Japanese Language and Soft Power in Asia PDF

Edited by Kayoko Hashimoto
Japanese Language
and Soft Power in Asia
Japanese Language and Soft Power in Asia
Kayoko Hashimoto
Editor
Japanese Language
and Soft Power in Asia
Editor
Kayoko Hashimoto
The University of Queensland
School of Languages and Cultures
Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
ISBN 978-981-10-5085-5 ISBN 978-981-10-5086-2 (eBook)

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017945666
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of
translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now
known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information
in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the
publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to
the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The
publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and
institutional affiliations.
Cover illustration: © Thoth_Adan
Printed on acid-free paper
This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature

The registered company is Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
The registered company address is: 152 Beach Road, #21-01/04 Gateway East, Singapore
189721, Singapore
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Japanese Language and Soft Power in Asia is a cross-disciplinary work by

international scholars who generously agreed to contribute chapters to
this book. Without a collaborative effort, this book would not exist. I am
extremely grateful to all of the contributors not only for embarking on this
challenging task but also for their willingness to share their expertise and
insights. Some of the chapter authors are emerging scholars who are full
of new ideas and enthusiasm about research in their fields, and it was very
rewarding for me to work with them as an editor. Looking back, I can trace
the beginning of my journey to develop the concept for this book to Gerry
Groot’s conference presentation on China’s soft power at the 2014 ASAA
Conference in Perth. It is great to have Groot’s chapter in this book. I first
met some of the other contributors during my research trip to Japan in
2013 to conduct a survey on native-speakerism in Japanese language teach-
ing. Their openness to my research and willingness to share their views and
experience encouraged me to further develop the concept for this book.
I thank Sara Crowley Vigneau, senior editor at Palgrave Macmillan,
who invited me to submit a book proposal when she saw our round-table
panel in the conference programme of ICAS 9 in Adelaide. I also thank
the School of Languages and Cultures at The University of Queensland
for their encouragement and financial support for this project. Lastly,
I wish to express my gratitude to Anne Platt for her professional copyedit-
ing as well as her unwavering encouragement and support for my work.
Brisbane Kayoko Hashimoto
v
CONTENTS
1 Introduction: Why Language Matters in Soft Power 1

Kayoko Hashimoto
Part I Cool Japan and Japan’s Soft Power 13
2 Cool Japan Versus the China Threat: Does Japan’s

Popular Culture Success Mean More Soft Power? 15
Gerry Groot
3 Cool Japan and Japanese Language: Why Does

Japan Need “Japan Fans”? 43
Kayoko Hashimoto
Part II Japanese Language and the Historical

Construction of Asia 63
4 Japanese Language Education in the Greater

East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere and the Kokuji Mondai
(National Script Problem) 65
Astghik Hovhannisyan
vii
viii CONTENTS
5 Media and Cultural Policy and Japanese Language

Education in Japanese-Occupied Singapore, 1942–1945 83
Masakazu Matsuoka
Part III Japanese Language Teaching in Asia 103
6 Japanese Language for Trainee Nurses from Asia:

The EPA Scheme as a Missed Opportunity 105
Rika Kusunoki
7 The Roles of Native Japanese Speaker Teachers

in Japanese Language Programmes at High
Schools in South Korea, Indonesia and Thailand 123
Kaoru Kadowaki
8 Japanese Pop Culture as a Motivating

Factor for Japanese Language Learners in Qatar 141
Aiko Nemoto
Part IV Japanese Language and Learners’ Empowerment 157
9 Japanese Language in the Wake of Hong Kong’s

Umbrella Movement: Is It a Form of Soft Power? 159
Kazuyuki Nomura and Takako Mochizuki
10 Accessing the Soft Power of Japanese Language

in Australia: Young Korean Migrants Studying
Japanese as a Foreign Language 179
Esther Lovely
Index 201
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Gerry Groot Department of Asian Studies, The University of Adelaide,

Adelaide, SA, Australia
Kayoko Hashimoto School of Languages and Cultures, The University of
Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
Astghik Hovhannisyan Graduate School of Language and Society,
Hitotsubashi University, Kunitachi, Tokyo, Japan
Kaoru Kadowaki Faculty of Foreign Studies, Setsunan University,
Neyagawa, Osaka, Japan
Rika Kusunoki School of Languages and Cultures, The University of
Esther Lovely School of Languages and Cultures, The University of
Masakazu Matsuoka Graduate School of Language and Society,
Hitotsubashi University, Kunitachi, Tokyo, Japan
Takako Mochizuki Language Centre, Hong Kong Baptist University,
Kowloon Tong, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Aiko Nemoto Centre for Global Communication Strategies, The University
of Tokyo, Meguro, Tokyo, Japan
Kazuyuki Nomura Department of Japanese Studies, The Chinese University
of Hong Kong, Sha Tin, New Territories, Hong Kong
ix
LIST OF FIGURES
Fig. 9.1 Fans of Japanese culture often form communities

to interact with one another and exchange information.
The young Hongkongers in the photograph are promoting
a society for Japanese culture at a local university, displaying
posters with messages in Japanese. The society has around
400 members. Photograph by Kazuyuki Nomura,
January 2017 168
Fig. 9.2 Protesters set up tents on a main avenue in Admiralty,
the central district in which the government headquarters,
the Legislative Council, and the Court of Final Appeal
are located (left). Because bus routes were altered to
bypass the occupied areas, signs such as “temporary stop”
(upper right) and “special incident” (lower right) became part
of everyday life during the Umbrella Movement. Photograph
by Kazuyuki Nomura, October 2014 170
xi
LIST OF TABLES
Table 3.1 Q4&5: Descriptions of Japan and Japanese people 46

Table 3.2 Areas of interest about Japan 47
Table 3.3 Interest in Japanese culture 49
Table 3.4 Motivation for studying Japanese language: Mexico
and South Africa 50
Table 3.5 Reasons for studying Japanese language: ASEAN countries 51
Table 7.1 Number of Japanese language learners 125
Table 7.2 TT by NNJST and NJST in South Korea, Thailand
and Indonesia 130
xiii
CHAPTER 1
Introduction: Why Language

Matters in Soft Power
Kayoko Hashimoto
Since the 1990s, research on language policy has focused on examining and
interpreting language policies within their historical, political, economic,
social, and cultural contexts (Tollefson 2013). Globalisation has brought
fundamental changes in many aspects of the nation-state, society, and indi-
vidual lives, often challenging traditional values and social orders. The
spread of English, facilitated by globalisation, has had a tremendous impact
on non–English-speaking countries in Asia. The responses and struggles
of these countries to the face of the rapid spread of English as the lingua
franca have been studied in terms of identity (Tsui and Tollefson 2007),
medium of instruction (Hamid et al. 2014), and education (Baldauf et al.
2012; Kirkpatrick and Sussex 2012). Tollefson (2013, 308–9) argues that
when national and cultural identities weaken and traditional forms of state
decision-making collapse, people often turn to ethnolinguistic nationalism
to protect themselves or to regain a sense of belonging. This has been the
case in Japan, which hovers between a commitment to globalisation and a
reassertion of patriotic nationalism.
K. Hashimoto (*)
School of Languages and Cultures, The University of Queensland,
Brisbane, QLD, Australia
© The Author(s) 2018 1

K. Hashimoto (ed.), Japanese Language and Soft Power in Asia,
DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_1
2 K. HASHIMOTO
Since the Japanese government acknowledged the impact of globalisation

for the first time in a White Paper in 2001,1 the government’s approach to
the teaching of English as a foreign language (TEFL) has been designed
to ensure that the language of this new order that is a product of globali-
sation does not undermine the core identity of the nation and its people
(Hashimoto 2009). In other words, Japan’s promotion of English has been
based on a negative view of globalisation, which it is feared will have unwel-
come consequences such as large-scale immigration and greater use of
languages other than Japanese within Japanese society. This reflects a per-
sistent denial of the need to learn English in the name of resisting English
imperialism (Tsuda 1993; Se 2015), but as Yasuda (2016) points out, such
opinions tend to be based on the nationalistic view that Japanese language
has been constructed solely by people whose mother tongue is Japanese.
In comparison to Japan’s “English education,” which has been a hotly
debated topic among Japanese people and has been extensively researched
by scholars within and outside Japan for the past 30 years, Japanese lan-
guage teaching for foreigners is a relatively new field. Japan has regulated
the national language and formulated various policies on foreign nation-
als, but has not developed a language policy that defines the roles of lan-
guages, levels of proficiency, the individual right to access to languages,
or the government’s responsibility to support language learning. This lack
of government initiatives has also been addressed in studies on Japan’s
multilingualism (Yasuda 2011; Carroll 2012). When there is no national
language policy, other official avenues such the Course of Study for school
education become binding forces in determining curricula. According to
the Course of Study, Japan’s TEFL paradoxically takes place within the
broader framework of the promotion of Japanese language (Hashimoto
2013a). Or, as Liddicoat (2013, 208) puts it, learning to articulate
Japanese ideas in Japanese language forms a necessary basis for the learn-
ing of foreign languages, and this requires an international audience for
the dissemination of Japan’s distinctiveness. One such international audi-
ence could be Japanese language learners, who are seen in a rather instru-
mental way as “Japanese language human resources” by the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs (MOFA), as discussed in Chap. 3 of this volume. In other
words, there has been a close relationship between TEFL in Japan and
Japanese language teaching for foreigners.
More than a decade ago, Nye (2004) pointed out that Japan’s weak-
ness in languages made it difficult for Japan to exercise its soft power. He
observed that Japanese language was not widely spoken around the world
INTRODUCTION: WHY LANGUAGE MATTERS IN SOFT POWER 3
and Japan’s English language skills ranked among the worst in Asia, which
made it hard for it to attract international talent to universities when Japan
began to face demographic issues brought about by the ageing population
and its historical resistance to immigration (Nye 2004, 87). The situation
has not changed since that time: the English proficiency of Japanese peo-
ple has remained low (The Japan Times 25 March 2013; The Japan Times
28 March 2015), and Japanese language is spoken as an official or common
language only in Japan, although it has been a popular additional language
to learn in some parts of the world, particularly in Asia and Oceania.2
Nye praised Japan, however, for its successful exchange programme that
develops lasting relationships with key individuals, which is one dimension
of public diplomacy. This was a reference to the so-called Japan Exchange
and Teaching (JET) Programme that brings “6,000 young foreigners each
year from 40 countries to teach their languages in Japanese schools, with
an alumni association to maintain the bonds of friendship that are devel-
oped” (2004, 109–10).
In fact, the JET Programme provides an interesting example of the
role of language in cultural diplomacy or as an aspect of soft power. The
programme—its official Japanese name is 語学指導等を行う外国青年招致
事業 [lit. project to host foreign youth who conduct language teaching]—
was introduced in 1987 as an MOFA initiative. Under the programme,
ALTs (assistant language teachers, although the official title of the posi-
tion in Japanese is 外国語指導助手 [lit. foreign language teaching assis-
tants], rather than teachers) are employed by the government and sent
to local public schools. This might well be a successful model for Japan’s
diplomacy from MOFA’s perspective, as Nye observed, but various prob-
lems have arisen with the programme as a provider of native speakers of
English to local schools (McConnell 2008; Hashimoto 2013b). In the
internal budgetary review process in 2010, it was pointed out that the
ambiguous relationship between language education and international
exchange had resulted in an ineffective practice of accepting ALTs who
did not possess language teaching qualifications, as well as in creating a
gap between the provider (MOFA) and the recipients (local governments
and schools) in terms of the selection of ALTs—MOFA sought diver-
sity, while schools preferred ALTs from the UK and the USA (Hashimoto
2013b). The employment of unqualified English native speakers without
Japanese language skills was a compromise that allowed Japanese teach-
ers to retain control in the classroom (Aspinall 2013), but the concept of
team teaching, which evolved under these circumstances as co-teaching
4 K. HASHIMOTO
by a non-native English teacher (Japanese national) and an ALT (native

