by Cecilia Luzi

In rural Japan, life often revolves around exchange, reciprocity, and community support. These values profoundly influence the way people live and interact, especially among urban-rural migrants. This blog post explores how these values are manifested through a seemingly ordinary object-a used television found in the home of one of my research participants in Buzen. By examining the history of this TV, I uncover how such objects symbolize broader patterns of reciprocity and sustainability among urban-rural migrants.

Hitomi, 43, originally from Kitakyūshū, moved to Buzen five years ago, shortly after the birth of her third daughter. After living in China, New Zealand, Singapore, the UK and Colombia, she now works as a translator, specializing in Chinese and English. Her family includes her Colombian husband and three daughters. She moved to live with her parents to help care for her grandmother, who suffered from dementia. This move also provided much needed support for her daughters while her husband remained in Colombia. Hitomi’s life is deeply rooted in the values of sharing and helping others, which is vividly illustrated by an object in her home. On my first visit to her home, I noticed a large, 60-inch flat-screen TV in the corner of the living area that doubles as the kitchen and family room. “That’s a big TV!” I said, and Hitomi replied, “Yeah, but it’s broken!” A friend had given her the TV when she moved into her rental house. “I still have to find the time and money to get it fixed,” Hitomi said. When I visited again a few months later, I saw that the room had been rearranged, with the TV now placed in front of the sofa. “Oh, so you finally fixed it!” I exclaimed. Hitomi laughed and said, “No, not yet. She explained that she didn’t want to throw it away because it was a gift from a friend and because “it’s a waste (mottainai); it could still be fixed!”

Exchange, reciprocity, mutual support and sharing are at the heart of Hitomi’s life. Hitomi connects effortlessly with people from all walks of life. Her life is a rich tapestry of relationships, and her genuine curiosity about others drives her to offer support and empathy whenever needed. I saw this in action when she helped a new JET participant from the UK find an apartment, shared details about a friend’s pastry class, and even took her daughter’s friend home from school for weeks at a time to help her mother, who had just given birth. “I’ve traveled and lived alone in many places,” Hitomi told me, “and if it weren’t for the help I received from so many people, I wouldn’t be where I am today. Helping you and others is my way of giving back some of that support to the universe.” In this context, the broken TV in Hitomi’s house has a special significance. It’s more than just a piece of furniture; it symbolizes her gratitude to the people in her life and reflects her commitment to a life rooted in interconnectedness and reciprocity. When Hitomi and her three daughters had just moved into their new home, the television was an unexpected and much appreciated gift. Given the expense of moving and settling into a new place, buying a TV wasn’t on her radar. It now sits prominently in her living room, a constant reminder of Hitomi’s social relationships built on sharing and mutual support.

During my visits, I noticed that Hitomi had moved the television from one place to another while she waited for it to be repaired. This in-between state, in which the TV no longer works but still has meaning, is a symbol of Hitomi’s commitment to a life centered on support, community, and sustainability, similar to many other migrants I met. The secondhand TV also underscores a more general trend that I observed among many people during my fieldwork. Urban migrants often rely on second-hand items, such as furniture and tools, and live a lifestyle focused on reuse and sustainability. This practice is also consistent with a deeper commitment to environmental awareness. Hitomi’s living room, a mix of old and new furniture, including the TV, sofa bed and dining table – all gifts from friends – exemplifies this trend. In this context, where secondhand items are both a necessity and a choice, these objects represent more than just sustainability. These objects, whether brought in from the city or purchased new, embody the relationships and exchanges between their former and new owners, forming a mosaic of objects and social relations, each with its own story.

by Stephan Bogedain

The number of vacant houses in Japan has been increasing nationwide due to a declining population caused by low birth rates. These vacant houses are called akiya and have many negative effects on the living environment of the area and the population living in the neighborhood. They also have an impact on the local economy, as they lead to a decrease in land prices and tax revenues. Many of the vacant houses are not sold because Japanese people prefer not to buy used houses. In addition, many of them are also used as storage space, second homes, or are awaiting renovation (Platz 2024: 43-44).

Located in Saitama Prefecture, Kawagoe is a city bustling with tourists who venture through the alleys to experience the traditional houses reminiscent of Japan’s Edo period. As many as seven million tourists visit Kawagoe each year to experience its unique and beautiful cityscape. However, the majority of these tourists only stay for the day and leave in the evening. The city has been experiencing steady population growth since the 1990s, but it is not free of the problems that akiya (City Population 2022) present. Due to the city’s massive success as a tourist attraction, rents are rising, and as a result, small private businesses are struggling to find a foothold in the area. This leads to these businesses being pushed out of Kawagoe and new ones being unable to open in the city, which negatively affects the residential areas (Seki 2022: 81). Since the main street sees a lot of visitors, it flourishes and is full of souvenir shops. The side streets, on the other hand, are deserted and the shopkeepers there are forced to give up their businesses.

