Figure 1: From the Japan Times, by Chris Mackenzie, Jan 20th, 2009 (Priestly, 2009).
Since the time of
the Meiji emperor and modernisation in the late nineteenth century, Japan has
experienced rapid change. Socially, the
move from feudal to industrial society, including great change for the 侍samurai class,
resulted in changes for the peasants of Japan too. Some considered that Japan became a classless
society by the twentieth century with an homogenous and thoroughly ‘Japanese’
middle class (Mouer and Sugimoto, 1986).
Certainly, for an
outsider, the social breakdown of Japan can be perceived to be largely middle
class and people from one place to another not dissimilar. However, by considering the group of people
known as 部落 buraku post-war, and later
the more non-descript 同和地区 dowa chiku, it is
possible to demonstrate that such homogeneity is not actually the situation for
all Japanese people. Scratch a little
further under the surface and you can see that the Japanese are actually as
varied and diverse in background as just about any national group in the twenty
first century.
It is no surprise
that even the reforms of the Meiji late nineteenth century era did not result
in equal human rights for all citizens of Japan. The indigenous Ainu, and the minorities of Chinese, Korean or Brazilian background
peoples are other socially discriminated groups in Japanese recent history. In
this essay, though, I will illustrate the diversity of Japanese society by
reference to the (originally low caste) group known as the burakumin. This essay will
consider the origins of the buraku, a
range of views about this group, including an experienced ‘invisibility’, the
variety of names used, current levels of discrimination, and finally a
potential resolution to the problems experienced.
The origin of the buraku: ‘穢多Eta’, the ‘unclean’
So where did this
social grouping, later known as dowa
mondai or burakumin, emerge
from? Who are this group and how many
live in Japan? This issue emerged from a
very particular understanding of purity and impurity from times past. 穢れ(汚れ[2]) Kegare is a reference to impurity, which
is caused by coming in touch with ‘death’ or ‘impure’ arts, such as leather
work and eating animals. According to
Jansen (2000), the hereditary eta were
the largest historic subcaste group.
They were popularly associated with death and defilement. Occupations included slaughtering, tanning
and fashioning leather, executions and disposals of corpses. Buddhism had a role in this understanding of
purity, with this notion of kegare, as
pollution, or impurity. People who had
been touched by kegare were to be
avoided. This attested to the ‘un-touchability’
of certain groups within Japanese society from historic times (Amos,
2011). Prior to the Meiji Restoration, this
people group were known as 穢多eta, literally, “filthy mass”. As time went on, they were called other
names.
The Meiji
restoration instigated a formally structured pattern of separate identity,
including the separation of farmers and samurai,
and registration of the population at the Buddhist institutions (Jansen, 2000,
122). On August 28th, 1871,
the Council of State put out an ‘Emancipation Edict’, “The titles of Eta and 非人 Hinin shall be abolished; and henceforth the people
belonging to these classes shall be treated in the same manner both in
occupation and social standing as the common people (平民heimin)” (Emily Reber, 1998; Ito, 2005). However, at the time, there were up to 21
incidents of riots, and Ito has outlined a massacre of burakumin (though they would not have been known by this name at
the time) in Okayama Prefecture in
1873, two years following the proclamation (2005)[i].
Thereafter, despite
the ‘Emancipation Edict’, discrimination continued in the realms of marriage,
housing, social behaviour and occupation.
An invisibility, or avoidance and corresponding taboo within Japanese
society, was projected on the buraku,
whilst their settlements tended to cluster at the outskirts of villages and
towns.
Post world war
II, the only use of the term eta, was
for anonymous decrying or persecution of the buraku groups. Officially,
the term for areas where the buraku could
be found was again to change to be often called abstractly, ‘同和地区dowa
chiku’ (discriminated area), or sometimes still buraku or burakumin. Dowa
mondai, meaning ‘discrimination problem’, dispelled the old names and could
be said to devalue the problem to be invisible. Dowa chiku is an idea rooted in the idea of national integration,
‘unnaming’ those seen as socially different (Amos, 2011).