speaker of English), has presented problems for both Japanese teachers
and ALTs, as it does not recognise either of them as independent teach-
ers with their own skills (Glasgow 2014). This form of team teaching,
however, has also been extended to Japanese language teaching overseas,
as reported in Chap. 7 of this volume. The case of the JET Programme
demonstrates that measurement of the success of exchange programmes
designed to develop friendships requires careful examination, particularly
where language teaching is concerned—it inevitably involves various play-
ers such as teachers, learners, parents, schools, communities, and local and
central governments, and the power relationships between them.
The term soft power itself is appealing partly because its positive image
allows subjective interpretations by governments. Nye (2011, 99) lists
basic sources of soft power, including “culture, values, legitimate poli-
cies, a positive domestic model, a successful economy, and a competent
military,” which Chitty (2017, 2) summarises as the standard categories—
cultural, economic, ethical, legal, military, and political. However, as Sun
(2013) points out, the tendency to equate soft power with popular cul-
ture, based on an assumed metamorphosis from culture to power, has
been overwhelming, and this is the case in Japan. In fact, the Ministry of
Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) presented
a rather limited view of soft and hard power in its 2004 proposal on inter-
national strategies (see Chap. 3 in this volume); in its proposal, all ele-
ments of soft power were cultural, while economic power was seen as hard
power. In the description of Japanese culture, Japanese language was not
mentioned. Then, in 2011, MOFA suddenly defined Japan’s soft power
as the creative power of Cool Japan and the power of Japanese culture,
including Japanese language. Does this indicate a departure from the “bad
memories of imperial Japan’s imposition of its language on its colonies”
(Watanabe 2017)? As many studies of Japanese diplomacy point out (Cull
2008; Iwabuchi 2015), Japan’s diplomacy has been heavily focused on
“exchange” or “trade,” and as a consequence, Japan has not been par-
ticularly adept at engaging directly with local people or considering the
“recipient context” (Sun 2013). If mutually beneficial relations are impor-
tant, as Brown (2017) stresses in describing the language of influence
in France and Germany, what does Japanese language offer? Is Japanese
language the language of influence in Asia, and if not, is Japan making an
effort to make this happen?
PREVIEW OF CHAPTERS
This book is an enquiry into the role Japanese language can play in exercising
Japan’s soft power in Asia. It questions the Japanese government’s view
of Japanese language in relation to its Cool Japan strategy and argues that
the assumption that Japanese culture creates “Japan fans” is not based
on an understanding of regional contexts or individual language learners’
relationships with the language. The book offers a systematic examination
of soft power as embedded in language, in four main parts. Part I, “Cool
Japan and Japan’s Soft Power,” outlines problems with the government’s
promotion of Japanese culture as soft power; Part II, “Japanese Language
and the Historical Construction of Asia,” demonstrates the historical con-
tinuity in the construction of the ideology of Japanese language; Part III,
“Japanese Language Teaching in Asia,” examines the current government
schemes for Japanese language teaching; and Part IV, “Japanese Language
and Learners’ Empowerment,” explores the role of language as a form of
soft power for empowering learners.
Chapter 2, “Cool Japan Versus the China Threat: Does Japan’s Popular
Culture Success Mean More Soft Power?” by Groot, examines Japan’s
rivalry with China in the arena of popular culture. Although China ranked
third, after South Korea and Indonesia, in terms of numbers of Japanese
language learners (Japan Foundation 2017), Japan’s relationships with
China, as well as South Korea, were identified as weak points in relation
to Japan’s soft power by the 2016 Portland’s Soft Power 30 analysis.
While Japan has been alarmed by the rapid global expansion of Confucius
Institutes but has not been able to come up with an equivalent scheme of
its own, a recent article reported that Japan has fallen behind other nations
such as China and the USA in the increasingly competitive research field
of artificial intelligence, while research collaboration between American
and Chinese universities has accelerated over the past six years (Nikkei
2016). The article pointed out that research collaboration between the
two countries was largely a result of connections established by Chinese
researchers while they were studying at American universities as interna-
tional students to the same extent. Although the majority of international
students in Japan were from China (49.3% in 2015),3 Japanese universi-
ties do not seem to take advantage of the presence of Chinese students.
Japan’s complex relationship with China and China’s different approach
to diplomacy are examined in detail in Groot’s chapter. Groot observes
that the Japanese government’s response to the recent renewed popularity
6 K. HASHIMOTO
of Japan’s cultural products has been to promote the concept of Cool

Japan to boost sales further and turn the success of games, manga, and
other products into soft power, to help achieve its official policy aims; it
has been unable to capitalise on this success, though, because of a misun-
derstanding of the nature of soft power, particularly its contingent nature,
compounded by bureaucratic short-termism. Groot concludes that while
Japan’s pop culture inspires affection, it is not likely to generate useful
political influence or create significant interest in learning the language or
learning about Japan more generally.
Following the detailed analysis of the Cool Japan phenomenon in the
previous chapter, Chap. 3, “Cool Japan and Japanese Language: Why Does
Japan Need ‘Japan Fans’?” by Hashimoto, examines the Japanese govern-
ment’s view of its engagement with the international community by exert-
ing cultural influence, including that of the language, over the past 15 years,
using critical discourse analysis (CDA) as an analytical tool. Hashimoto
argues that the rhetoric that foreigners want to learn Japanese language
because of their interest in anime and manga, which originated with the
Cool Japan marketing strategy, has been so entrenched that it has produced
confusion and misconceptions. Therefore, Japan’s soft power strategy of
creating “Japan fans,” a one-dimensional approach that does not take into
consideration the context of the recipient country, mirrors a tendency
within Japanese society to seek reassurance based on a belief in an unchang-
ing Japanese culture and tradition that is unique to Japanese people.
One of the arguments that has been lacking in previous studies of
soft power relates to the coercive and non-coercive nature of languages.
If Japan was hesitant about promoting Japanese language in Asia until
recently because of the negative experience of colonisation—when
Japanese language was used as a form of coercive power by the military—
what kind of non-coercive power does the Japanese government associ-
ate with the current promotion of Japanese language in Asian countries?
In the field of the national language, some studies focus on the histori-
cal continuity of the national language (kokugo). One such scholar, Lee
(2010), claims that “the coerciveness of kokugo policy in modern Japan
was a sign, not of the strength of kokugo but of its weakness, just as the
coercion of the Great Japanese Empire indicated Japan’s tenuous moder-
nity” (quoted in Chap. 5 of this volume). Two historical studies in Part II
are important in providing insights into the current situation surround-
ing the promotion of Japanese language teaching. Chapter 4, “Japanese
Language Education in the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere and the
kokuji mondai (National Script Problem)” by Hovhannisyan, examines

script reform advocates’ arguments for script simplification in the war-
time period and their responses to the popular discussions about the need
to spread Japanese in the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. In the
background to this discussion was a debate between people from differ-
ent ideological and social backgrounds about simplification of the Japanese
writing system on various grounds, such as the spread of education, the
advancement of civilisation, and industrial efficiency. Hovhannisyan dem-
onstrates that reform advocates saw the expansion of the Japanese empire
as an opportunity to renew and reinvent their pro-reform position, arguing
that script reform would make Japanese more universal and more attractive
to learn, which could in turn generate soft power for Japan.
Similarly, Matsuoka argues in Chap. 5, “Media and Cultural Policy
and Japanese Language Education in Japanese-Occupied Singapore,
1942–1945,” that the concept of soft power or cultural power already
existed during World War II. Focusing on one Japanese intellectual, Jimbo
Kō tarō , Matsuoka explores the ideological nature of Japanese language
education, which was part of Japan’s cultural policy in wartime Singapore.
By examining the “Nippon-Go Popularising Week” campaign, which
was organised by Jimbo and the wartime administration’s Propaganda
Department, he argues that Jimbo’s ultra-nationalistic view of Japanese
language and culture was partly based on an inferiority complex in rela-
tion to Western civilisation. Japan’s efforts to eliminate Western languages
(Dutch and English) rather than Chinese suggest that the influence of par-
ticular languages is dependent on local contexts and the presence of other
languages. This argument is certainly applicable to Chaps. 9 and 10, where
Japanese language has specific meanings for language learners precisely
because of the presence of other languages.
The three chapters in Part III examine timely and understudied top-
ics in Japanese language teaching for foreigners. Chapter 6, “Japanese
Language for Trainee Nurses from Asia: The EPA Scheme as a Missed
Opportunity” by Kusunoki, provides insights into Japan’s Economic
Partnership Agreement (EPA) scheme, which allows nurse trainees from
the Philippines, Indonesia, and Vietnam to work in Japan. Although the
EPA scheme has been widely reported on by the media, mainly for the par-
ticipants’ low pass rate in the national exam and as a case study in skilled
foreign labour migration, it has not been considered in the context of
language policy. In the field of international relations, Watanabe identifies
the lack of “mechanisms for coordinating potentially complementary
8 K. HASHIMOTO
activities by the numerous government units” as “a fundamental weakness

of Japan’s public diplomacy” (Watanabe 2017, 410). The same criticism
seems to apply to the EPA scheme, which has been administered by three
ministries. Drawing attention to the potential of the EPA scheme for mak-
ing Japanese language a source of soft power, Kusunoki argues that this
represents a missed opportunity for the Japanese government. Examining
data from interviews with trainee nurses, Kusunoki concludes that the
EPA scheme should be conducted based on a long-term vision, so that the
trainees can prepare for future employment opportunities in Japan. This
would enable the government to use the scheme as a vehicle for promot-
ing Japanese language in the nurses’ home countries, as well as to attract a
larger number of trainees to Japan to work for longer periods.
Chapter 7, “The Role of Native Speakers in High School Japanese
Programmes in South Korea, Indonesia, and Thailand” by Kadowaki,
examines three countries—two of them partner countries in the EPA
scheme—and looks at whether the Japanese government policy on over-
seas Japanese language education addresses local needs and satisfies local
expectations. Outside Japan, learners of Japanese language are mostly
high school students, and the majority of their teachers are non-native
speakers of Japanese. The Japanese government has sent Japanese native
speakers to work in high schools in those countries, but the roles of these
native speakers, as well as their teaching methods and relationships with
local teachers, have not been clearly defined. Kadowaki argues that it is
important for such programmes to meet the needs of local schools if Japan
wishes to promote Japanese language and culture as a form of soft power.
Nemoto’s chapter, “Japanese Pop Culture as a Motivating Factor
for Japanese Language Learners in Qatar” (Chap. 8), provides rare data
collected in a Middle Eastern country, Qatar, where Japanese language
teaching is not yet well established. Nemoto examines the relationship
between Japanese pop culture and Japanese language learning based on
data obtained from interviews with graduates of the Qatar Language
Teaching Institute and members of the Qatar University Japan Club.
The findings suggest that attempts to motivate foreigners to study
Japanese using Japanese pop culture are likely to be more effective if pro-
spective learners are encouraged to take an in-depth interest in a particular
aspect of the culture rather than simply being provided with wide-ranging
but superficial information. This finding should also be useful in assist-
ing the government and educational organisations to formulate effective
strategies to promote Japanese language in countries and regions where
the local people are less familiar with the language.
Part IV, “Japanese Language and Learners’ Empowerment,” is important

to this book because it emphasises the connection between the nation, the
language, and individual learners of the language. In the current Japanese
government policies on foreign nationals, foreigners or Japanese language
learners are seen as useful resources for promoting Japan. The two chapters
on Hong Kong and Australia (Chaps. 9 and 10) provide us with an oppor-
tunity to consider the power of language, which goes beyond the Japanese
government’s notion of creating “Japan fans.” Chapter 9, “Japanese
Language in the Wake of Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement: Is It a Form of
Soft Power?” by Nomura and Mochizuki, is also timely in shedding light on
the Umbrella Movement of late 2014. Nomura and Mochizuki argue that
Japanese language has functioned as an agent of soft power in Hong Kong
in Nye’s terms since the time of the Umbrella Movement, the largest sit-in
protest for full democracy in Hong Kong’s history. Although the move-
ment was ultimately unsuccessful, Hong Kong gained attention—and often
sympathy—from Japan through media and the Internet. Consequently,
Japanese language—which is widely studied and used in Hong Kong—was
the means of expressing these favourable Japanese gazes on Hong Kong.
Since the Umbrella Movement, Japanese language as the vehicle for convey-
ing gazes from Japan has served to empower many largely pro-democracy
young Hongkongers. Further, it has encouraged them to feel an attachment
to Japan, Hong Kong’s most significant democratic neighbour.
Chapter 10, “Accessing the Soft Power of Japanese Language in
Australia: Young Korean Migrants Studying Japanese as a Foreign
Language” by Lovely, examines Korean migrants in Australia through
their relationships with three languages and cultures. Drawing on case
studies of Korean migrants who moved to Australia during their adoles-
cence post-2000, Lovely demonstrates that Japanese language played a
significant role in establishing a place for these young people in Australian
society. Comparing the status of Japanese language in Australia and South
Korea, Lovely argues that the high status of Japanese language in Australia
makes it an attractive area of study for Korean learners in Australia and
that their Japanese language studies enabled them to use the soft power
of Japanese language to gain a secure foothold in Australian society.
Perhaps it would not be of interest to the Japanese government to know
that Korean migrants who settled in Australia managed to negotiate their
identities through Japanese language learning, but in the long run, these
Korean migrants in Australia are likely to be great assets to Japan in the
international community.
10 K. HASHIMOTO
NOTES
1. The White Paper on “Japanese Government Policies in Education, Culture,
Sports, Sciences and Technology 2001” is subtitled “Educational Reform
for the 21st Century.” The document is available in both Japanese and
English.
2. According to the survey conducted by the Japan Foundation (2017), in
2015 Japanese language was taught in 137 countries and regions, and the
number of Japanese language learners was 3,655,024.
3. Japan Student Services Organisation, 2016. 平成27年度外国人留学生在籍状
況調査結果 [2015 fiscal year, Survey results on foreign student enrolments].
http://www.jasso.go.jp/about/statistics/intl_student_e/2015/index.html
REFERENCES
Aspinall, Robert W. 2013. International Education Policy in Japan in An Age of
Globalisation and Risk. Leiden: Global Oriental.
Baldauf, Richard B. Jr., Robert B. Kaplan, Nkonko M. Kamwangamalu and
Pauline Bryant, ed. 2012. Language Planning in Primary Schools in Asia.
New York: Routledge.
Brown, Robin. 2017. “Alternative to Soft Power: Influence in French and German
External Cultural Action.” In The Routledge Handbook of Soft Power, edited by
Naren Chitty, Li Ji, Gary D. Rawnsley and Craig Hayden, 37–47. New York:
Routledge.
Carroll, Tessa. 2012. “Multilingualism or Easy Japanese?: Promoting Citizenship
Via Local Government Web Sites.” In Language and Citizenship in Japan,
edited by Nanette Gottlieb, 193–216. London: Routledge.
Chitty, Naren. 2017. “Introduction.” In The Routledge Handbook of Soft Power, edited
by Naren Chitty, Li Ji, Gary D. Rawnsley and Craig Hayden, 1–6. New York:
Routledge.
Cull, Nicholas J. 2008. “Public Diplomacy: Taxonomies and Histories.” The
Annals of the American Academy 616:31–54.
Glasgow, Gregory P. 2014. “Teaching English in English, ‘In Principle’: The
National Foreign Language Curriculum for Japanese Senior High Schools.”
International Journal of Pedagogies and Learning 9(2):152–61.
Hamid, M. Obaidul, Hoa Thi Mai Nguyen and Richard B. Baldauf Jr., ed. 2014.
Language Planning for Medium of Instruction in Asia. London: Routledge.
Hashimoto, Kayoko. 2009. “Cultivating ‘Japanese Who Can Use English’: Problems
and Contradictions in Government Policy.” Asian Studies Review 33:21–42.
Hashimoto, Kayoko. 2013a. “The Japanisation of English Language Education:
Promotion of the National Language Within Foreign Language Policy.” In
Language Policies in Education: Critical Issues, 2nd edition, edited by James
W. Tollefson, 175–90. New York: Routledge.
Hashimoto, Kayoko. 2013b. “The Construction of ‘Native Speakers’ in Japan’s