To address these issues, the city has formulated a plan to combat the increase in vacant properties. This includes raising awareness among citizens. The city also states that the owners of the houses are responsible for the proper management of the houses. However, the city will assist the owners if needed. The plan advocates the effective use of the empty spaces as community spaces in an attempt to revitalize the region. The focus of the revitalization is on areas with many elderly residents and vacant houses (Kawagoe City 2018a). According to a study carried out by the local government, the areas with the most vacant houses also have the highest proportion of elderly people over the age of 65 (Kawagoe City 2016: 75). While the city is generally experiencing population growth, it still faces the same problem of an increase in akiya due to an aging population. As part of the counter-measures, the city has started to collect data on vacant houses that their owners want to sell and is collecting them in a so-called vacant house bank (akiya banku). This makes it easy for individuals and organizations interested in buying a house to find and contact the owners (Kawagoe City 2023).

The city has also set up a school to teach how to renovate old vacant houses. Among the participants in this school is a group of people who have formed a company called “80%”. The company’s activities focus on repairing and renovating empty houses so that they can be reused for new businesses, such as coworking spaces and guesthouses, allowing 80% to make a profit by renting out the newly created spaces. The company renovates about one house per year. An example is the renovation of an old tenement that is now a rentable coworking space and café. The city’s 350,000 residents live alongside the many tourists who visit Kawagoe. The renovation projects serve as a way to make the city more livable by creating more businesses primarily for locals, which in turn can attract more tourists, while creating spaces where both worlds can meet and mix (Seki 2022). Their coworking spaces are advertised as having a cozy atmosphere and they offer their services 24 hours a day, 365 days a year (80 %). The company does not receive financial support from the local government for its projects, as it is a for-profit business. However, the city provides soft support to the group by arranging meetings and mediating between them and previous homeowners. Although the members of 80% are aware that they are doing a lot of work for the city, they also value having fun while renovating houses and want to make the city a place that reflects these values. Their sentiment is reflected in the name 80%, which means “creating a better day without working too hard” (Seki 2022: 83).

References:

80% (2024), “Kowākingu” [Coworking], https://80per.net/coworking/ (17.06.2024).

City Population (2022), ,,JAPAN: Saitama”, https://www.citypopulation.de/en/japan/saitama/ (17.06.2024).

Kawagoe City (2016), “Kawagoeshi akiya nado jittaichōsa hōkokusho” [Kawagoe vacant houses survey report], https://www.city.kawagoe.saitama.jp/kurashi/jutaku/akiyataisaku/jittaihoukokusyo.files/h28_jittaityousahoukokusyo.pdf (17.06.2024).

Kawagoe City (2018a), “Kawagoeshi akiya nado taisakukeikaku wo sakutei” [Formulated plan to deal with vacant houses in Kawagoe], https://www.city.kawagoe.saitama.jp/kurashi/jutaku/akiyataisaku/akiyakeikaku.html (17.06.2024).

Kawagoe City (2023), ,”Akiya banku” [Vacant house bank], https://www.city.kawagoe.saitama.jp/smph/kurashi/jutaku/akiyataisaku/bank-hp2.html (17.06.2024).

Platz, Annemone (2024), “From social issue to art site and beyond – reassessing rural akiya kominkan,” Contemporary Japan 36, 1: 41-56. 43-44.

Seki, Kōya (2022), “Kankōbaburu no ato no kawagoe o omou.” [Thinking of Kawagoe after the tourism bubble], in: TURNS, April (51): 78-83.

Stephan Bogedain is a student in the BA program in Japanese Studies at Freie Universität Berlin.

by Anton Hinz

Koyasan is a small town in Wakayama Prefecture with a population of about 3000. What makes it special is that the town consists of 117 temples and a third of the population are Buddhist monks.  Koyasan is the home of Shingon Esoteric Buddhism and was founded in 816 by the monk Kūkai (774-835), who is also the founder of this branch of Buddhism. Koyasan has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2004. It is located on a mountain peak of about 800 meters. According to mythology, the location of Koyasan was chosen because the surrounding mountain peaks resemble the shape of a lotus flower. The visitwakayama website  describes Koyasan as “one of Japan’s most sacred sites” that has been visited by “emperors, feudal lords, aristocrats, politicians, acolytes and ordinary citizens”. These “ordinary citizens” have grown to a steady number of about 1.4 million foreign and Japanese visitors per year, or nearly 4,000 visitors per day – outnumbering the local population. Considering that many visitors stay for one or more nights, the number of visitors can even exceed 10,000 on any given day.

