Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the pedagogy of "happiness" in women's everyday life in Banana Yoshimoto's Kitchen, in the context of neoliberalism. Looking at the social discourse of the 80s, I will discuss the contradictory connections between women's workforce and domesticity in relation to their happiness.

Paper long abstract:

This paper explores and questions the pedagogy of "happiness" in women's everyday life in Banana Yoshimoto's debut novel Kitchen (1987), in the context of neoliberalism. Looking at Kitchen in the social discourse of the 80s, I will discuss the contradictory connections between a women's workforce and domesticity in relation to their happiness. The protagonist Mikage's pursuit of happiness always already lies in how she can be proximate to the idea of kinship, and this demonstrates the limitation of this novel to imagine woman's happiness outside of bloodlines.

Previous critics argue that the novel radically portrays new forms of family through the queer mother figure, as well as by exploring a family connection not through blood relations, but from eating food together; as Chizuko Ueno called it in Midnight Call, 'shokuen-kazoku'. However, I will challenge this optimistic reading of a new family portrait, and argue that this novel reinforces the idea of heterosexism. Happiness works here as a norm and the idea circulates that happiness is in reproducing the blood-related family, seen through the death of the transgender mother, and in the ambiguous relationship between Mikage and Yuichi. In this sense, happiness in this novel works as a border-making system, which excludes those who are not grounded in (heteronormative) bloodlines.

Contextualising Kitchen in 1980s Japan, when the Japanese economic bubble reached its peak, and neo-conservatism was on the rise, provides a thread with which to undo the complicated process of gaining happiness in girlhood: in the process of her growth into a woman, the girl is willing to participate in the neoliberal market, to be proximate to the normative sense of happiness. This "happiness" is described as something cultivated through the good care of (heterosexual) parents. The process in this text is precisely that of the girl maturing and entering the market as part of its labour force. In this, the girl is encouraged to fulfill the utmost of her ability with the newfound liberation of women to work, but at the same time, the novel suggests the "ultimate" happiness is still contained in the kitchen, inside the conventional family unit.

Paper short abstract:

This paper explores literature after 3.11 and the ethics of representing the disaster that so profoundly disrupted the norms and rhythms of everyday life in Japan. This paper is concerned with two issues: the politics of representing 3.11 and the transmission of trauma narratives about 3.11.

Paper long abstract:

This paper explores literature after 3.11 and the ethics of representing the disaster that profoundly disrupted the rhythms of everyday life in Japan. I will focus on two issues: the politics of its representation and the transmission of trauma narratives about it. Following the Triple Disaster in Japan, the multiple traumas of the Great Eastern Earthquake, tsunami and meltdown at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant elicited responses in various genres. At the same time, however, some writers and critics have expressed a reticence towards portraying the disaster, perhaps due to the enormous responsibility of adequately expressing its trauma. This reluctance points to challenges in ethically representing traumatic events. As Whitehead has argued of trauma fiction, such representations pose a number of risks: the reduction of the traumatic experience, the appropriation of another's trauma, and/or the generalisation of the trauma. Drawing on trauma studies from other literary and cultural traditions, I will consider questions including: What are the possibilities and limitations of representing 3.11 in Japan? Where are the ethical boundaries to those representations? How does the discipline of trauma studies, rooted in responses to the Holocaust, inform our discussions of 3.11 in Japan? How can literature formulate an ethical response to the crisis? Moreover, who has the right to narrate a disaster or traumatic event?

The second issue considered here is the transmission of trauma narratives about 3.11. A large sign posted above the sizeable '3.11 Corner' of a bookstore in Kamaishi in the disaster-stricken region of Tōhoku reads, 'Ichiban kowai no wa fūka suru koto' (What we fear most is forgetting). In the years following 3.11, the issue of how to respond to and represent it stood at the forefront of literary and artistic responses. Six years on from the disaster, the bookstore sign echoes the fears expressed by those still living in the hisaichi (disaster zones) about the 'weathering' of memories of 3.11 alongside the growing temporal distance from the actual events. This paper will address how these concerns might impact the production, reception and discourse on 3.11 writing.

Paper short abstract:

This paper will analyse how Kawabata and Yokomitsu explore the sense of reality in everyday life though new literary expression, focusing on the senses and perception. It will explore links between cultural life, especially in terms of the emergence of modernism, and political life in 1920s Japan.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper, I intend to explore links between everyday, cultural life, especially in terms of the emergence of modernism, and political life in 1920s Japan. My main concern is with the writings of Kawabata Yasunari (1899-1972), but I will also make reference to the work of Kawabata's contemporary, Yokomitsu Riichi (1898-1947). Such a comparison is useful because it emphasizes the fact that, although all writers of the same generation largely share a common cultural and political zeitgeist, they also have the capacity to respond to their age in different, more personal and individualistic ways. It is precisely through attention to the differences between Kawabata and Yokomitsu that I aim to throw into sharper relief the unique manner of Kawabata's literary engagement with the cultural and political life of Japan during the 1920s.

As is well known, Kawabata and Yokomitsu were founding members of the Neo-Sensationalist group (Shinkankaku-ha), and critics have connected both writers with literary modernism. As its name implies, the group was particularly keen to concentrate on the concept of kankaku (sensation) as a means of fleshing out a modernist world-view. The Kawabata text I will use to explore links between modernism and sensation is his 1924 essay, 'Commentary on new trends among newly emerging authors' ('Shinshin sakka no shin keikô kaisetsu'). I will compare this work with a 1925 essay by Yokomitsu Riichi, entitled 'On Neo-Sensationalism - in response to criticisms of sensory activity and sensory works' ('Shinkankaku-ron: kankaku katsudô to kankakuteki sakubutsu ni taisuru hinan e no gyakusetsu').

Kawabata is generally thought to have had little interest in broader social and political matters, but my argument is that there is indeed a political dimension to his writing. This leads me to conclude that Kawabata made his own contribution to the overall political environment in Japan during the 1920s.