Educational Policies for TEFL.” In Native-Speakerism in Foreign Languages
Education: Intergroup Dynamics in Japan, edited by Stephanie Houghton and
Damian Rivers, 159–68. London: Multilingual Matters.
Iwabuchi, Koichi. 2015. “Pop-Culture Diplomacy in Japan: Soft Power, Nation
Branding and the Question of ‘International Cultural Exchange.” International
Journal of Cultural Policy 21:419–32.
Japan Foundation. 2017. “2015年度海外日本語教育機関調査 [Survey Report
on Japanese–Language Education Abroad 2015].” http://www.jpf.go.jp/j/
project/japanese/survey/result/survey15.html
Kirkpatrick, Andy and Roland Sussex, ed. 2012. English as An International
Language in Asia: Implications for Language Education. New York: Springer.
Lee, Yeounsuk. 2010. The Ideology of Kokugo: Nationalizing Language in Modern
Japan. Translated by Maki Hirano Hubbard. Honolulu: University of Hawaii
Press.
Liddicoat, Anthony. 2013. Language-in-Education Policies: The Discursive Construc-
tion of Intercultural Relations. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
McConnell, David L. 2008. “Japan’s Image Problem and the Soft Power Solution:
The JET Program as Cultural Diplomacy.” In Soft Power Superpowers: Cultural
and National Assets of Japan and the United State, edited by Yasushi Watanabe
and David L. McConnell, 18–33. Armonk: M.E. Sharpe.
Nikkei. 2016. “AI 研究、米中2強出遅れ目立つ日本勢 [AI research, USA and
China Two Powerhouses: Noticeably Japan Got a Late Start].” 9 December.
http://www.nikkei.com/article/DGXLASGG09H0M_Z01C16A2MM0000
Nye, Joseph. 2004. Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics. New York:
Public Affairs.
Nye, Joseph. 2011. The Future of Power. New York: Public Affairs.
Se, Teruhisa. 2015. 英語化は愚民化-日本の国力が地に落ちる [Anglicisation
Makes People Stupid: Downfall of Japan’s National Power]. Tokyo: Shueisha.
Sun, Jing. 2013. Japan and China as Charm Rivals: Soft Power in Regional
Diplomacy. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
The Japan Times. 2013. “Abe Wants TOEFL to Be Key Exam.” 25 March.
The Japan Times. 2015. “Disappointing Levels of English.” 28 March.
Tollefson, James W. 2013. “Language Policy and Democratic Pluralism.” In
Language Policies in Education: Critical Issues, 2nd edition, edited by James
W. Tollefson, 301–10. New York: Routledge.
Tsuda, Yukio. 1993. “英語支配への挑戦序論 [Introduction to Challenge to English
Dominance].” In 英語支配への異論 [Objection to English Dominance], edited
by Yukio Tsuda, 13–68. Tokyo: Daisanshokan.
Tsui, Amy B. M. and James W. Tollefson, ed. 2007. Language Policy, Culture, and
Identity in Asian Contest. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
12 K. HASHIMOTO
Watanabe, Yasushi. 2017. “The Pivot Shift of Japan’s Public Diplomacy.” In The
Routledge Handbook of Soft Power, edited by Naren Chitty, Li Ji, Gary
D. Rawnsley and Craig Hayden, 400–13. London: Routledge.
Yasuda, Toshiaki. 2011. 多言語社会という幻想 [Illusion of Multilingual Society].
Tokyo: Sangensha.
Yasuda, Toshiaki. 2016. 漢字廃止の思想史 [History of Ideas of Kanji Abolishment].
Tokyo: Heibonsha.
PART I
Cool Japan and Japan’s Soft Power

CHAPTER 2
Cool Japan Versus the China Threat: Does

Japan’s Popular Culture Success Mean More
Soft Power?
Gerry Groot
Whether the Japanese government and people recognise it or not, they are
involved in a profound struggle for hearts-and-minds around the world,
a battle with China for soft power. On some indicators, this seems like
a battle in Japan’s favour, particularly considering the continued success
of its pop culture. In 2016, the Pokémon Go smartphone app game was
an instant worldwide success and became a craze in which millions took
part. Participation was so intense for some that by the end of the year,
12 people had died while playing (Pokémon Go Death Tracker 2017).
More positively, the success of the Stand by Me Doraemon movie in Asia
and Makoto Shinkai’s Your Name in Asia as well as America, where it was
named best animation by the L.A. Film Critics, were other milestones. In
mid-December, a new Nintendo Super Mario Run game was downloaded
nearly three million times in its first day.
Mario, the little Italian from New York, is now so symbolic of Japanese
computer game influence that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appeared as
G. Groot (*)
Department of Asian Studies, The University of Adelaide,
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_2
16 G. GROOT
the famous running plumber at the closing of the Rio Olympics on 20

August 2016. His goal was to highlight Tokyo’s hosting of the next games
in 2020. This popularity is reflected more broadly; earlier in 2016, the
Portland Communications Soft Power Survey placed Japan 8th and China
13th in its soft power rankings, up one place from 2015 (McClory 2016).
In 2010, a similar survey by Britain’s Institute for Government had rated
Japan 15th and China 17th (McClory 2010). On this basis then, Japan’s
soft power and cultural influence would seem to be growing.
Nevertheless, a note of warning is in order. In the early to mid-2000s,
Japan also had an obvious and apparently rising positive international
profile due to its booming exports of pop culture: animé, manga, J-pop
music, computer games and related brands including Nintendo and Sega.
There were also other big brands related to relevant high-end consumer
technology including Sony, Panasonic and Sharp, among others. To
many, both within and outside Japan, it seemed that this rising popularity
also meant a concomitant rise in soft power and hence, somehow, also
more Japanese political influence around the world. Seeking to build on
this pop-culture-based momentum came the idea of promoting “Cool
Japan,” and in 2007 Prime Minister Taro Aso began promoting manga,
Japanese comics, as “a bridge to the world” (BBC 2007). With the suc-
cess of Pokémon, games and movies like 2001’s Spirited Away, it almost
seemed as if these cultural industries would both put a dent in American
domination of the world’s cultural markets and even help to lift Japan out
of its economic doldrums.
Unfortunately, the explosive rise of Pokémon Go in July 2016 and its
almost as rapid decline and replacement by new Super Mario game in
December is perhaps a more apt allegory of the vagaries of this sort of
popularity. Affection can be fickle. This decline is despite the Pokémon
franchise as a whole generating more than $USD41 billion over the course
of two decades, with 55% coming from outside Japan (The Pokémon
Company 2016). By 2016 also, some of Japan’s top high-tech consumer
brands, including Sony, Sharp and Toshiba, were all experiencing signifi-
cant difficulties.
A decade after Aso’s optimism, we can see some of the fundamental
weaknesses in any soft power push reliant on popular culture. The successes
of 2016 notwithstanding, it is now clear that Japan’s cultural export suc-
cesses had peaked around the time Aso spoke and have struggled to regain
momentum since. It is not even self-evident that these later achievements
equal those of a decade ago. Moreover, Japanese official commitment to
build on the any initial momentum has not been maintained. As a result,
COOL JAPAN VERSUS THE CHINA THREAT: DOES JAPAN’S POPULAR... 17
the continued popularity of learning Japanese, as discussed elsewhere in this

volume, is all the more remarkable and owes much to the disproportionate
success of Japanese pop culture in building bonds of affection with youth as
opposed to reliance on some sort of self-interest or conversion to Japanese
values and reflected in surveys of Japan’s attractiveness (Stokes 2016).
This chapter argues that while Japan does have a likely soft power
advantage based on widespread affection for its pop culture, this attrac-
tion cannot be relied on because it is subject to whims of consumers (read
fans). Any Japanese content must remain somehow relevant to foreign
audiences. Yet even the reasons why fans may be attracted to particular
animé can also be a problem, for example, if it involves hentai. This issue
raises the key one of what if any particular values are embedded in such
products, let alone recognised and found appealing and worthy of acting
on? Moreover, while the government has talked up the benefits of pro-
moting soft power, it has not only failed to capitalise on past advantages
but also its active support for potential soft power drivers like animé has
been weak. As a result, while it does seem that Japanese pop culture is
again winning new fans and promoting more interest in Japan generally,
including Japanese language, this popularity obscures a degree of capri-
ciousness and a lack of depth in such attraction.
This chapter reveals that promoting Cool Japan never developed to
become about important or universal political/moral values, the key to
substantial soft power appeal, but more about national branding and mar-
keting, both of which are much more subject to the volatility of con-
sumer affections. At the same time, opportunities to win over those who
might go on to champion Japanese values or Japan itself, notably those
attracted to study in Japan, are likely being lost. Even worse perhaps, at
the heart of one key element of this struggle for soft power—attracting
international students—lies another contradiction. Though initial attrac-
tion to and affection for pop culture can help to attract interest, trying
to increase opportunities to study about Japan, in Japan, but then teach-
ing in English is likely to greatly reduce effectiveness. Even “success” in
this attempt would mean that deep learning and understanding is being
foregone because lacking substantial Japanese language skills also means
foregoing the deep cultural knowledge (and a greater likelihood of com-
mitment) that accompanies such efforts. Even worse for Japan is the
fact that China is undertaking substantial efforts to build its soft power
capacities with one eye on using such power to actively delegitimise Japan
and paint its government as lying, recalcitrant and militarist. China is also
a direct competitor for the same hearts-and-minds.
18 G. GROOT
This chapter initially discusses the definitions and meanings of soft

power as first proposed by Joseph Nye and elaborated upon since,
particularly the pronounced tendency to oversimplify the relationship
between soft power and popular culture. This is followed by first an exam-
ination of Japan’s pop-culture-related soft power resources and the rise
of interest in these to the extent that many such fans now self-identify as
otaku. Other aspects of soft power, such as attractiveness as an educational
destination and tourism are then looked at and their links to pop culture
discussed. In the fourth section, Japan’s soft power promotion policies
will be outlined with emphasis on its loss of momentum and failure to
engage in the substantial issues of soft power generation. The relative
strengths and weaknesses will be exposed and their implications discussed.
This discussion will show that official reliance on what amounts to pro-
moting mere consumption and national branding mean that rather than
being about any real potential soft power, Cool Japan will continue to be
about sales and therefore subject to all the problems associated with mar-
ket cycles and consumer desires.
WHAT IS SOFT POWER?

The concept of soft power has been around since the term was first coined
by Joseph Nye in 1992. In 2004, he famously summed up his idea as
... a country may obtain the outcomes it wants in world politics because
other countries – admiring its values, emulating its example, aspiring to its
level of prosperity and openness – want to follow it. In this sense it is also
important to set the agenda and attract others in world politics, and not
only to force them to change by threatening military force or economic
sanctions. This soft power, getting others to want the outcomes you want –
coopts people rather than coerces them. … Soft power rests on the ability to
shape the preferences of others. (Nye 2004, 5)
The shaping of preferences is crucial to subsequent political action which

works in favour of the soft power generator. This soft power though is not
to be confused with hard power; military might and its powers of coercion;
or economic power with its ability to induce compliance via some sort of
monetary enticement, reward or payment. Generally, however, economic
success and military power are prerequisites for subsequent soft power as
manifested as an agenda setting for example. Success in the hard areas is
usually a key to inducing a desire to emulate national success by adopting

similar institutions and values which bring about such material success.
According to Nye, there are three key bases giving rise to the attraction
of any given nation: its political values (when it lives up to them at home
and abroad), its foreign policy (when seen as legitimate and having moral
authority), and of particular importance in the context of this book, its
culture when this is attractive to others (emphasis added) (Nye 2004, 12).
The popular take on the latter was that cultural exports and soft power
were more-or-less the same despite Nye’s care in highlighting how cul-
ture had to somehow embody universal or at least attractive values that
after being recognised and accepted, could subsequently exert some sort
of political effect when acted on. Nye’s powerful examples were of how
culture played an important role in the Cold War struggle between the
individualist, capitalist, liberal-democratic West and the authoritarian if
not totalitarian Communist Bloc with its collectivism, central planning
and attempts to eliminate markets and the profit motive and the like.
Hence, merely listening to or playing rock & roll and jazz music under
communism came to embody individualism and rejection of collectivism
and cultural conformity. In other words, such music became symbolic.
Musical preferences, clothing, hairstyles and so on, could in this particular
and highly contingent context, become political and result in action with
dramatic consequences.
The most extreme example provided since has been the claim that a
Bruce Springsteen concert in East Berlin on 19 July 1988 helped bring
down the Berlin Wall and subsequently the communist system, at least in
East Germany (Kirschbaum 2013), though this is rejected by others (Gans
2013). Again, the importance of contingent circumstance is crucial. In
this case, Western values were clear alternatives to Communist ones and
were clearly reflected in, or symbolised by, many cultural products and
actions. In China today by contrast, rock & roll is merely a minor music
genre and no longer a political statement let alone a threat to the state.
Nevertheless, as a result of Nye’s discussion of the role of culture, particu-
larly pop culture, much effort has been spent equating cultural exports
with soft power ever since.
Directly related to cultural attraction is the issue of a nation as an edu-
cational destination as others seek to learn the “secrets” behind the suc-
cess of such countries. As a result, Nye suggested that a key indicator of
soft power attraction was the number of students willing to move to a
particular country to learn its ways. Certainly others have also come to
20 G. GROOT
see attracting international education as a soft power tool (Wojciuk et al.