Almost 6 years ago, I was fortunate enough to work at one of the temples that offer authentic temple lodging (shukubō). During my time there, I spent many contemplative hours wandering the temple grounds before sunrise or after sunset, when guests were busy having their traditional breakfast or dinner (shōjin ryōri). Despite how beautiful and spiritual the city still is, I could not help but wonder if the large crowds standing in line, taking pictures, or talking loudly were somewhat at odds with the religious significance and spirituality of Koyasan. Silvia Aulet and Tomasz Duda (2020) have introduced the concept of spiritual sustainability. While sustainability is usually considered from an economic, environmental or socio-cultural perspective, in the case of sacred sites spiritual sustainability is defined as the preservation of the spirit of a place, its original use, and the sacredness of the site (Aulet & Duda, 2020, p. 5). But in addition to spiritual sustainability the economic, environmental, and socio-cultural sustainability of sacred sites remain important as well.

What does it mean for a sacred site to be spiritually unsustainable? Desecration and dispossession of a site can occur when visitors behave disrespectfully or when the site becomes “over-commercialized and its sacredness can no longer be perceived” (Aulet & Duda, 2020, p. 5). Another way this can happen is when “locals are unable to perform rituals at sacred sites, or even when sacred objects are decontextualized” (ibid, p. 5). In the case of Koyasan, one could argue that monks are inhibited in performing rituals by their new role as tour guides or perceived tourist attractions, and that the presence of recording devices or a noisy visitor distracts from the austere morning ceremonies. I have found that guiding visitors through Koyasan as a cultural heritage site and the teachings of Shingon Esoteric Buddhism is not a hindrance to their rituals and monastic duties, but a modern extension of them. Nevertheless, the disruption of the austere atmosphere by the sheer number of visitors, many of whom take pictures and few of whom adhere to spoken or unspoken guidelines, seems to contribute to a degree of spiritual unsustainability.

Koyasan was, and in some cases still is, a beloved destination for pilgrims. Modern accessibility has affected not only the perception of the site, but also the use of some of its features. In order to make the site more accessible to visitors, it was equipped with a cable car that carries passengers several hundred meters up the mountain, connected to a long, sloping train line that comes from Kyoto and passes through many smaller stations. In addition, a winding, well-constructed road was built into the mountainside for easy access by car. While they can still be seen in their towering beauty, most of Koyasan’s historic large wooden gates have been stripped of their function as welcoming signs for a weary traveler who has been walking for several days to reach Koyasan. To combat overtourism and maintain Koyasan’s spiritual sustainability, an article in the Asahi Shimbun of March 2, 2024 suggests that the mayor of Koyasan consider taxing visitors to Koyasan to reinvest the money in the maintenance and repair of public facilities and roads. Similar concepts are being implemented in other tourist hotspots in Japan, such as Myajima Island, as well as in European cities such as Venice.

On the other hand, the presence and behavior of tourists need not negatively affect a site and its spiritual sustainability. Kaori Yanata (2021, p. 5) argues that tourism is a kind of “secular substitute for organized religion”. The free time that tourists take for themselves serves as spirituality per se, because it can provide “a space for the contemplative and the creative, a unity of thought and action.” In this way, Shingon Esoteric Buddhism, which reaches approximately 1.4 million people per year, and up to 10,000 daily visitors who experience the spirituality of an ancient site, could further fuel the spiritual current of Koyasan. A full analysis of the impact of tourism on Koyasan is yet to be conducted, but for now, Koyasan is a shining fortress of spirituality and religiosity, and it seems likely to remain so for the foreseeable future.

References:

Aulet, S. & Duda, T. (2020), “Tourism Accessibility and Its Impact on the Spiritual Sustainability of Sacred Sites,” Sustainability 12, doi:10.3390/su12229695.

Ohno, H. (2024), “Mount Koyasan town eyes charging visitors with special tax,” The Asahi Shimbun, https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/15185726#:~:text=In%202023%2C%20the%20World%20Heritage,and%2030%2C000%20visitors%20every%20day

The Official Wakayama Travel Guide (2024). Koyasan Area: Majestic Temples and Rich Nature.  https://visitwakayama.jp/en/stories/koyasan#78

Anton Hinz is a student in the BA program in Japanese Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin.

by Gina Bresch

In 2019, after finishing school, I decided to go to Japan for a few months to do voluntary service. I ended up in Tokushima City, the capital of the prefecture of the same name on the smallest of Japan’s four main islands, Shikoku. While many of my fellow volunteers, who came through the same agency, were the only ones at their placement, I was lucky enough to become part of a large team of volunteers who worked, ate and lived together. For three months I was part of the NPO “Bizan Daigaku” where I did a lot of hard but rewarding work. 

