework for exploring how minority individualsdeal with their devalued social identity in Japan. The use of social identity theorymakes apparent the diversity and wide range of variability in the social identitiesof minority individuals.Until now research and activism related to minorities in Japan have mainly fo-

cused on the marginalization of and discrimination against minorities in Japanesesociety, rather than diversity and agency within minority groups. Formally estab-lished minority organizations that are considered representative of minorities inJapan do not seem to resonate with the changing needs and situations of youngerminority members. To be truly representative of minority individuals, the diver-sity observed in the social identity of minority individuals needs to be consideredin activism and research related to minorities in Japan.

Acknowledgements

I am truly grateful to all the participants in this study for their generosity andcooperation in agreeing to be interviewed. My thanks also go to Maya Mori,Mina Sakai, Yoko Shillaw and Yugo Tomonaga for introducing me to differentparticipants. I would also like to thank two anonymous reviewers from JapanForum, Roger Goodman, Jeff Kingston and Tina Miller for their comments andTakako Ohki for her help with the research. Finally I would like to thank AndrewBarfield for his comments on the research and the writing of this article.

Notes

1. Although there are sociological studies that explore the identity of Buraku (e.g. Uchida 2008a,2008b) and young Zainichi Koreans (e.g. Fukuoka 2000), these studies focus on classifying anddescribing types of identity, rather than on investigating transformational processes in minor-ity identity formation. Matsushita (2002) adopted a developmental psychological approach toexploring young Buraku identity, but her study focused on the impact of Buraku identity on


psychological states (such as conflict, anxiety) of individuals and used types of identity state toexplain Buraku identity.

2. It is difficult to know the exact population of Ainu, since the official number (23,767 in 1999)in Hokkaido counted only the individuals who registered themselves as Ainu in the 1999 census(Siddle 2009, p. 36). The Ainu who did not put themselves forward as Ainu were not includedin official numbers.

3. Embezzlement cases concerning some local Buraku Liberation League members, and the mediaspotlight on those prominent cases, probably led to the withdrawal of the municipal funds.

4. It was difficult to recruit participants from minority groups, so I could not get equal numbers ofmen and women within each group or equal numbers of participants for each group.

5. Unlike minorities in multiracial, multilingual societies in North America or Europe, Japaneseminorities are more or less phenotypically indistinguishable from majority Japanese. They allspeak the Japanese language and can pass as Japanese. Even Ainu without typical Japanesefeatures can pass as Japanese in big cities like Tokyo.

6. This is a pseudonym.

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Tin Tin Htun, who comes from Burma, completed her PhD in social psychology on gender andleadership orientation at TsukubaUniversity in Japan. Her research interests cover gender, minority,civil society and social identity. She is currently teaching courses on gender and society in Japan,prejudice and discrimination in Japan at Temple University Japan Campus and Chuo University.She may be contacted at [email protected].

Social Identity of Minority in Japan

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