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Paper short abstract:

In this paper I examine the depiction of the home as an ambiguous space of both comfort and frustration in a series of short pieces written by published Japanese authors as part of the daily blog "Day to Day" the first Covid-19 State of Emergency in Tokyo in 2020.

Paper long abstract:

In the wake of revolving Covid-19 restrictions on movement, our affective relationships with the ‘home’ are being transformed. How do we experience and conceptualise the private space of the home when our movements are being restricted by public discourse and the forces of the state? The home has long been positioned within feminist geography as a contested and politicised space in which the public and private overlap. The massive rise in working from home and restriction on public leisure spaces, places the home as a concept and geographic location in the cross-hairs.

During the first State of Emergency in Tokyo during early 2020, Japanese publishing giant Kodansha launched through their online platform a daily blog called “Day to Day”. For 100 days starting on May 1, short pieces by Japanese authors about their daily life during the pandemic were published. This created a collection that is timely, but also remarkably focused as these creators responded to a shared prompt and a shared, evolving disaster.

This paper focuses on a sub-corpus of 13 pieces within the collection which focus on the home, familial relationships, and changing daily life practices. For some of these accounts what becomes apparent is that the home itself is experienced as a negotiated space, especially under the strain of relationships and individual lives that are increasingly overlapping. For others, the home itself is a source of discomfort and frustration, carrying with it isolation or fragmentation of self. Local neighborhoods and neighbors create an uneasy intimacy, with a desire for human contact coming into conflict with the Covid-19 era of “humans as risk”. Consequently, we can see that home is left an ambiguous space – for some “staying home” is a source of comfort and indulgence, for others a source of fear or melancholy. As we collectively reconceptualise our relationships with our homes, these works offer us an early glimpse into the questions and challenges that arise – is the home a space of solace, comfort, or unease?