One of the people I met during that time was a former volunteer who worked at one of the nurseries we sometimes worked at; a Russian woman named Zhanna. After her volunteer work ended, she had traveled a lot in the Tokushima area and liked the tranquility of it more than the big cities in Japan, so she decided to stay. I didn’t see her very often while I was working in Tokushima, but I learned that she had later secured a position as an English teacher. Even after Zhanna left the volunteer program, she remained close to the close-knit community of the Bizan Daigaku organization. We saw each other from time to time, and I was very impressed with her Japanese language skills and admired how she lived in Tokushima, away from her family, and found her own way. I hoped that one day I would be able to come to Japan for a permanent stay like she had.

When I returned to Japan in late 2022, I met Zhanna and found out that she had moved to Kaiyō, a small town on the south coast of Tokushima. She seemed very busy with her work. She told us about her work and what made her move to remote Kaiyō. After living in Tokushima City for a while, Zhanna had begun traveling to Kaiyō on weekends. She saw it as an escape from her busy work life in the city and began to wonder what it would be like to live in this place, which she came to appreciate more and more. At the same time, Zhanna had started taking surfing lessons in Tokushima City, and since Kaiyō is known to have the biggest waves in the prefecture, she thought it would help her improve her surfing skills if she moved there. When I talked to her, she even called it “Surfers’ Mekka.

Zhanna lives in Kaiyō, but works in a town called Minami, which is 40 minutes away by car. She works in the Regional Revitalization Division of the Tokushima Southern Prefectural Office, which includes Kaiyō City, Minami City, Anan City, and others. Of these, I was only familiar with Anan City because one of the nurseries where I volunteered was located there. As you might expect, these are very remote areas that are struggling with depopulation. Zhanna is responsible for the English versions of the prefectures’ social media sites, as well as photographing “the best views and local traditions,” all with the goal of revitalizing the region. Through her work, she hopes to help promote some of the region’s specialties and its appeal to attract more (foreign) tourists to visit the southern, rural part of Tokushima Prefecture. It also involves a lot of translating and interpreting Japanese promotional material into English, such as brochures. Finally, her SNS work consists of appearing on the prefectural government’s YouTube channel, showcasing various places and activities in the area.

On the other hand, she participates in tourism fairs and conventions and speaks at the annual “Silver Daigakko” event, which is designed to help recruit new volunteer guides in Tokushima City. Her presence as a foreigner helps the cause of revitalization by adding another perspective to these rural areas that can be attractive to both Japanese and foreign visitors. Zhanna calls Tokushima a “treasure chest for exploration” and would like to share this place with many people so that they can experience a different side of Japan. As for her hopes for the future, she hopes that the infrastructure of southern Tokushima will be developed and that her work will help the area become more popular to attract new tourists. That way, the money they earn from tourism could help local people improve their lives and live more comfortably. In particular, she wants to promote the various unique festivals that take place between August and November, such as the Anan Danjiri Kenka Matsuri. I wish her and her work all the best for the future and hope to see her soon, perhaps when visiting Kaiyō myself.

Gina Bresch is a student in the BA program in Japanese Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin.

by Cornelia Reiher

Rural Japan is not only an interesting field of research, but also an attractive topic for teaching Japanese Studies. In the summer of 2024, I taught a course on recent social, cultural and political dynamics in Japan’s rural areas to students of the BA program in Japanese Studies at Freie Universität Berlin. In this course, we talked about cultural aspects of local crafts and arts and discovered several interesting initiatives to attract artists to rural Japan, realize art projects together with locals, and promote tourism through traditional crafts. Other course topics included the mobility of people as tourists, urban-rural migrants and transnational migrants and their experiences in rural Japan. We discussed differences and similarities in the lives of Japanese and foreign newcomers to the countryside and attempted to define tourism, migration and kankei jinkō through the perspectives of weblogs and social media accounts of tourists and migrants. Finally, we talked about rural revitalization policies, agriculture and municipal mergers, and followed policy developments at various levels of government to better understand central-local relations in Japan.

Not only did the students read secondary literature and analyze a variety of primary sources such as videos, websites, white papers, blogs, and social media accounts, but I also asked them to write a post for this blog on a topic they found interesting. In order to get to know the blog and the different topics and perspectives that blog authors have contributed to this blog on urban-rural migration and rural revitalization, I asked them to present three blog posts to the group. As a next step, they drafted their own posts based on the primary sources we analyzed in class or based on their own experiences in rural Japan. Over the next few weeks, we will share their posts on topics as diverse as remote work, foreign residents in rural Japan, art projects in the countryside, spiritual tourism, renovation of abandoned houses, and migration stories to Okinawa.