2015). In practice, this usually also means learning languages as a pre-
requisite for fully understanding the culture of another society and the
content being taught. In the case of the United States, Nye’s baseline,
this meant learning English in order to be able to study successfully, learn
America’s ways and absorb its culture. As a result, learning English has
been promoted in part, as also promoting American soft power including
by the military (Molloy 2006) and other chapters in this volume discuss
the place of Japanese in directly related ways.
More recently, tourism has also come to be regarded by some as another
soft power indicator (Chen and Duggan 2016). A quick Google search
makes it clear that many have made the connection between national
attraction and tourism as a measure of soft power, while in China unease
about bad behaviour by its nationals abroad has been linked to diminish-
ing Chinese soft power, hence undermining Xi’s attempts to promote the
country as civilised (Anderlini 2016). For academics studying tourism, the
soft power aspect is certainly seen as becoming more relevant as tourism
grows (Ooi 2016). Tourism, of course, is also often directly related to
cultural attractiveness so the potential connections are clear.
JAPAN’S POP-CULTURAL SOFT POWER RESOURCES

Japan’s cultural exports may have peaked around 2006 (see below), but
they had created a long tail of affection resulting in interest and sales in
related merchandise long after the original big hit successes. This tail also
seems to boost Japan’s soft power resources. While perhaps a minority
in an absolute sense, the young people who were attracted to Japanese
culture through childhood exposure to games, television and merchandise
have often remained interested as they have matured. In some cases, chil-
dren of the 1990s, having watched Pokémon on television and grown up
collecting and playing Pokémon card games with friends, were then able
to download later series for their own children to watch on mobile devices
and more recently, start playing Pokémon Go with them in 2016.
The 1990s are particularly important because this was the decade that
Japanese pop culture exports, like Pokémon, not only became common,
but more importantly began to be more readily recognised and appreci-
ated as being Japanese. In some cases, their origins became part of the
attraction. Animé and manga with their different aesthetics and themes
provided an alternative to mainstream Western, American-dominated mass
culture. Before this, few non-Japanese viewers of animé, such as Astro Boy,
Speed Racer or Kimba exported around the world in the 1960s and 1970s,
would have had any inkling of any Japanese origins. Such exports were
marked by their “cultural odourlessness,” resulting from both attempts
by Japanese companies modifying the aesthetics and stripping out refer-
ences to all things Japanese to make their product as widely acceptable to
as many audiences as possible. Alternatively or additionally, exports were
subjected to processes of localisation when foreign buyers would rework
Japanese product for local markets, often completely changing content
and any original messages in the process (Iwabuchi 2002).
Many things changed in the 1990s. The Pokémon phenomenon, from
electronic games, to cards, to movies and merchandise, which began in
Japan in the early 1990s, rising, and then fading away only to reappear in
new variations some years later, is symbolic of a growing Japanese cultural
influence around the world. Pokémon introduced many young people to
Japanese “kawaii” cute culture for example. While by 2004 it seemed to
some academics that such crazes may have run their course (Tobin 2004),
this apparent decline coincided with rise of popularity of Nye’s ideas on soft
power. Moreover, the decline in popularity of animé and manga was itself
not yet obvious while enthusiasm about Japan’s apparent popularity con-
tributed to a common belief that pop culture exports were indeed creating
soft power to Japan’s benefit merely by being economically successful.
According to the Animé Industry Report 2016, the total value of the
animation market in 2015 was 1.63 trillion Yen (US$13,855 billion), an
increase of 12% on 2014 (AJA 2016). Significantly, a key reason for this rise
was the new income being generated by digital streaming rights in China,
which had increased by 79%, as well as increased numbers of animé-related
events and exhibits (Animé News Network 2016). This success marked
five years growth after the downturn from the industry’s 2005 peak (AJA
2016). The top ten export markets based on commercial contracts were
Korea, United States, Taiwan, China, Canada, Thailand, Italy, Australia,
New Zealand and Hong Kong.
The problem for the industry, bearing in mind currency fluctuations, was
that the market was more-or-less stagnant. Income related to music rights
highlights the most popular animé: Dragon Ball Z, Bleach, Barbapapa,
Pokémon, Fairytale, Naruto, Saint Seiya and so on. Yet even here, revenue
generated had not returned to the level of 2005 (Association of Japanese
Animations 2016). Kelts’ 2007 book, Japanamerica: How Japanese Pop
Culture Has Invaded the US, then, was premature and described a high
22 G. GROOT
tide that had already gone out. As if to highlight the difficulty of fighting
Hollywood, in 2015 in Japan itself, the two biggest grossing animated
films were Frozen, followed by Big Hero 6, both Disney productions even
if the latter, made in Japan, also had significant Japanese content.
What the sales figures from the Animé Industry Report 2015 only hint
at though, is the widespread attractiveness of their product and associ-
ated merchandising. Japan’s combinations of film, toys, clothes and games
make for a very powerful combination of factors that while not necessarily
attractive to a majority of mostly young people outside Japan, often come
together for a small number of what we might term intense fans. These
fans can become disproportionately influential as a result of harnessing
their passion behind promoting that which they love. For many of these,
the Japaneseness of such products is important and acts as an alternative of
sorts to the mainstream pop culture at home, be this in Asia where most of
such fans are, or elsewhere. This and the fact that many are exposed from
childhood, indeed, they may have been introduced via Pokémon pyjamas,
toys and games, means that Japanese pop culture and any related values
can become very important to them, and often even part of their identity.
Importantly, access to Japanese animé has continued to improve as
major media companies have moved into digital delivery alongside and
against illegal content providers who are supplying it “free” or much
cheaper (Eddy 2017). Increasing access to the Internet as well as the
growing ease of online shopping for cultural product has also allowed the
evolution of fandoms and online consumers and emergence of a new self-
declared foreign otaku phenomenon.
The Rise of the Foreign “Otaku”

One consequence of increasing availability, particularly in English but
also in other languages, such as French (France being a major market for
Japanese pop culture), Portuguese and Chinese, is an expanding online
fanbase of young girls, boys, women and men. This group has continued
to grow even though its size is almost impossible to determine with any
accuracy, and is as yet under-researched. The first fan clubs for animé out-
side of Japan were in America (1977) and the Philippines (1978), inspired
by early series like Astroboy and Speed Racer with new groups of fans aris-
ing with the release of new series, from Robotech to Akira. The release of
Sailor Moon, dubbed in English in 1995, resulted in a dramatic increase
in fans and the inclusion of girls for the first time (Poitras 2000). By this
time, Americans were also being exposed to Pokémon and other series.
The release of another Pokémon series in 1998 marked another high point
and an increasing recognition by audiences of animé’s Japanese origins. As
such, the rise of affection for Japan via its pop culture coincided with the
decline of Japan’s economic strength as stagnation took hold.
Other factors behind the more recent increase in attraction to animé
include the rapid increase in access to online content (both legal and ille-
gal), particularly as smartphones became ubiquitous (these were them-
selves a Japanese innovation, introduced in 1999 by NTT DoCoMo), and
other devices became more sophisticated and cheaper. Indicators of this
expansion of access and the rise of consumption of animé and the like,
include the adoption by English-speaking fans (and detractors) of terms
such as “weeb” or “wee-aboo” (Japanese wannabes) otaku, “waifu” (obses-
sive fans dedicated to one character) fujoshi (women who like animé about
gay love) and so on (Animé Maru 2016). The site Urban Dictionary lists
some 40 animé-related terms (Urban Dictionary 2017). The term otaku
for serious fans of animé who first emerged in Japan was eventually then
taken on by some foreign fans as a mark of their respect and the serious-
ness of their interests (Ito et al. 2012).
Searching for “animé fan sites” readily brings up over 140,000 hits in
multiple languages and the sites themselves range from those set up as
personal projects in the 2000s, to those built around content distributors.
Sites like Myanimelist.net are very popular with fans. More recently fans
have also been able to establish themselves on social media sites including
Instagram and Facebook. Other sites more targeted at young teenagers,
like Reddit, host very active discussion groups on all aspects of animé and
Japanese pop culture. A search linking Reddit + animé brings up over 29
million hits. The notorious site 4chan, infamous for its hosting of often dan-
gerous content, was originally based on Japanese bulletin board software to
cater for animé fans and subsequently attracted legions of them to discuss
their particular interests and obsessions before developing into something
much darker (Beran 2017). (Note that 4chan’s contents are made unavail-
able by the author’s university Internet administrators because of its often
problematic (such as hentai, pornographic animé and the like) and illegal
content, some implications of which are discussed below).
Otaku and Other Conventions

Around 2004, in remote South Australia, a group of self-confessed nerds at
the University of Adelaide who had become interested in the arrival of 1990s
animé and manga, initiated the first AVCON (Animé Video Convention).
24 G. GROOT
It attracted a few dozen participants. By 2016, AVCON had become the

single largest conference event in the state, visited by more than 16,000
participants over three days and now held off-campus in a convention cen-
tre. Gaming, animé and cosplay are now central to the event’s success.
Similarly, in Los Angeles in 1992 there were 1750 fans at the inaugural
Anim↑ Expo and 80,000 in 2014, the 11th largest in the world (Jetro US
2017). In 2015, the largest such event in America hit 90,000 participants
(Green 2016). As the industry noted, such events are increasingly signifi-
cant financially. More importantly in a soft power context, such fans are
highly committed and actively interested in at least Japan’s popular culture.
Yet while it might have been inspired by Japanese influences, AVCON
and similar events in the United States and elsewhere were soon joined by
similar ones organised by the major American publishers. Copycat events
like Supanova cast their nets much wider and include so much Western
pop culture content, from movies like Harry Potter to television series
such as Dr Who as well as comics and characters from the major DC and
Marvel Comics, that animé itself becomes a minor rather than a defining
part and attract even larger audiences. The 2016 New York Comic Con,
for example, attracted 180,000 participants (Johnson 2016). Yet, this
does not mean that animé and its related spin-offs are completely replaced
as they have other attractions.
Cosplayers
Dressing up as one’s favourite fictional character is hardly a uniquely
Japanese activity. The author himself dressed as Superman circa 1966
and attempted to fly from a tank stand, with predicable abrasive conse-
quences. The Japanese term cosplay, which has now entered the English
lexicon, is a contraction of costume and player, which emerged in Japan
around 1983 and hints at its Anglosphere inspiration. More importantly,
the dressing up as animé-related characters which took off in Japan in
the 1990s, has since also been enthusiastically taken up around the world
including in that same Anglosphere, as well as across Asia. Although in
the course of expansion cosplay has come to include non-Japanese themes
(Rahman et al. 2012), the identification with Japan remains strong. This
identification is reinforced by Western pop culture references to Harajuku
and the often outrageous fashions, including cosplay outfits, worn there
on Sundays by young Japanese.
Although some have tried to exclude the Lolita-related aspect of such

