Embedded racism : Japan's visible minorities and racial discrimination / Debito Arudou.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Arudō, Debito, 1965- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Nationalism--Social aspects.

Nationalism.

Social isolation.

Physical-appearance-based bias.

Race discrimination--Law and legislation.

Race discrimination.

Noncitizens.

Social conditions.

Minorities.

Racism.

Japan--Race relations.

Japan.

Race relations.

Racism--Japan.

Minorities--Japan--Social conditions.

Noncitizens--Japan--Social conditions.

Race discrimination--Japan.

Race discrimination--Law and legislation--Japan.

Physical-appearance-based bias--Japan.

Social isolation--Japan.

Nationalism--Social aspects--Japan.

Noncitizens--Social conditions.

Minorities--Social conditions.

Physical Description:

xxvi, 351 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Lanham, Maryland : Lexington Books, [2015]

Summary:

"Despite domestic constitutional provisions and international treaty promises, Japan has no law against racial discrimination. Consequently, businesses around Japan display 'Japanese Only' signs, denying entry to all 'foreigners' on sight. Employers and landlords routinely refuse jobs and apartments to foreign applicants. Japanese police racially profile 'foreign-looking' bystanders for invasive questioning on the street. Legislators, administrators, and pundits portray foreigners as a national security threat and call for their segregation and expulsion. Nevertheless, Japan's government and media claim there is no discrimination by race in Japan, therefore no laws are necessary. How does Japan resolve the cognitive dissonance of racial discrimination being unconstitutional yet not illegal? Embedded Racism carefully untangles Japanese society's complex narrative on race by analyzing two mutually-supportive levels of national identity maintenance. Starting with case studies of hundreds of individual 'Japanese Only' businesses, it carefully analyzes the construction of Japanese identity through legal structures, statute enforcement, public policy, and media messages. It reveals how the concept of a 'Japanese' has been racialized to the point where one must look 'Japanese' to be treated as one. The product of a quarter-century of research and fieldwork by a scholar living in Japan as a naturalized Japanese citizen, Embedded Racism offers an unprecedented perspective on Japan's deeply-entrenched, poorly-understood, and strenuously-unacknowledged discrimination as it affects people by physical appearance"--Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction: Why such a long introduction?

Part One: The context of racism in Japan

Racial discrimination in Japan : contextualizing the issue

How racism "works" in Japan

Part Two: "Japanese only" : examples of racial discrimination

Case studies of "Japanese only" exclusionary businesses

Part Three: The construction of Japan's embedded racism

Legal constructions of "Japaneseness"

How "Japaneseness" is enforced through laws

A "Chinaman's chance" in Japanese court

From foreign fetishization to fear in the Japanese media

Part Four. Challenges to Japan's exclusionary narratives

Maintaining the binary despite domestic and international pressure

Part Five. Discussion and conclusions

Putting the concept of "embedded racism" to work

"So what?" : why Japan's "embedded racism" matters : Japan's bleak future

Glossary

Appendix One: Sakanaka's "big Japan" vs. "small Japan"

Appendix Two: This research's debt to critical race theory.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781498513906

1498513905

OCLC:

921240377