Since I invited students to contribute to this blog last year, this year’s students were very impressed when they read their peers’ posts. This inspired and motivated them to write their own posts. By incorporating student contributions into this blog, it has become both a resource and a method for teaching about rural Japan. I hope you will enjoy our students’ new posts!

by Nakako Hattori-Ishimaru

Ishigaki-shi, Japan’s southernmost city with a population of about 50,000 people, is located on Ishigaki-jima. The semi-tropical Yaeyama islands, the main island of Okinawa, Tokyo and other areas are connected by this transportation hub, which has attracted tourists and migrants. On the location of a former golf grounds, conservative city mayor Nakayama Yoshitaka claimed in 2016 that he had reached an agreement with the Ministry of Defense to build a new camp for the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF). Ever since, Yamazato Setsuko (born in 1937), a native of the island, has been leading the weekly standing protests against the military facility development. For the members’ average age of 74, the group is named the Ishigaki Grannies’ Society to Protect Life and Livelihood (Ishigaki no kurashi to inochi o mamoru obā tachi no kai). As the name suggests, Yamazato san’s actions go beyond just opposing the establishment of a military base. Years of continuous public protests can be time- and energy- consuming, and even sour relations within small communities. But why does Yamazato san feel the need to engage in peace activism so strongly?

I first learned about Yamazato san through a YouTube video that showed her and her fellow protesters chanting in Ishigaki Port in March 2023. They were protesting against the missiles that had been brought to and installed at the recently constructed Ishigaki Camp without the locals’ permission. In the following year, the documentary film director, Mikami Chie, published the film Ikusa-fumu (The War Clouds), which illustrates how the state-driven fortification efforts since the mid-2010s had gradually and dramatically altered rural societies and landscapes of the southwestern areas of Okinawa, including Ishigaki. Prominent locals are shown in this film, including Yamazato san, who is crucial to native narratives. During my first fieldwork in Okinawa in 2023, I had the opportunity to meet Yamazato san at her home. During a follow-up visit, I attended the documentary film’s premiere screening in Naha. The screening was followed by a talk with the director, where Yamazato san made an appearance as a speaker. Her journey as an activist demonstrates a deep commitment to her native island which runs through her professional endeavors and her personal worldview.

The motivation for Yamazato san’s lifelong commitment to protect island life has been a deep sense of regret. She is from a farming family and after the Pacific War on Ishigaki-jima in 1945, she and her grandmother were the only two survivors of their eight-person family. The years during the post-war American occupation were “another battlefield for survival” (interview with the author in September 2023). Nevertheless, in 1955, she was able to secure a respectable position with the U.S. Military Geology Survey (USGS) as a local field assistant. Leading the survey was female geologist Dr. Helen Foster, who recognized Yamazato san’s strength and appreciated her advice to safeguard the team from natural dangers. In return, the young Yamazato san gained valuable work experiences: She improved her English skills, learned how to collect data, took a jeep to all the creeks on the island and spent some time in Tokyo to finish the colored maps that were to be sent to Washington. Her interests, however, gradually turned towards reviving the traditional lifestyles she had learnt firsthand from her grandmother. These included farming, writing songs in regional ballad forms and recovering the customs of local silk weavers.

In the late 1970s, she was involved in an environmental movement to oppose a plan of new airport construction on the Shiraho Shore, which would have devastated the rich coral reef. While researching the project’s background, she was shocked to discover that the blueprint was based on the geological inquiry she was working on. “I still feel a strong deal of regret for what I did back then. Even though I was working for a salary, I was contributing to a process that would eventually result in the destruction of my native island” (interview with the author in September 2023). She then understood that any significant initiatives for external development on Ishigaki-jima are inevitably linked to military objectives. In 1989, the group appealed to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to lobby the Japanese Government, whereupon construction of the airport was halted but moved to another location on the island. She considers this to be only a partial victory as their ultimate goal was to stop construction completely.

Yamazato san’s lifelong exposures to various foreign institutions gave her profound ideas for protecting her native land. When I asked her to define peace, her answer was clear: the ability to pass on her inherited way of lifestyle and livelihood to future generations. The quality of peace, she is seeking for, is to preserve her ancestral homeland as intact as possible. Developmentalism is often linked to state-led military buildup in order to counteract rural depopulation. On Ishigaki-shi’s 75^th city anniversary, Mayor Nakayama proudly declared in July 2023 that the population had surpassed 50,000, citing the deployment of Camp Ishigaki in addition to general local economic revitalization as the primary drivers (Ryūkyū Shinpō 2023). Countering this dominant discourse of a military-driven economic boom, Yamazato san and her friends warned that the military bases have the potential to take away local autonomy once again. And Yamazato san is aware that many people on the island morally support her group’s protests despite the fact that they appear to be alone when they protest on the street.