dressing up on the grounds that such enthusiasts are not imitating char-
acters as such (Rahman et al. 2012, 318), Lolita is also regarded by the
general public as Japanese inspired cosplay. Insofar that participants dress
as animé or manga-related characters, they are expressing their fan sta-
tus, passions and their identity in ways very meaningful to themselves
and outside Japan, often against parental wishes. The importance of their
involvement is reflected through the amount of time, money and thought
expended (Rahman et al. 2012). Inspired by British Victorian era lace and
complexity, Lolita fashions, cosplay connections (often worn as cosplay/
animé-related conventions) and the adoption of “cute” or kawaii poses,
are all reminders of Japanese connections. Another significant attraction of
cosplay, one directly related to animé, is the widespread ambiguity about
gender and sexuality in many animé series, an aspect which allows cosplay-
ers much more latitude and fun than might be the case with Western
comic characters (Leng 2013).
Fansubbers
Cosplay can readily become an important aspect of individual identity,
one linking young people in Italy or Korea with Japan in deeply personal
ways by dressing as their favourite animé characters. Likewise, animé in
its early days abroad also spawned a perhaps more important subculture,
the fansubbers. This under-researched group of very dedicated fans take
the Japanese language animé original, translate the scripts and then add
subtitles in their own language. Their work has been crucial for allowing
many more series to be accessed by fans in addition to, or instead, of any
already being televised. As a result fansubbers have done much to broaden
the animé fan base beyond those only exposed to the often highly medi-
ated versions of animé on television and cable networks. These commer-
cial enterprises often omitted edgier and more culturally loaded series. As
McLelland (2017) has highlighted, foreign companies were often quite
concerned about potential controversies and censorship likely to be gen-
erated by animé with sexual and other content unacceptable outside of
Japan. This caution was in part because until the more recent normalisa-
tion of animé as also being for adults, Western companies in particular,
assumed animé in their markets should be aimed at children.
Originally done using Video Cassette Recorders, fansubbing processes
were adapted for Digital Video Discs and most recently for direct streaming
26 G. GROOT
over the Internet. At each stage, more fans have been able to engage with
the product and content, mediating its meanings themselves and spread-
ing the results ever more widely. Fansubbers often work in teams to trans-
late and add subtitles, and they work to a code of ethics which is itself
available from the Animé News Network fansite. While fansubbers made
many series accessible which commercial operators deemed unsuitable,
this also had the detrimental effect of confirming in many Western minds
that much Japanese animé was too weird and unacceptable, thereby delay-
ing broader acceptance (Wurm 2014).
A key shift occurring with initiatives like fansubbing is a dramatic
increase in the degree of “participatory media fandom,” a new bottom-up
consumer engagement with cultural products and one which is reduc-
ing the influence of original producers and creating a new model of con-
tent distribution (Lee 2011). Importantly, this subculture is also helping
spread many more Japanese cultural products of a much wider variety than
the still largely conservative Japanese media companies would otherwise
allow. As McClelland notes, “What is ‘cool’ about Japan for young people
often includes aspects of the culture that are different and disapproved of
by ‘authority figures’ and this coolness in turn is one reason many go on
to learn more about Japan” (McClelland 2017).
Tourism
There has already been one major benefit of interest in Japanese pop cul-
ture, recent past, and present, in helping boost inbound tourism. The
2016 release of Your Name had already generated substantial domestic
tourism revenue by the end of the November that year. Hida City had
reportedly seen some 18.5 billion Yen ($USD164 million) after some
750,000 fans flocked there in the wake of the movie’s release in August.
The film then topped box offices in Thailand and Hong Kong shortly
after (Sherman 2016) with Japanese authorities hoping for a similar effect
from these foreign audiences. This “otaku tourism” emerged as a response
by fans wanting to extend their interests to where different series were
set in what has become known as “animé pilgrimage” (Okamoto 2014;
Yamamura 2014). Animé is also generating foreign tourist income.
In 2015, the number of international visitors to Japan topped 19.73
million; the first time in over four decades that visitors surpassed Japanese
going abroad and the country is likely to meet its 2020 target of 40 million
visitors. Significantly, there were 4.99 million Chinese, 4 million Korean,
3.67 million from Taiwan and 1.52 million from Hong Kong. The vast
majority of tourist spending was also by these groups (Japan Times 2016).
While economic advantages, such as a cheap Yen and a reputation for
high-quality consumer goods, electronics, cosmetics and many other prod-
ucts are significant factors attracting these tourists, the appeal of Japanese
culture, also looms large. Prime Minister Abe’s dressing up as Super Mario
was about more simply heralding that Tokyo would host the Olympics in
2020, it was an explicit acknowledgement at the highest level, of the fame
of Mario and his connection to Japan, and the intention to use pop cul-
ture to attempt to attract visitors. To help achieve this goal, in September
2016 some of the largest companies involved in tourism launched the
Japan Animé Tourism Association aimed at foreign visitors. The inten-
tion is to create animé pilgrimage routes for such tourists. There has been
some success already, with key sites including Akihabara shopping district,
the Ghibli Studio Museum (of Miyazaki and Spirited Away fame, among
many), Gundam Front and many others. Significantly though, tourists
going to Japan because of its pop culture associations number only around
9% (Lee 2016) and is easily exaggerated.
FROM TECHNO-COOL TO COOL JAPAN: AN ATTRACTIVE

DESTINATION FOR INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS?
Another big issue facing the Japanese government is how to make the
country more attractive to a wide variety of international students. With
economic (read national) success being almost a prerequisite for soft power
attraction, Japan was very attractive in the 1970s and 1980s when it was
being touted to overtake the United States as an economic power. This
success was based to a significant extent on the coolness and complexity of
its engineering and manufacturing, symbolised by brands such as Toshiba,
Hitachi, Toyota, Mitsubishi and many more.
As Nye has pointed out, the attractiveness of a country to foreign stu-
dents is an important proxy for attempting to measure soft power because
moving to another country to study reflects great commitment and expense
on the part of students and the power of attraction of the host. The under-
lying assumption is that learning in a foreign land, normally using the local
language, will create not only deep bonds of affection, but also the likeli-
hood of an internalisation of its values which may subsequently become
politically beneficial. When in 2015 Britain topped the Portland Soft Power
Index for example, the British Council was quick to point out that one in
28 G. GROOT
seven serving world leaders were graduates of United Kingdom institutions

(Dubber 2015). Without any further evidence, the implication was that
such graduates were ipso facto, pro-Britain and its values.
Japan already has a history of soft power success if we take into account
those who came in significant numbers to study how the old feudal regime
had been overthrown and the basis of success of the Meiji Restoration.
Importantly, many of these students were from China and Korea and keen
to learn the lessons of Japanese modernisation in order to apply them at
home; a clear soft power win during a period of rising anti-imperialist
struggle. More recently, around the same time as soft power was start-
ing to capture the imagination of Japanese policy makers, following the
popularisation of the idea of Cool Japan by McGray (2002), attracting
international students once again became a priority.
However, it took some two decades to reach the target of more than
100,000 set much earlier, in 1983 and achieved only in 2003. In 2004, the
number was only 117,302 (Groot 2006). In 2008, the plan was revised
with the intent of tripling numbers by 2020 as part of “The 300,000
Foreign Student Plan” announced by the Ministry of Education, Sports,
Science and Technology, in part to keep enrolments in tertiary institu-
tions at around three million even as Japan’s own population declined.
Nevertheless, the initiative was also explicitly intended to “build human
networks between Japan and other countries, enhance mutual under-
standing and foster amicable relationships, and contribute to global sta-
bility and work peace (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2008).” In May 2015,
foreign students reached 208,379, an increase of 24,000 from 2014, of
whom some 152,062 were enrolled in higher education according to Japan
Student Services Organisation. The remainder was in Japanese language
schools, and an area which had increased 25% over 2014 (JASSO 2016).
The problem for the Japanese government and its 2020 target is that
numbers will need to increase by some 50% over five years to achieve the
goal of 300,000 and that is unlikely. The main problem is competition with
China. Whereas Japan’s share of international students had stayed steady
at about 3% of the world total, by 2014 China had managed to increase
its share to 8% to become the world’s third most popular higher education
destination (Clavel 2014). Apparently on the initiative of Prime Minister
Shinzo Abe, in 2014 another major initiative, the Super Global Universities
Project, was launched in an effort to improve the rankings of Japan’s uni-
versities. Moreover, in a speech in Britain he declared: “the number of
foreign students at a university will determine its success (Ince 2014).”
THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF STUDYING JAPANESE

The Japan Foundation’s Survey Report on Japanese Language Education
Abroad 2012 concluded there were almost four million learners of Japanese
in more than 128 countries and 8 regions, some 3,985,669 students, a
rise of 9.2% on the 2009 total (Japan Foundation 2013). What is notable
about the growth in interest in Japanese since 1979 is that while it began
during Japan’s high economic growth period, it has continued despite the
subsequent economic problems and loss of economic and technological
leadership (to Korea, and China in particular). The report makes clear that
the key drivers of interest are predominantly interest in the language itself,
communication, interest in manga, animé and J-pop and the like, as well as
history, literature and so forth. In contrast, instrumentalist reasons related
to finding work were much less important motivations (emphasis added,
Japan Foundation 2013).
The origins of students are also important. The Foundation is open about
the very limited opportunities for students in South Asia, Central America
and Africa to access Japanese language study even if they might wish to.
Rather coyly, Foundation statistics show learners origins by region rather
than country, with 54.1% from East Asia (China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and
Korea), 28.4% from South East Asia, a mere 4.5% from North America
and only 1.9% from Western Europe. In more specific figures, Chinese
students constitute 26.3% (1,046,490), a 26% increase over three years.
Korea made up 21.1% while Australia constituted 7.4%. Yet Indonesia with
872,411 students was the second largest country of origin, outnumbering
Korea by some 32,000 (Japan Foundation 2013). In the United States in
2013, Japanese ranked the fifth most popular language at university level,
with 66,700 enrolments, slightly ahead of Chinese with 61,000 and Korean
with 12,200. Numbers enrolling in Japanese though are in slow decline
(Hiroyuki 2015). Nevertheless, the attraction of animé and pop culture was
an important factor in attracting students (McLaren 2015). This power has
also been harnessed by language teachers and the Japan Foundation which
provides teachers with resources based around harnessing interest in animé
and manga in particular (Japan Foundation 2010).
ROLE OF LANGUAGE IN SOFT POWER

Understanding the role of language as an agent or conductor of soft
power is as yet an under-researched topic although this volume is attempt-
ing to help remedy this shortcoming. It is clear from the emphasis put on
30 G. GROOT
disseminating languages by national governments via institutions such as

the Goethe Institute, China’s Confucius Institutes, The Japan Foundation,
Alliance Francaise and the like, that learning a language is assumed to
facilitate greater understanding if not sympathy for that nation and hence
implies subsequent political payoffs. Certainly learning the language of
another country is one way to get a much deeper cultural understanding
because without good fluency, many subtleties risk going unnoticed let
alone being understood.
In the case of languages like Japanese and Chinese, the considerable
efforts and length of time needed by foreigners to master them often
amount to a considerable personal investment. Any reasonable degree of
mastery is a usually as source of considerable pride and/or cultural capital
and may also have positive economic consequences as well as allowing
for greater acceptance by speakers of that language. The dominance of
English as the essential lingua franca of the twenty-first century is cer-
tainly a source of immense irritation for many non-native speakers, such
as Japanese and Chinese leaders and intellectuals. Attracting foreigners to
learn their languages has become a particular source of national pride with
the number of students becoming another measure of national attrac-
tiveness. Yet while learning Japanese to the level of mastery, for example,
implies that the learner has also understood the associated cultural subtle-
ties, this is still a long way from being able to assume that the underlying
values are also accepted, let alone internalised. Moreover, even if cultural
values are assimilated through language mastery, this still does not imply
natural acceptance of local political or moral values.
PROBLEMS WITH THE COOL JAPAN AND RELATED STRATEGIES

The issue of the attraction of values is really at the heart of soft power.
However, as Nye’s own and other examples have shown, whether people
can act on them and, in doing so create outcomes favourable to the nations
which promote them, is very much contingent dependent. Edwards, for
example, has shown that in the Middle East, even American pop culture
is just as readily adapted by others to oppose American values and poli-
cies (Edwards 2016). As a consequence any effort to promote soft power
through any particular means is at best a gamble. Nation state agents can-
not really predict in which context particular values will become salient to
foreign audiences let alone whether this will work in their own govern-
ment’s favour. Nevertheless, all sorts of initiatives are being launched at
considerable expense with an eye on future benefit.
The undoubted popularity of Japan’s pop culture exports and the

notion of Cool Japan notwithstanding, such success is not enough to
guarantee any concomitant soft power. To see whether soft power might
arise requires addressing some issues, including the nature of actual poli-
cies launched under the Cool Japan banner and their consequences, the
problem of whether animé contains relevant values, the role of Japanese
language, and the need for champions of such values in the outside world.
Douglas McGray did Japan an enormous favour when in 2002 he
wrote his Foreign Policy article, “Japan’s Gross National Cool.” It became
a slogan that informed thousands of articles and caught the imagination of
people around the world, not least in Japan itself. In a follow up in 2009
though, while still enthusiastic, he noted examples that showed a clear
inability to make much of many obvious advantages and cultural hooks of
great interest to foreigners. This included the clear failure by the Japanese
Sumo Association to make its museum a must-see destination for interna-
tional visitors. After all, sumo is inextricably linked with Japan and deep
cultural traditions. For McGray, this omission marked a significant failure
of imagination and a lost opportunity to promote sumo to the world.
With such vast reserves of potential soft power, “and with the cultural
reach of a superpower already in place, it’s hard,” he wrote, “to imagine
that Japan will be content to remain so much medium and so little mes-
sage” (McGray 2009). Yet Japan has failed to rise to the challenge.
Unfortunately, perhaps, for all the success of individuals like Makoto
Shinkai and Your Name, Pokémon and so on, Japanese officialdom has
not followed up its initial enthusiasm for Cool Japan with consistent
and wholistic policies that build on existing strengths. The Ministry of
Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) did attempt to take the initiative
and build around the Cool Japan slogan but its nature and scope have been
limited if not disappointing. It was not until 2010 that METI came up
with a policy for creative industries labelled Cool Japan with off shoots
including a Made in Japan Project and the Nippon Brand Meister pro-
gramme (Hasegawa 2013). A Cool Japan Advisory Board was established
in 2011 followed up with a Cool Japan Movement Promotion Council
in 2014, to bring together those involved in animé and film (Kawashima
2016). Finally, in 2013 a Cool Japan Fund joint public–private partner-
ship was set up to commercialise Cool Japan by providing risk capital to
increase overseas demand for Japanese product from media and content,
to food and services, fashion and lifestyle (Cool Japan Fund 2017).
32 G. GROOT
The chronology of these developments already tells as a story of a shift