In 1965, a
Deliberative Council Report acknowledged considerable discrimination, including
poverty, prejudice and neglect of civil, social and economic human rights
(McLaughlan, 2003). Following this in the 1970s and 1980s, conditions in buraku areas improved as a result of ‘Special
Measures Legislation’, which included extensive funding.
Current views on the buraku
Post war, the dowa mondai label served to make this
problem less visible in society, and gradually the buraku[ii]
or burakumin terms have been used less
and less within Japan, becoming taboo in a similar way to the more slanderous eta.
Therefore, when a May 17, 1996 official report from the government on
the status of buraku mondai, called
for a 部落開放基本労 buraku kaihou kihon rou, or
Fundamental Law for Buraku Liberation, the Japanese Communist Party and two
thirds of the Liberal Democratic Party stated their opposition to this law. Their considered reasons were the following:
‘1.
There is no more discrimination
2. If
a law concerning buraku discrimination is passed, discrimination will always
remain.’ Others said at the time: ‘This
type of law which specially entitles burakumin to reap certain government
benefits antagonizes the citizens in general’ (Reber, 1998).
This contradictory
statement is testament to the reasons for the continuing invisibility of this
problem in Japanese society.
Changing titles: same discrimination
Should you
mention the name burakumin today in
Japan, it is quite possible that the person you meet will have little to tell
you about them. It may be that it is
perceived as an embarrassing or even offensive topic (Emily Reber, 1998), in
the mode of the responses to the suggested liberative law above. Because buraku
are physically indistinguishable from other Japanese citizens, and many
people consider that the majority of discrimination has been removed, it is not
uncommon to believe this problem would disappear completely if only people
would stop talking about it.
寝た子はそのまま。Neta
ko wa sono mama ‘Don’t wake a sleeping baby’
The above proverb
sums up this way of thinking. To not
wake a baby, as in the above familiar Japanese saying, is to ignore and do
nothing about buraku mondai and in
this way to avoid any problem (Reber, 1998).
Unfortunately, this has not reduced discrimination. Instead, a high level of misunderstanding
regarding the history and identity of buraku
has resulted.
Similar to the
Australian experience where expectations that immigrants should ‘assimilate’
into society are common, in Japan, buraku
have been expected to ‘integrate’, or forgo their own identity and become a
part of greater Japanese society. The
assumption is that the buraku experience
is not ‘inferior’ or ‘not good enough’, especially if their ancestry is made
known. Actually, a place where people
are unable to announce their ancestry without concern for negative reactions or
issues as a result, is a place where discrimination is apparent (Reber, 1998). Integration in this context is at the cost of
individual and buraku identity. It would seem that there is a need for a
reclamation of the buraku name and
identity.
21st Century buraku discrimination
Discrimination
continues into the twenty first century. Buraku discrimination includes human
rights violations such as slanderous graffiti, marriage discrimination and
employment discrimination (Burakukaiho 2004 and Teraki and Noguchi, 2001, cited
in Takuya Ito, 2005). In 2001,
McLaughlan conducted research in a buraku
in Osaka, interviewing 21 residents who had experienced prejudice and
discrimination. Nineteen out of the
interviewees thought that the problems of prejudice would not be solved in the
following one hundred years (2003).
In May 2003, when
Uramoto Yoshifumi, researcher and activist at the Buraku Liberation League
(BLL), received numerous packages in the mail marked ‘pay on delivery’,
followed by dozens of handwritten postcards in Japanese, some containing
threats such as: ‘For an eta, Uramoto
is pretty arrogant. I’ll kill him’ (Amos, 2011). Eventually, the protagonist of these letters
and packages was caught and tried.
The 2008 Academy
Award winning, Japanese film, “Okuribito”
or “Departures” (Rojiro Takita) did not explicitly name burakumin, but it is the story of an out
of work young man, who, in a country town, overcomes his fear of death and
works in a job which would once have been only done by buraku people. His work as
an assistant in a funeral home is considered shameful to family and friends.