References:

Haino, Akira (2022), “Tokushū otome-tachi no sensō 3: Setsu-chan oba no sensō (Special Series: The war of the maidens No.3: Setsuko grandma’s war),” Gekkan YAIMA 334, 6, pp.14-25.

Mikami, Chie (2024), “Ikusa-fumu: Yōsaika suru Okinawa, Shimajima no Kiroku (War clouds: The fortification of Okinawa and its records on the islands),” Tokyo: Shūeisha Shinsho.

Mikami, Chie (2024), “Ikusa-fumu(War Clounds) (Documentary Film)” 2024, https://ikusafumu.jp/ (retrieved on 3 July 2024).

Oaten, James, Lisa McGregor, and Yumi Asada (2003), “There is no end of war for us,“ ABC News, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-02-16/japan-ishigaki-military-base-remilitarisation-counter-china/101869542 (retrieved on 3 July 2024).

Ryūkyū Shinpō,  ”Ishigaki-shi no jinkō ga gomannin o toppa”(The Ishigaki City population has exceeded 50,000)” on 10 July 2023, https://ryukyushimpo.jp/news/entry-1744966.html, (retrieved on 9 July 2024).

Nakako Hattori Ishimaru (nakako.hattori2@fu-berlin.de) is a research assistant at the Institute of Japanese Studies at Freie Universität Berlin (FUB) and a doctoral candidate at the Graduate School of East Asian Studies (GEAS). Her main research interests include international cooperation, welfare states, security politics of Japan, war-peace narratives and collective identity formation. 

It’s very hot in Berlin and our team is going on vacation for a few weeks. The blog will be back up on August 9. Thank you for supporting our blog and our activities. Have a wonderful summer.

Cornelia Reiher

by Cornelia Reiher

The image of rural Japan as a place where people can live in harmony with nature, raise their children in safety and live in a close-knit social community is conveyed through various media. For many urban-rural migrants, images and stories shared by friends or strangers on social media became one of the many incentives to move to the countryside. And when I had to postpone my fieldwork in Japan during the Covid-19 pandemic, the beautiful images of rice fields, picnics, the mountains and the sea shared on social media provided solace and became the object of my longing at the same time.

However, when scrolling through numerous Instagram accounts, I noticed that the depictions of the countryside often were quite similar in style. Most of them adapted to the changing seasons, showing flowers and trees, children and old people as well as everyday scenes. The profiles of businesses were often a mixture of personal stories about their owners and information about the business itself, blurring the line between private and public profiles. As a newcomer to Instagram, I had assumed that most people took the pictures they post themselves, but when I finally went to Japan, I learned two things: first, the fancy pictures on Instagram are a bit prettier than reality. Second, most of the pictures posted on Instagram were taken by professional photographers and carefully curated.

One of the photographers I met is an urban-rural migrant herself. Her work as a freelance photographer made it possible for her to move to the countryside. The other photographer is a young man from one of the cities where I conducted my field research. For him, photography was a way to stay in his hometown and earn a living. Both photograph for local artists, food stores, hostels or farmers, but also take family portraits for special occasions such as weddings or Shichi-Go-San, a traditional Japanese rite of passage and festival for three- and seven-year-old girls, five-year-olds and sometimes three-year-old boys, which takes place every year on November 15 to celebrate the growth and well-being of children.  Many of these images are posted via Instagram, either by their clients or on their own profiles, which also serve to showcase their work and attract new clients.

Yuri (pseudonym) is from Kansai and is in her early 30s. During the pandemic, she was able to work from home and went on “workations.” She visited several places in Japan, including Okinawa, to work. By chance, she met someone who recommended one of my field sites in Kyushu, and she looked at the Instagram profile of an accommodation there. She was fascinated by these pictures, because they gave her a warm feeling and the impression of “being at home.” She immediately contacted the accommodation, visited it twice for a short workation and finally moved there in 2023. Many of her photographs now appear on her hosts’ Instagram profile, she gives lectures on photography and continues to work remotely for a company in Kansai and take freelance photography assignments across Japan.

Takumi (pseudonym) is in his mid-20s and has always lived in his hometown. He decided to attend a university nearby, and when he graduated, he realized that he would like to live and work in his hometown. He has always been interested in photography, but never thought he could earn a living from it. Through contacts with artists, he learned that there are people who live in the countryside but also work for clients in the city and make a living from their art. He got his first commission through a friend, and since then he has been booked by local businesses and families, but also has commissions outside his home prefecture. In addition to his commissioned work, he also photographs the everyday lives of locals and has had several exhibitions showing his work. Many of his photographs are shared on Instagram.