in emphasis from support of the film and animation industry central to the
idea of Japanese coolness, to much more commercially driven ventures.
While the Cool Japan Fund for example, initially helped fund a few animé-
related projects, it soon moved to promoting shopping centres, food
processing, fashion and other proposals aimed at eventually stimulating
demand for Japanese consumer goods and services. As Kawashima notes,
this leaves only a small role for film for example, as cultural ambassadors
(2016, 800). It was also far less than was implied only a few years earlier
when it seemed that the Cool Japan Fund would plough a significant por-
tion of its initial $USD500 million into animé and the like (Lies 2013).
The failure to develop a wholistic policy to support the key creative indus-
tries behind the origins of Cool Japan is a threat to its success. The economic
problems, which saw the cultural industries fade in the mid-2000s, are likely
to reappear. The artists who draw the manga and animé, for example, are
often paid extremely poorly (D’Anastasio 2015), while Kawashima (2016)
worries that failure to become part of the world film industry might doom
introverted Japanese film to extinction. Certainly, key artists like Gackt have
been scathing about the lack of real support for the artistic endeavours
needed to underpin cultural exports (RocketNews24 2015).
Just as importantly, the Cool Japan marketing has effectively moved
from trying to associate Japan with culture and hence to values, to mere
consumption. Iwabuchi has noted that moves beginning in 2006 by
Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs to use pop culture to promote Japan
around the world failed to get beyond one-way projection and hence
undermines attempts at developing soft power (Iwabuchi 2015). In her
critique of official attempts to ride the Cool Japan wave, Valalaskivi makes
the point that in seeking to brand Japan the nation as cool, policy makers
were falling into the trap of turning Japan into a mere brand and object of
consumption. As a result of this approach Japan becomes a product and
not a community (Valalaskivi 2013, 499). The obvious weakness of such
a transformation is that any ties of affection to a product are usually much
less than to a community and with it the reduction if not elimination of
any potential soft power.
Perhaps it is just as well that METI has not been interfering directly
with the animé/manga gold egg-laying goose. For one, the linking to
national branding has as one consequence, a diminution of local unique-
ness in favour of broader appeal (Valalaskivi 2013). Secondly, this chap-
ter has at various stages hinted that one key ingredient in Japan’s pop
culture coolness abroad has been both its difference from local forms and
an important degree of edginess or in some cases even outright illegality.
Hence, the interest in cross playing cosplay inspired by androgynous char-
acters, to hentai, the erotic/pornographic forms of animé oft discussed on
forums like 4chan. Likewise, lolicon, animé revolving around a particular
form of cute girls, can straddle the boundaries between acceptable and
deplorable. The close association in many parents’ minds of cartoons and
childhood interests can allow some children and youth to safely watch
what would otherwise shock their folks. In this sense, any official efforts to
make animé more mainstream would likely cost the interests of the intense
fans who go on to form discussion groups, create websites and blogs,
undertake fansubbing, organise conventions and the like. Such fans after
all, created the basis for Cool Japan outside Japan in the first place. For
more casual consumers, the need to learn more about Japan, visit Japan or
learn Japanese would be far less intense. The importance to Cool Japan of
promoting the foreign otaku, like the importance of dedicated fans within
Japan, is a missed opportunity for the government (Stevens 2010). Still,
though many foreigners are attracted to Japan via animé and related prod-
ucts, because their relationship is based to a large extent on consumption,
this would seem to reduce any need to try to expand their understanding
of Japan much beyond the content of what they watch and buy.
The gentle decline in interest in studying Japanese vis-à-vis growth in
interest in Chinese for example, hints at the potential weakness of rely-
ing on any consumption-based form of attraction. An anecdotal but tell-
ing example of this weakness is the inability of even Tokyo University to
fill places in its undergraduate programmes for international students, for
courses about Japan taught in English. Out of 100 places, 70 were not
taken up—candidates decided to go elsewhere (Kyodo 2015). This lack
of enthusiasm indicates a number of problems including serious issues
implementing internationalisation (Japan Times 2015). The potential for
students who do complete such courses to later become substantial cham-
pions for greater understanding of Japan is much diminished precisely
because they did not learn much if any Japanese.
Perhaps a more important flaw in any attempt to use Japanese pop
culture for soft power is not that it lacks values, rather it is that whatever
values it does reflect are not ones that any Japanese government would
wish to see as ones reflecting its own. The political values of Japan’s rul-
ing conservative political elites are not ones generally reflected in popular
animé known outside the country. Some manga do actively incorporate
34 G. GROOT
and promote right-wing ideas, such as the Manga Ken Kan Ryu (Hating
the Korean wave) which has sold a million copies since 2005, or equiva-
lent anti-Chinese or revisionist texts justifying Japanese imperial expansion
before 1945. However, such works both fail to appeal to a foreign audi-
ence and often result in substantial nationalistic backlashes among Japan’s
neighbours. Such work plays right into the hands of Japan’s foreign critics,
notably in China and Korea.
To date, it has been the quirkiness and points of difference of animé and
related content from that in their own countries which has made it attrac-
tive outside of Japan’s borders, but only to minorities, however intense.
Moreover, within such minorities, animé appeals to even smaller groups.
Androgeny, cuteness, a certain degree of sexual freedom and other values
have been seized upon by fans but these are a far cry from political ones
which might be taken up with any subsequent results somehow benefit-
ting the Japanese state. Such values are not presently discernible let alone
the circumstances in which they might become actionable. Nevertheless,
the attraction of animé has been influential and it remains an area in which
Japan has a distinct advantage over China. The latter both resents Japanese
success and is run by a party intent on surpassing Nippon and humiliating
it in the process.
THE CHINA CHALLENGE

In contrast to an economically stalled Japan, China, as a one party-state
comprehensively dominated by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
would seem to have many advantages in any struggle for soft power influ-
ence. Its economy surpassed Japan’s in 2010 to make it the world’s second
largest; the population exceeded 1.4 billion, 11 times larger than Japan’s
126.5 million (and shrinking); it has a diaspora population of more than
50 million; and it has rapidly developing cultural and technology sectors.
Yet more significantly, particularly since the ascent of new CCP General
Secretary, Xi Jinping in 2012, China also has a new vision, Xi’s “China
Dream.” Realisation of this vision would see China assuming, what many
Chinese see as its rightful place, again, as the world’s foremost power in
all respects; economic, military, diplomatic, cultural and ideational.
This “rejuvenated” China, presumably something even greater than
at the height of the imperial Tang (A.D. 618–907) or Ming (A.D.
1368–1644) Dynasties, will allow the communist People’s Republic of
China to reshape the international order, institutions, norms and culture
to a significant degree. Though the CCP publicly eschews any suggestion

of hegemony, realisation of this dream would indeed mean precisely the
ability to reshape the world much more to its liking. The CCP also wants
soft power influence commensurate with its capacities and China’s his-
tory as Asia’s great power and source of much of the culture in its region,
notably Japan and Korea. It now regards these aspects as part of its index
of Comprehensive National Power with which it measures itself against
competitors, particularly Japan and America (Zhang 2010). To achieve its
goals, the Party-state can harness many thousands of skilled workers with
billions of dollars of investment and coordinate private, state and pub-
lic bodies under CCP leadership in ways that democracies are inherently
unable to copy. Moreover, it has covert national strategies underlying but
supporting such actions (Heath 2012; Norton 2015).
For achieving all of these aims a dramatic increase in soft power is
invaluable while economic and cultural success in-and-of-itself will also
generate soft power by validating the efficacy and also legitimacy of the
CCP’s institutions, policies, culture and values. China has therefore spent
billions of dollars building an infrastructure to promote its vision and get
its messages out. This also includes investing in international radio and
television networks, dramatically boosting its Internet presence as well as
using private companies to buy into Hollywood with businessmen like
Wang Jianlin hoping to eventually own at least one of America’s major stu-
dios. The rising importance of the Chinese box office for ensuring finan-
cial success of expensive blockbusters has already lead to self-censorship by
Hollywood studios, including Sony, and an increasing number of Chinese
stars appearing in and securing roles of more-and-more importance
(Groot 2017). Ironically, China has probably achieved already what Sony
with its enormous and longstanding investments in Hollywood could not.
More directly, Chinese investment in promoting the study of Chinese has
seen it pour billions of dollars into its misnamed Confucius Institutes and
Confucius Classrooms, which promote Mandarin Chinese, pinyin and
simplified characters, not Confucianism. The intention is to have some
500 such institutes in large cities around the world by 2020.
The importance of China’s soft power strategy is that it encompasses a
number of goals. Overall it aims to create a much more positive impression
of China and the policies of the CCP. Its promotion of Mandarin Chinese
is in part about helping achieve this goal but it is also about breaking the
dominance of English which many Chinese intellectuals see as unfairly dis-
advantaging them. The soft power aspect is very clear but not only is this
36 G. GROOT
about promoting China, it is also about negating the power of not only the
United States, which the CCP sees as its main enemy, but also that of Japan.
In its constant attacks on Japan’s wartime record, visits by Japanese lead-
ers to Yasukuni Shrine to honour war dead, including war criminals, and
China’s claims to sovereignty in waters bordering Japan are all intended
to weaken Japan’s standing at home, abroad and within China itself
(Liu 2014; Callahan 2015). As such the CCP presents a threat to Japan
at many levels. The great apparent weakness of China to-date though,
that it has very few fans of the type that animé has brought to Japan.
CONCLUSION
In some ways, this chapter has undermined the notion that Japanese cul-
ture, particularly its pop culture, has any real or significant soft power, at
least in the sense that Nye proposed the concept. Still, as we have seen,
this pop culture has been extremely important in making Japan popular
among young people around the world and this has flowed onto interest
in learning Japanese, visiting and studying in Japan. This might not be
political power, yet, but the power of the affection brought about by pop
culture is still important. The warning inherent in this overview is that
official insularity and lack of imagination is undermining Japan’s pop cul-
ture strengths in favour of shortsighted and limited economic gains.
Not only is the Japanese government missing out on developing an
inherent advantage, it is undermining its own ability to respond to a real
threat from China where the CCP wishes to see the delegitimisation of
Japan’s political system and its eventual submission to Chinese claims
about history, morality and sovereignty. For China, every student who
chooses to learn Chinese, even if only instrumentally to take advantage
of its economic dynamism, is a win for China and a loss for countries like
Japan. Were the Japanese government to realise and promote the plural-
ism inherent in its animé though, it might indeed start to develop the sort
of soft power that Nye advocates.
REFERENCES
Anderlini, Jamil. 2016. “Beijing Frets that Chinese Tourists Threaten its Soft
Power.” Financial Times, July 13. https://www.ft.com/content/b21e4b50-
485e-11e6-b387-64ab0a67014c
Animé Maru. 2016. “The Ten Types of Anime Fans.” February 8. http://www.
animemaru.com/the-ten-types-of-anime-fans/
Animé News Network. 2016. “Report: Anime Industry Up 12% in 2015.”

September 30. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2016-09-29/
report-anime-industry-up-12-percent-in-2015/.107055
The Association of Japanese Animations (AJA). 2016. Anime Industry Report
2015, January 2016. Accessed December 15. http://aja.gr.jp/english/
japan-anime-data
BBC News. 2007. “Manga Shows Game on Leader Hopes.” September 12.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6991720.stm
Beran, Dale. 2017. “4chan: The Skeleton Key to the Rise of Trump.” Accessed
February 14. https://medium.com/@DaleBeran/4chan-the-skeleton-key-to-
the-rise-of-trump-624e7cb798cb#.qtal9j2ps
Callahan, William A. 2015. “Identity and Security in China: The Negative Soft
Power of the China Dream.” Politics 35(3–4): 216–29.
Chen, Yu-Wen, and Duggan, Niall. 2016. “Soft Power and Tourism: A Study of
Chinese Outbound Tourism to Africa.” Journal of China and International
Relations 4(1): 45–66.
Clavel, Teru. 2014. “Japan Struggles to Keep Up as China Woos International
Students.” JapanTimes, October 26. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/community/
2014/10/26/issues/japan-struggles-keep-china-woos-international-
students/#.WJlhEhChi3U
Cool Japan Fund Inc. 2017. “What is Cool Japan Fund?” Last modified 2017.
https://www.cj-fund.co.jp/en/about/cjfund.html
Coughlan, Sean. 2014. “One in Seven Countries Has Leader Who Studied in
UK.” September 25. http://www.bbc.com/news/education-29361704
D’Anastasio, Cecelia. 2015. “The Invisible Labor Economy Behind Pirated
Japanese Comics.” Motherboard, April 9. https://motherboard.vice.com/en_
us/article/meet-the-scanlators
Dubber, John. 2015. “How Soft Power Can Help Meet International Challenges.” The
British Council, September. https://www.britishcouncil.org/organisation/policy-
insight-research/insight/how-soft-power-can-help-meet-international-challenges
Eddy, Max. 2016. “The Best Anime Streaming Services of 2016.” PC Mag,
November 23. http://www.pcmag.com/roundup/349255/the-best-anime-
streaming-services
Edwards, Brian T. 2016. After The American Century: The Ends of U.S. Culture in
the Middle East, Columbia, Columbia University Press.
Gans, John Jr. 2013. “Did Bruce Springsteen Win the Cold War?” Survival
4:169–78.
Groot, Gerry. 2017. “Making the World Safe (For China).” In China Yearbook
2016. Canberra: ANU Press.
Groot, Gerry. 2006. “Soft Power in the Asia-Pacific Post 9–11: The Cases of
China, Japan and India.” In Asia-Pacific and a New International Order, edited
by Purnendra Jain, Felix Patrikeeff, and Gerry Groot, 53–70. New York: Nova
Publishers.
38 G. GROOT
Green, Scott. 2016. “Ten Largest North American Anime Conventions of 2015
Ranked.” Crunchyroll, January 5. http://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-news/
2016/01/04/ten-largest-north-american-anime-conventions-of-2015-ranked
Hasegawa, Yuka. 2013. “Cultivating Self-Knowledge as Japan Specialists: Gender
and Consumption Behind Cool Japan.” Japan Studies Association Journal 11:
29–45.
Heath, Timothy R. 2012. “What Does China Want? Discerning the PRC’s
National Strategy.” Asian Security 8(1): 54–72.
Hiroyuki, Kotake. 2015. Nikkei Asian Review. “Language Teachers Work Hard to
Build Soft Power in the United States.” October 19. http://asia.nikkei.com/
Politics-Economy/International-Relations/Language-teachers-work-hard-to-build-
soft-power-in-US
Ince, Martin. 2014. “Prime Minister Abe to Accelerate Internationalisation of
Japanese Universities.” QS Intelligence Unit, May 19. http://www.iu.qs.
com/2014/05/prime-minister-abe-to-accelerate-internationalisation-of-
japanese-universities/
Ito, Mizuko, Okabe, Daisuke and Tsuji, Izumi, eds. 2012. Fandom Unbound:
Otaku Culture in a Connected World. New Haven/London: Yale University
Press.
Iwabuchi, Koichi. 2015. “Pop-Culture Diplomacy in Japan: Soft Power, Nation
Branding and the Question of International Cultural Exchange.” International
Journal of Cultural Policy 21(4): 419–32.
Iwabuchi, Koichi. 2002. Recentering Globalization: Popular Culture and Japanese
Transnationalism. Durham/London: Duke University Press.
Japan Foundation. 2010. “Japanese in Anime and Manga”. Japanese-Language
Institute, Kansai. Accessed December 12. http://www.anime-manga.jp/
Japan Foundation. 2013. Survey Report on Japanese Language Education Abroad
2012 (Excerpt). Accessed December 5, 2016. https://www.jpf.go.jp/e/
project/japanese/survey/result/
Japan Times. 2015. Editorial. “University of Tokyo Failing Non-Japanese
Students.” April 11. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2015/04/11/
editorials/university-tokyo-failing-non-japanese-students/#.WJlhZRChi3U
Japan Times. 2016. “Visitors to Japan Surge to Record 19.3 Million, Spend All
Time High of 3.48 Trillion Yen.” January 19.
Japan Student Services Organization (JASSO). 2016. “International Students in
Japan 2015.” March. http://www.jasso.go.jp/en/about/statistics/intl_stu-
dent/data2015.html
Jetro United States. 2017. “Anime and Manga”. Accessed December 9, 2016.
https://www.jetro.go.jp/usa/japansexports/animemanga.html
Johnson, Rich. 2016. “New York Comic Con 2016 Had a Record Attendance of
Over 180,000.” Accessed March 13, 2017. https://www.bleedingcool.
com/2016/10/09/new-york-comic-con-2016-had-a-record-attendance-
of-over-180000/
Kawashima, Nobuko. 2016. “Film Policy in Japan – An Isolated Species on the