Figure 2:
Another fascinating example of
the prevalence and/or sensitivity to this discrimination emerged recently upon Google
Earth’s culturally unconsidered publishing of a map in relation to buraku neighbourhoods. Google Earth caused a furore in Japan, by
posting maps to its historical online section in 2008 (see Figure 2 for an
example from Osaka), sourced from the University of California, and a
collector, David Rumsey. There was a
considerable backlash to Google Earth, due to the subsequent revelations of burakumin areas in Osaka and Tokyo
(Huffington Post, 2-5-2009). By
identifying some areas as burakumin using
the offensive term eta, Google was
potentially contributing to discrimination, because people who live in a
particular area of Osaka could be identified by their address as burakumin. This would potentially lead
to workplace and marital discrimination, and other social ostracism. In the end Google removed the maps. A neighbourhood near Asakusa, for example,
was identified in these maps as an ‘Eta’
village.
Figure 2: A David Rumsey map, overlaid over a Google Map of
Osaka (Woodblock, 1806), accessed online, 24th July, 2012.
Different views about the ‘Dowa’ or ‘Buraku’ problem?
Solutions to this
level of discrimination are controversial.
The two major liberation groups have been consistently in conflict with
each other. Whilst the BKD or 部落開放同盟 buraku
kohei domei, have had aggressive strategies of
publicity and confrontation, the Zenkairen (All
Japan Federation of Buraku Liberation) has since the 1970s preferred to avoid
conflict and take a softer approach. Whilst
the BKD has frequently said that the Zenkairen does not believe in a problem,
this is not actually the case. Reber
talks of the need for the two groups to be more conciliatory and to work
together for the cause of the buraku. In effect, in some cases, the government
has only recognised buraku under the
BKD banner and therefore other buraku people
have missed out on equal participation in new initiatives. Perhaps there is a middle road and the two
groups can learn from each other.
Reclaiming a buraku heritage Figure 3
It is the taiko drums of Japan (Figure 1 and 3)
that suggest this path to the future. Recently,
Japan’s taiko drums have come to symbolise more than a rallying call to the
Japanese to be patriotic. They have come,
in themselves, in some parts of Japan, to represent this (sometimes) proud
minority, the burakumin. This is, of course, because the making of the
taiko drums is a leather work, which is a work undertaken by the burakumin peoples. Japan’s famous taiko drums, made with
leather, were originally, of course, made by the lower caste group, the burakumin, or eta, those who had to deal with animal skins and dead animal parts. Today, the Naniwa buraku community in Osaka celebrates its history by an avenue lined
with showcases of leather production and taiko drums, as well as seats shaped
like taiko. The road leads to the Osaka
Human Rights Museum, where the human rights struggle, which the buraku community has participated in, is
celebrated (Ian Priestly, 2009). Also,
positively, the physical environment of many buraku areas, including apartments and schools have been improved
considerably, benefitting from special funds from the government.
The buraku liberation league has supported attempts
to reclaim the name, buraku, although
its cause was not helped early this century when one of its main leaders was
linked to ヤクザ yakuza gangster[3] corruption
(Johnston, 2006). Still, the buraku name is certainly more visible in
Osaka.
The Future
Whilst the Meiji
restoration made moves to deal with the discrimination problem, outlawing in
name a general class of people, other names emerged and the discrimination
problem evolved and changed over time. Strongly
held views on kegare, or impurity
have remained strong in the 21st century and taboos about the buraku people have continued to
reverberate into discrimination. The
goal of the Buraku Liberation League in particular, has been to restore a sense
of pride amongst the burakumin, that
their history is actually of importance and that staying silent (and shameful)
about it is not the only response. It is
to be hoped that the buraku people
and groups can develop a sense of unity in this reclamation of visibility in
Japanese society, transcending history. A
sense of pride for the buraku people
is shown by the avenue of taiko drum,
a belief in human rights and a shared consciousness with other oppressed
minorities around the world. Rather than
simply disappearing, perhaps the buraku will
come to represent Japan’s new future.