The promotional material provided by rural prefectures and cities aimed at attracting new residents often only reaches a small number of people, but Yuri and Takumi’s pictures on Instagram have a much larger audience. A local government official told me that self-promotion of the experiences of urban-rural migrants in the countryside through social media is much more effective than the videos of local or prefectural governments distributed through YouTube or their official websites. For Yuri, who was attracted to the countryside by images others shared on Instagram, and who now produces and shares such images herself, this is the magic of social media.

by Anne-Sophie L. König

The cold was slowly creeping through my jeans on a cold February day in 2023 as I tried to keep my balance sitting on a bridge railing, while writing down field notes. I had just come from an hour-long interview with the chairman of the village assembly of Minamiyamashiro in Kyōto Prefecture and I did not want to forget anything he had said. As part of my doctoral thesis on the phenomenon of candidate shortage (narite busoku) in local elections, I wanted to find out why there is a shortage of candidates in all towns in the area except for Minamiyamashiro.

I first came across Minamiyamashiro when I checked the voter turnout in the towns and villages of Kyōto Prefecture during my research stay in Japan from 2022 to 2023. Looking at the map of Kyōto municipalities, I noticed a pattern. The shape of the prefecture looks like a European dragon, with Kyōtango city in the southwest as the dragon’s head, then in the stubby tail that stretches far into the mountains between Nara, Shiga and Mie prefectures in the northeast lies Sōraku district with Minamiyamashiro. In this spur, there are a number of towns where uncontested elections were held due to a lack of candidates, and at the border of the prefecture is Minamiyamashiro, the outlier. Between 2011 and 2024, there were five uncontested elections in Ide, one in Wazuka, four in Kasagi, while in Minamiyamashiro, voter turnout was between 69 and 81 percent over the same period. I found that strange. Why does the village furthest from the urban center have such a high voter turnout, while the neighboring communities struggle to hold an election at all? This is why I decided to contact all municipalities, and went to Minamiyamashiro and Kasagi for interviews. I reached the municipalities via train in about 2 and a half hours from Demachiyanagi station in Kyōto. In Kizu I boarded a cute little train running once every hour. Historically, all of the towns and the village focused on agriculture and forestry. One famous export product was tea, but tea production and agriculture remained as a main industry only in Minamiyamashiro. From the train following the flow of Kizu river the change from rice paddies to steep tea plantations is clearly visible. In summer, the producers offer a tea plantation experience with a guided tour through the processing facilities.

In Kasagi, many people began to commute to the larger town of Kizu or further afield to work in the industry. Ecotourism also gained traction with a larger campground and climbing areas at the famous boulders located at the mouth of a gorge carved by the Kizu River. Kasagi used to have a different clientele, as evidenced by the closed onsen hotel uphill from the boulders, but those days sadly seem to be over. There is a good network of hiking trails in the mountains that follow the stream of Kizu River, and on winter mornings you have a breathtaking view of the so-called unkai – the sea of clouds – that covers the valley. When I climbed up to Kasagi Temple, the sun was bright in the sky and I could clearly see Kasagi from above. The temple is really worth a visit because of the impressively large Buddhas carved in stone and the beautiful rock formations.

In the low season, the communities in Sōraku are a little short of cafés and restaurants. This is why I decided to start writing down my field notes on a bridge in the cold February. Later, I found food and a warm spot in a bentō delivery store run by a U-turn migrant who used to work for the Kyōto city government. He wanted to leave the bustling city and do something meaningful in his hometown. After work, he sat down with me while I ate and talked about life and politics in the village and in Sōraku district. He did not understand why his fellow villagers were so fired up at election time. Instead, he showed me some footage from the local TV station about migrants like him and pointed out that it’s not just about politics and tourism. Apart from his bentō business that caters to administration, tea producers and the elderly, there were some recent college graduates who had set up a wildlife farm to capitalize on the new culinary trends in the Kansai region. He wondered if people in Minamiyamashiro are simply more invested in village politics, as they are mostly tea farmers. Working and living in the same place as opposed to commuting, he assumes, naturally creates interest in affairs village.

In my doctoral thesis, I will dig deeper into the puzzle of the Sōraku district. As the district’s municipalities are quite small and their population is only in the low four-digit range. Therefore, the lack of candidates for political positions is a major problem. However, the communities are not only interesting case studies for my dissertation, the visit there also gave me interesting insights into life in the countryside, the challenges faced by the communities and the unpredictability of fieldwork. I can highly recommend a visit if you are interested in rural Japan, as the district is easily accessible even without a car. Moreover, if I somehow tickled your interest in the candidate shortage issue, I recommend staying tuned for my doctoral thesis!