Verge of Extinction?” International Journal of Cultural Policy 22 (5): 787–804.
Kelts, Roland. 2007. JAPANAMERICA: How Japanese Pop Culture Has Invaded
the US. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Kirschbaum, Erik. 2013. Rocking the Wall: Bruce Springsteen: The Berlin Concert
That Changed the World. New York: Berlinica Publishing.
Kyodo. 2015. “70% of Foreign Students Shun Offers from University of Tokyo
Degree Programs in English.” Japan Times, March 29. http://www.japan-
times.co.jp/news/2015/03/29/national/70-of-foreign-students-shun-
offers-from-university-of-tokyo-degree-programs-in-english/#.WJliCBChi3U
Lee, Hye-Kyung. 2011. “Participatory Media Fandom: A Case Study of Anime
Fansubbing.” Media, Culture & Society 33(8): 1131–47.
Lee, Seok Hwai. 2016. “Japan’s Anime Power.” The Straits Times, November 29.
http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/japans-anime-power
Leng, Rachel. 2013. “Gender Sexuality and Cosplay: A Case Study of Male-to-
Female Crossplay.” The Phoenix Papers. Harvard University (April) 89–110.
Liu, Xiaoming. 2014. “China and Britain Won the War Together.” The Telegraph,
January 1. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/10546442/Liu-Xiaoming-
China-and-Britain-won-the-war-together.html
McLaren, Sally. 2015. “Made in Cool Japan.” Griffith Review 49.
McLelland, Mark, ed. 2017. The End of Cool Japan: Ethical, Legal and Cultural
Challenges to Japanese Popular Culture. Oxon: Routledge.
McClory, Jonathan. 2010. “The New Persuaders: An International Ranking of
Soft Power.” Institute for Government. Accessed June 15, 2016. http://www.
instituteforgovernment.org.uk/sites/default/files/publications/The%20
new%20persuaders_0.pdf
McClory, Jonathan. 2016. The Soft Power 30: A Global Ranking. London: Portland
PR Limited.
McGray, Douglas. 2002. “Japan’s Gross National Cool.” Foreign Policy (June)
45–54.
McGray, Douglas. 2009. “Japan’s Gross National Cool.” Foreign Policy, November
11. http://foreignpolicy.com/2009/11/11/japans-gross-national-cool/
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. 2008. “Study in JAPAN Comprehensive
Guide.” Accessed December 19. http://www.studyjapan.go.jp/en/toj/
toj09e.html
Molloy, Thomas. 2006. “Projecting Soft Power Through English Language
Teaching.” The Defense Institute of Security Cooperation Studies Journal 28–29:
110–20.
Norton, Simon. 2015. China’s Grand Strategy. China Studies Centre. University
of Sydney, November 2015.
Nye, Joseph. 2004. Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics. New York:
Public Affairs.
40 G. GROOT
Okamoto, Takeshi. 2014. “Otaku Tourism and the Anime Pilgrimage Phenomenon
in Japan.” Japan Forum 27(1): 12–36.
Ooi, Can-Seng. 2016. “Soft Power, Tourism.” In Encyclopedia of Tourism, edited
by Jafar Jafari and Honggen Xiao, 1–2. Cham: Springer International Publishing.
Stokes, Bruce. 2016. “Hostile Neighbors: China vs. Japan.” Pew Research Center,
September 13. http://www.pewglobal.org/2016/09/13/hostile-neighbors-
china-vs-japan/
Poitras, Gilles. 2000. Anime Essentials: Everything a Fan Needs to Know. South
Bridge: Stonebridge Press.
The Pokémon Company. 2016. “Pokémon in Figures.” Accessed December 3.
http://www.pokemon.co.jp/corporate/en/data/
Pokémon Go Death Tracker. 2017. Last modified January 26. http://pokemon-
godeathtracker.com/
Rahmanh, Osmud, Wing-sun, Liu and Cheung, Brittany Hei-man. 2012.
“‘Cosplay’: Imaginative Self and Performing Identity.” Fashion Theory 16(3):
317–342.
Lies, Elaine. 2013. “Why Japan is Counting on Anime, Manga to Boost Economy.”
ABS-CBN, July 22. First published in Reuters.
RocketNews24. 2015. “Gackt Lashes Out at Cool Japan: ‘Almost No Results of
Japanese Culture Exported Overseas’.” July 3. https://www.japantoday.com/
categor y/entertainment/view/gackt-lashes-out-at-cool-japan-almost-
no-results-of-japanese-culture-exported-overseas
Sherman, Jennifer. 2016. “Shinkai’s Your Name, Setting Earns 18.5 Billion Yen
from Anime Pilgrimage.” Anime News Network, November 26. http://www.
animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2016-11-24/shinkai-your-name-setting-
earns-18.5-billion-yen-from-anime-pilgrimage/.109120
Spangler, Todd. 2014. “Hulu to Stream Anime Classic Sailor Moon.” Variety,
May 16. http://variety.com/2014/digital/news/hulu-to-stream-anime-
classic-sailor-moon-1201184012/
Spangler, Todd. 2016. “Crunchyroll, Funimation Reach Deal to Cross Licence
Anime Titles.” Variety, September 8. http://variety.com/2016/digital/
news/crunchyroll-funimation-anime-cross-license-1201855020/
Stevens, Carolyn S. 2010. “You Are What You Buy: Postmodern Consumption
and Fandom of Japanese Popular Culture.” Japanese Studies 30(2): 199–214.
Tobin, Joseph, ed. 2004. Pikachu’s Global Adventure: The Rise and Fall of Pokémon.
Durham: Duke University Press.
Urban Dictionary. 2017. Accessed December 8, 2016. http://www.urbandiction-
ary.com
Valalaskivi, Katja. 2013. “A Brand New Future? Cool Japan and the Social
Imaginiary of the Branded Nation.” Japan Forum 25(4): 485–504.
Wojciuk, Anna, Michalek, Maciej and Stromowska, Marta. 2015. “Education as a

Source and Tool of Soft Power in International Relations.” European Political
Science (April): 1–20.
Wurm, Alicia. 2014. “Anime and the Internet, the Impact of Fansubbing.” Reflexive
Horizons, February 18. http://www.reflexivehorizons.com/2014/02/18/
anime-and-the-internet-the-impact-of-fansubbing/
Yamamura, Takayoshi. 2014. “Contents Tourism and Local Community Response:
Lucky Star and Collaborative Anime Induced Tourism in Washimiya.” Japan
Forum 27(1): 59–81.
Zhang, Weihong. 2010. “China’s Cultural Future: From Soft Power to
Comprehensive National Power.” International Journal of Cultural Policy 16(4):
383–402.
CHAPTER 3
Cool Japan and Japanese Language: Why

Does Japan Need “Japan Fans”?
Kayoko Hashimoto
Because of its complex historical relationship with languages, Japan has

not been able to use languages to its advantage to increase its interna-
tional standing. One of the factors behind Japan’s perceived linguistic
weakness—both in mastering foreign languages and in spreading Japanese
language around the world—is the perceived dichotomy between Japanese
and foreigners, or Japan and the rest of the international community.
Since the 1980s, the ultimate goal of Japan’s internationalisation has been
to export Japan to the world (Yoshino 1995). Within the framework of
internationalisation, English language teaching is fundamentally seen as a
means of disseminating Japanese ideas among an international audience,
and education in the national language for Japanese people is important
to enable them to articulate Japan’s distinctiveness (Hashimoto 2013). In
terms of the promotion of Japanese language in the international com-
munity, while some hold the view that Japan is not proactive in spreading
the language because of an assumption that Japanese language is too dif-
ficult for foreigners to learn (Miller 1982; Weber 1999; Burgess 2012),
K. Hashimoto (*)

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_3
44 K. HASHIMOTO
others suspect that it is a reflection of a lack of pride or confidence in the

language and culture (McCrum 2010; Kato 2010) or an inferiority com-
plex in relation to the West (Suzuki 2001).
In this sense, it is hardly surprising that Japanese language is not on
the list of cultural items that Japan has been promoting through the Cool
Japan strategy. However, faced with the demographic issues brought
about by an ageing population and the growing number of foreign work-
ers in Japan, Japanese language teaching for foreigners overseas and in
Japan has become an urgent matter for the government. In fact, as will
be discussed later in this chapter, in 2011, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
(MOFA) defined Japanese language as an element of Japan’s soft power
along with aspects of Cool Japan such as anime and fashion. This chap-
ter explores how Japanese language has been viewed and presented by
the Japanese government in relation to Japan’s soft power and cultural
diplomacy. It examines government documents on soft power, Cool Japan
and Japanese language, and other relevant documents, applying critical
discourse analysis (Fairclough 2001; van Dijk 2008) as an analytical tool.
I use both the Japanese and English versions of publications where avail-
able, examine any differences between them and discuss the implications
of these differences.
The chapter comprises three parts. First, it analyses MOFA’s opinion
polls on Japan conducted in various countries and regions from 2000
onwards in order to investigate changes in the Japanese government’s
expectations of other countries’ views about Japan—its culture and lan-
guage in particular. Second, it examines policy documents on Japanese
language teaching and discusses continuities with or inconsistencies with
MOFA’s views of the role of Japanese language in cultural diplomacy.
Lastly, based on these findings, it argues how they impact on the way
Japanese language functions as one aspect of Japan’s soft power.
MOFA’S POLLS ON THE IMAGE OF JAPAN