REFERENCES
Amos, Timothy D., (2011), Embodying difference: The making of
Burakumin in Modern Japan, Honolulu, University of Hawaii Press.
De Vos, George, William O Wetherall and
Kaye Stearman, (1983), Japan’s
Minorities: Burakumin, Koreans, Ainu and Okinawans, 3rd Edition,
London, Minorities Rights Group.
Goto, Masaru, Portraits of Japan’s Outcaste People, www.masarugoto.com, accessed, 31st
July, 2012, includes downloadable pdf file.
Huffington Post, (2nd May,
2009), ‘Old Japanese maps on google’, accessed online 24th July,
2012.
Ito, Takuya, (October 31st,
2005), ‘Cooperativeness and Buraku Discrimination.’ Electronic
Journal of Contemporary Japanese Studies, Discussion Paper 5, http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/
Jansen, Marius, (2000), The Making of Modern Japan, London,
Harvard University Press.
Johnston, Eric, (2006), ‘Activist’s arrest
lays bare yakuza’s ties with burakumin’, Japan Times online, http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20060713f1.html, accessed 17th August, 2012.
McLaughlan, Alastair, (January 31, 2003) ‘Solving
Anti-Burakujumin Prejudice in the 21st
Century: suggestions from 21 Buraku Residents’,
Electronic Journal of Contemporary
Japanese studies, Discussion Paper 1, http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/
Mouer, Ross, and Yoshio Sugimoto, (1986) Images of
Japanese Society: A Study on the Structure of Social Reality. London and
New York, Kegan Paul International.
Priestley, Ian (January 20, 2009), ‘Breaking
the silence on burakumin’, Japan Times Online, accessed 13th
July, 2012.
Reber, Emily A.S., (1998), ‘Buraku mondai in Japan: Historical and
Modern Perspectives and Directions for the Future: From the perspective of an
American Researcher’, Dowa Mondai
Kenkyuu: 20 (45-62), Osaka, Osaka City University.
Rumsey, David, ‘Japanese Historical Maps’,
(2002) http://www.davidrumsey.com/japan/view.html, accessed 31st July, 2012,
University of California.
[1] On first
introduction of a Japanese word, for the purposes of this essay, I have
included Japanese Kanji, as this is a useful reference point for those who have
Japanese/and to some extent Chinese proficiency. Because many of these words are
taboo as I have mentioned, it is not possible to input the phonetic reading
into a Japanese keyboard and automatically produce the Kanji, rather you need
to input the kanji one at a time.
[3] However, many
slanderous links have been made to yakuza
over the years, and a quick scan of internet sources pulls these up, which
are very often unverified. Eg. http://factsanddetails.com/japan.php?itemid=634&catid=18, accessed, 18th August,
2012.
[i] “They
made the captured Burakumin prostrate
themselves and write letters of apology. They persistently chased the Burakumin who tried to escape to
a nearby mountain. When they found the Burakumin on the mountain, they killed them with bamboo
spears and pushed a woman, who was carrying a baby on her back, off the
mountain. Eighteen people were killed, and thirteen people were injured, 263
houses were burnt down, and 51 houses were destroyed in the riot. From a social
psychological perspective, such a crowd is called an 'aggressive mob' (Abe
1977: 128-151). When the farmers started rioting, they sent letters to other
farmers who did not participate in the riot. This was a forceful demand for
'cooperativeness'. Under these circumstances, can the discriminators still
assert that is the Burakumin who
are 'dreadful', that 'the Burakumin attack
in a group', or that 'the Burakumin are
unpredictable people'? In fact, the dreadful people are not the Burakumin themselves but the
people who project their shadow onto the Burakumin”. (Ito, 2005)
[ii] Buraku was an administrative term for a ‘neighbourhood’,
which came to be a reference to
areas of low-caste groups post-war.