References:

Seijiyama Minamiyamashiro (2024), Minamiyamashiro, https://seijiyama.jp/lgov/26/263672/

Kasagidera (2024), Kasagidera Temple, https://kasagidera.net/  

Anne-Sophie L. König is a doctoral candidate in Japanese Studies at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München and a research associate in the DFG project “Demography and Democracy: How Population Ageing Changes Democracy – The Example of Japan”. Her research interests include politics in Japan with a focus on democracy studies and local politics. She can be reached at an.koenig@lmu.de.

by Lise Sasaki

In a rapidly ageing and depopulating society, Japanese women are facing unprecedented challenges to maintain their economic and social status. Their situation has worsened due to the increase in female unemployment in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Exacerbated by the pandemic, derailing career paths are typical experiences for women in Japanese society. On top of this, political and societal pressure to perform as working women and to fix the declining birth rate can be overwhelming for many women. In 2018, my engagement as a research assistant led me to Tosa-chō in Kōchi Prefecture, where domestic migrants (ijūsha), among them many women, have settled, started families and developed a sense of belonging. In a rapidly depopulating post-pandemic Japan, where women face the brunt of economic decline and are less likely than ever before to start families, I have been eager to understand why migrants move to rural areas to raise children. 

Tosa-chō is a town in Kochi Prefecture with about 3,500 residents. 40% of the population is aged 65 or older, and the population has declined by 50% over the past 40 years to 3,803 people (Tosa-chō 2020). This rural mountainous area is remote, with the nearest city, Kōchi City, one hour away. Tosa-chō’s population is widely scattered across the town’s 15 districts.Some of the more remote villages have fewer than 15 inhabitants. It is almost impossible to access some of these villages without a car, as they are located deep in the mountains, far away from the more populated villages in the valley. It can take more than one hour by car from some of these villages to a public facility such as a post office or town hall.

I have become close with a few ijūsha women who have moved to Tosa-chō for various reasons like seeking refuge after the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011, pursuing serenity amidst the pressures of urban living, and desiring healing within the lush green and the flowing waters of Tosa-chō. The town is known to have one of the most beautiful rivers in the country. While none of these ijūsha women expressed they had ‘lost’ themselves in their past urban city lives, it seemed Tosa-chō served as an avenue to cultivate an identity they were in search of. It became evident that their sense of belonging was nurtured through strong interpersonal connections. Ijūsha women viewed rural lifestyles as ideal, and while they envisioned a hybrid, tranquil lifestyle, they set out to connect to the land and the locals. This ideal life was most evident when I observed their kitchens, where migrant women chose old-fashioned kitchens over contemporary system kitchens. Utilizing the Kamado (Furnace Stoves) instead of gas stoves and handed down wooden cabinets instead of contemporary all-in-one cabinets exemplified their carefully constructed living spaces and atmospheres through cooking and homemaking.

Embraced warmly by older residents of the town, the newcomers are initiated into a culture rooted in communal care and mutual support, exemplified by practices such as osusowake (sharing food) and village rituals. I wondered whether their quest for belonging extended beyond mere communal ties to encompass a more profound yearning for love, nurturance and care bestowed by others. A recent conversation with a close friend who moved to Tosa-chō ten years ago to raise her children emphasized the importance of physical closeness in experiencing love. For her, love is felt deeply when you can touch and feel it, so that you sense intimacy and warmth. “In cities,” she said, “where is the time for each of us to feel this warmth between us?” In an increasingly digitalized society, she believes the virtual world somehow lacks emotional connection, perhaps because it is a physically individual activity that is not shared. But in Tosa-chō, the human-to-human connection remained and she was able to experience physical connections and empathy every day. At the same time, she also pointed out the tensions between the young ijūsha and the locals: “I love it here, I really do … but now that I’ve been here for almost 10 years, I sometimes feel the need to breathe.”  This statement and my own experiences in Tosa-chō made me think about the permanence of these social bonds. I experienced the rapid spread of information by word of mouth myself. If I ran into a friend at the market, a mutual friend would often check in with me a few minutes later and kindly remind me that the vegetables I had bought were cheaper at the farmer’s market three miles away. Stories and information seemed to spread faster and further, and I remember a sense of invasion of my personal space. Against this backdrop, I am curious to explore how ijūsha women achieve a balance between connectedness and autonomy as they navigate the complexities of belonging in Tosa-chō. I am particularly interested in the shifting forms of belonging in this digitalized society, to explore the ways in which rural life is dissolving into new ways of living that provide a sense of healing for ijūsha women.

References

Kōchi Prefecture Tosa-chō Home Page (2020). Tosa chō. Retrieved from http://www.town.tosa.kochi.jp/ Last accessed May 2024.

Lise Sasaki is a freelance researcher who has worked on projects at UCL Anthropology and Osaka University. Her research explores the redefinition of female identity and its implications for motherhood in contemporary Japan.