MOFA has conducted polls on views of Japan in various countries and
regions around the world since the 1960s. Polls have been conducted
almost every year in the USA but do not seem to have been conducted
in China or South Korea, at least in the past 15 years. One of the regions
polled in 2016 was the “Asia region,” but the countries that comprised
this “Asia region” were in fact just the ten ASEAN countries and India.
Given that its relationships with China and South Korea were identified
COOL JAPAN AND JAPANESE LANGUAGE... 45
as weak points in terms of Japan’s soft power in the 2016 Portland’s Soft
Power 30 analysis,1 the MOFA polls appear to be little more than popu-
larity surveys, rather than aiming to collect genuine opinions and address
issues for improvement. Different sets of questions have been asked in
these polls in different countries and regions. The results (details and/or
summaries) are available at MOFA’s website at “Opinion Poll on Japan”
under “Public Diplomacy” in both Japanese and English,2 but not all of
the information is available in English. Interestingly, while the Japanese
term “opinion poll on Japan” has been unchanged, its English translation
has changed over the years. Until 2002, it was “Poll on opinions toward
Japan,” but since 2003, “Opinion Poll: Image of Japan” has generally
been used, with a few exceptions.3 The term “image of Japan” seems to
reflect the poll’s focus on popularity, rather than on reality.
In its Opinion Poll: Image of Japan in 2008, MOFA asked 300 nation-
als and permanent residents from each of “six major ASEAN countries”
(Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam)
whether they thought Japan and Japanese people were “cool.” The poll
was outsourced to a Singaporean company, and the data were collected
through face-to-face interviews (Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam)
or by e-mail (Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia). Participants were asked
to rate their answers on a scale of 1–10 (where 1 represents strongly dis-
agree and 10 represents strongly agree). Of them 42% of respondents gave
Japan ratings of 8 and above, while 36.5% rated the Japanese people 8 or
above. The responses varied according to the country—less than 20% of
the Thai participants gave a rating of 8 or above for either the country or
the people. “Coolness” was one of the 13–15 possible descriptions given
for Japan and Japanese people (see Table 3.1). The awkward and ambigu-
ous expression, “cool image,” stood out in the descriptions.
It is not known how the term “cool” was translated in the local languages
of the six countries in the poll. While the English version used the expres-
sion “cool image,” the Japanese original provided both a Japanese adjective
かっこいい (kakkoii),4 written in hiragana (one form of Japanese charac-
ters), and the English “cool” in brackets. The concept of “cool Japan”
was foreign to Japanese people when it was first popularised by McGray
in 2002. Since that time, the katakana (another form of Japanese charac-
ters) term クールジャパン (cool Japan) has been used by the government
and industry, occasionally with the equivalent Japanese adjective given
in brackets because not everybody in Japan is familiar with the informal
meaning of “cool.” Although the ubiquitous nature of Japanese–English
46 K. HASHIMOTO
Table 3.1 Q4&5: Descriptions of Japan and Japanese people

Japan %a Japanese people %a
1 Technologically advanced 85.9 Hardworking 81.0

2 Economically advanced 78.8 Efficient 72.3
3 High standard-of-living 75.4 Polite 62.6
4 Beautiful natural scenery 69.2 Work well as a team 62.4
5 Interesting culture 69.1 Traditional-minded 50.6
6 Transmits/spreads the 60.7 Keep their promises 50.1
animation/fashion/culinary
and other contemporary
cultures around the world
7 Peaceful 56.8 Obedient 44.7
8 Democratic 45.0 Calculative 41.4
9 Cool image 42.0 Kind/compassionate 37.7
10 Concerned only with its own 34.3 Cool image 36.5
economic growth and profits
11 People are difficult to understand 24.4 Aggressive 28.7
12 Oriented towards Europe and America 23.3 Have closed mind 18.8
13 Warlike 11.7 Arrogant 16.8
14 Copy what others do 15.8
15 Not reliable/lacking 9.9
in credibility
Source: 2008 MOFA Opinion Poll with ASEAN countries; original English; author’s emphasis
Respondents who ranked 8 or above on a scale of 1–10 (1: strongly disagree; 10: strongly agree)
a
expressions written in katakana has been well documented (Stanlaw 2004),

Kato (2006) argues that the purpose of using katakana words is to make
the meaning less clear and that katakana words are often deliberately cho-
sen by the authorities for this reason. “Cool Japan” could be interpreted as
one example of this practice, and the ambiguous nature of the term seems
to be convenient for national branding purposes (Iwabuchi 2015). Perhaps
contrary to MOFA’s expectations, the results of the opinion poll showed
that Japan’s “coolness” was not enthusiastically embraced by people in the
ASEAN countries. The 2008 poll of the ASEAN countries was the first
and last poll (to date) to ask about the “coolness” of Japan and Japanese
people, probably because of the disappointing result.
The descriptions of Japan and Japanese people used in the poll could
also be interpreted as a reflection of MOFA’s assumptions about how peo-
ple in the ASEAN countries viewed Japan and its people, because all of
the descriptions, including the negative ones, were basically stereotypes.
One of the descriptions of Japan, “people are difficult to understand,”
was actually given as “mysterious country” in the original Japanese. It

is not clear what the sources of such descriptions were, but a similar set
of questions had already been used in the 2006 poll in the USA. Issues
that could be relevant to respondents when they visited or lived in Japan,
such as gender equality, the multilingual and multicultural aspects of the
society, and its openness to foreigners, were not included in the descrip-
tions. It should also be noted that Japanese culture was described in two
different ways in the poll—“interesting culture” and “contemporary cul-
ture.” In the Japanese original, however, the term used was “new” culture
rather than “contemporary” culture. This differentiation was also evident
in another question about participants’ interest in Japan—Q6: Which
of the following aspects of Japan would you want to know more about?
(multiple answers allowed). The same question had been asked in the polls
conducted in 1997 and 2002, but “comics/animation” was added in the
2008 poll (Table 3.2).
Interest in comics and animation was not strong and varied according
to the country; only 8.4% of Indonesian respondents were interested in
them. In this question, Japanese culture was described in three differ-
ent ways—culture/arts, comics/animation and pop music. It seems that
“culture and arts” meant traditional culture, as opposed to new culture,
Table 3.2 Areas of inter-

%
est about Japan
1 Science/technology 54.4
2 Economy 42.4
3 Way of life/way of thinking 39.6
4 Culture/arts 36.7
5 Business development 35.0
6 Economic and technical cooperation 29.2
7 History/tradition 27.3
8 Comics/animation 19.7
9 Politics, foreign policy 16.8
10 Pop music 8.3
11 Sports 7.4
12 Others 0.6
13 Don’t know 0.0
Source: 2008 MOFA Opinion Poll in ASEAN countries;

original English; author’s emphasis
48 K. HASHIMOTO
which was represented by comics/animation and pop music. Japanese

language was not listed. Was this because Japanese language was consid-
ered to be part of traditional culture? As with the descriptions of Japan
and Japanese people, the list of areas of interest could be seen as a reflec-
tion of MOFA’s assumptions about people’s interest in Japanese culture
in the ASEAN countries. One obvious absence from the list was educa-
tion. Its absence is noteworthy partly because Japan has one of the most
highly educated labour forces among the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries5 and partly because
attracting international students has been seen by the government as an
important measure to increase the competitiveness of Japanese higher
education in the international market (Hashimoto forthcoming). Education
was still absent from the list of areas of interest in Japan in the 2016 poll of
the ten ASEAN countries.6 The absence of education provides an interest-
ing contrast with the inclusion of “Japanese people’s way of thinking” in
relation to Japanese culture in the poll. By citing “Japanese people’s way
of thinking” as a specific area of Japanese culture, MOFA was sending the
message that Japanese people think in a particular way, which is presumably
cultivated through education.
The view that culture means traditional culture and that pop culture
is synonymous with contemporary Japanese culture was evident in the
2007 opinion poll of four EU countries.7 The difference between the two
types of Japanese culture was emphasised in the 2011 poll of the USA.
The original Japanese question Q14a was “Japanese traditional culture or
pop culture—which are you more interested in?” but this was changed to
“Are you interested in the following aspects of Japanese culture?” in the
English version. The results were (1) traditional Japanese culture 29%; (2)
Japanese pop culture 2%; (3) both 30%; (4) neither 39%; (5) don’t know
0%. What was the intention of such a question? Did MOFA expect to find
that American people were more interested in pop culture than traditional
culture? Interestingly, this question was not asked again in later polls, prob-
ably because of the disappointing result. The grouping of traditional (old)
and contemporary (new) cultural items was apparent in Q14b (Table 3.3).
Clearly, items 1–8 are elements of traditional culture, which are regarded
as unique to Japan, and 9–15 are contemporary culture, which were later
described as “Japanese contents” in the 2016 poll of ASEAN countries.
They do not, however, represent the actual cultural interests of Japanese
people. For example, baseball and soccer are more popular than sumo and
other martial arts in Japan. Were such sports not listed in the poll because
Table 3.3 Interest in Japanese culture

%
1 Flower arrangement 55
2 Tea ceremony 52
3 Traditional Japanese theatre (Kabuki, Noh, Kyogen) 50
4 Calligraphy (Shodo) 63
5 Traditional Japanese music (Gagaku, Koto) 47
6 Japanese literature, Haiku 52
7 Sumo, Japanese martial arts (Karate, Judo, Kendo) 61
8 Bonsai 62
9 Animation 58
10 Manga 15
11 Video games 37
12 Pop music 22
13 Fashion 39
14 Movies and dramas 56
15 Cuisine 84
Source: 2011 MOFA Opinion Poll with U.S.A., author’s emphasis
they were not originally Japanese? Are Japanese soccer fans irrelevant to
the image of Japan? The answers to these questions depend on what is
considered to constitute Japanese culture. As Sun (2013) points out, if
any attempt to influence the international audience is also a message to the
domestic audience, what kind of message was MOFA sending to Japanese
people by describing Japanese culture in this way? This reminds us of the
recent case of the Japanese government’s advice regarding primary school
moral education textbooks. As part of the authorisation process, the
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT)
advised textbook publishers to replace “bakery” with “Japanese style con-
fectionary store,” and “playground with athletic equipment” with “shop
that sells traditional Japanese musical instruments,” in order to enhance
children’s familiarity with and attachment to Japanese everyday life and
local culture (Maeda et al. 2017). The Japanese bakery association pro-
tested against this directive, claiming that bread is an authentic part of
Japanese culture—bread was brought to Japan in the sixteenth century by
the Portuguese (Hidaka and Maeda 2017). This incident demonstrates
that MOFA’s descriptions of Japanese culture for foreigners in the opin-
ion polls on the image of Japan are not unrelated to the culture that the
government is promoting among Japanese people. In that case, what kind
50 K. HASHIMOTO
of image of Japanese language, which is called the national language in

the Japanese education system, has MOFA tried to project in these polls?
In 2010, the poll was conducted in Russia, the USA and Australia. In
the poll of Russia and Australia, for the first time, Japanese language was
added to the list of aspects of Japan that respondents wanted to know
more about. In the USA poll, respondents were asked about the languages
they were studying and the languages they hoped to study in the future.
The question about Japanese language learning experience, however, had
first been asked in the 2004 poll of Mongolia. Perhaps this was because
of the sumo boom, which produced many Mongolian-background sumo
wrestlers in Japan from the late 1990s. In 2011, MOFA asked for the
first time about respondents’ motivation for learning Japanese language
(Table 3.4).
The low proportion of respondents who were interested in studying
Japanese language because they wanted to understand manga reflected the
low level of interest in Japanese pop culture in general. In the 2011 poll
of the USA, a similar question was asked, but it was phrased differently—
Q15b: “Which of the following had the biggest influence on your interest
in learning the Japanese language?” Japanese pop culture was given at the
top of the list, but was chosen only by 10% of the respondents. Motivation
and influence are different matters in language learning, because motiva-
tion is related to future aspirations for using the language. In the 2016
poll of the ten ASEAN countries, 11 reasons were provided in relation
to the question about the reason for studying Japanese language, and the
results gave the top nine reasons (Table 3.5).
Table 3.4 Motivation for studying Japanese language: Mexico and South Africa
Mexico South Africaa
1 I like Japanese culture 40.8 29.4

2 It is useful for jobs 31.2 31.2
3 I want to read manga/understand manga & anime 6.0 7.9
4 I want to go to Japan 13.8 38.7
5 Other 4.8
6 Don’t know 3.4
Source: 2011 MOFA Opinion Poll, author’s translation

a
It appears that South African respondents were allowed to give multiple answers
Table 3.5 Reasons for studying Japanese language: ASEAN countries

%
1 To visit Japan 59
2 To understand Japanese culture and lifestyle 53
3 To travel to Japan for sightseeing 50
4 Useful in the future 45
5 To enjoy Japanese contents that I see or heara 44
6 To communicate with my Japanese friends better 35
7 To work in Japan 32
8 To study in Japan 28
9 Necessary for my work/business 24
Source: 2016 MOFA Opinion Poll, original English

a
The Japanese version says “Japanese contents (fashion, music, movie, drama, manga and anime)”
The results varied among the ten countries (Brunei, Cambodia, Laos
and Myanmar were added to the six major countries in the 2008 poll),
but the outsourced marketing company that conducted the polls observed
that the motivation to learn Japanese language for business, career and
educational purposes was shared by respondents in Brunei, Cambodia,
Laos and Myanmar.
As discussed above, the opinion polls on the image of Japan have evolved
over the past 15 years, but the artificial division between old (traditional)
and new (pop) culture has endured. Since questions about learning Japanese
language were introduced in 2010, an effort has been made to connect the
reason for learning the language with an interest in pop culture, while more
practical reasons—such as study and work opportunities—also started to
appear. The assumption that foreigners are interested in Japanese pop cul-
ture, however, has persisted—in the 2016 poll of Russia, the report noted
that Russians’ interest in Japanese contemporary culture—namely, anime,
computer games and manga—remained low (less than one-third). The next
section discusses how the findings of these polls reflect the relevant govern-
ment policies on Japanese language.
COOL JAPAN AND “THE VIEW OF FOREIGNERS”

As discussed in the previous section, the image of Japan that MOFA has
projected in its opinion polls on Japan is one dimensional. This reflects the
definition of “cool Japan” provided by the Cool Japan Strategy Promotion
52 K. HASHIMOTO
Council, which was organised by the Cabinet Office to promote Cool

Japan strategies that would enable the public and private sectors to “make
money” in the lead-up to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and beyond.8 The
council proposed the “Cool Japan Strategy Public–Private Collaboration
Initiative” in June 2015. In the proposal, Cool Japan was defined as follows:
Cool Japan refers to the aspects of Japanese culture that non-Japanese per-
ceive as “cool.” The target of Cool Japan “encompasses everything from
games, manga, anime, and other forms of content, fashion, commercial
products, Japanese cuisine, and traditional culture to robots, eco-friendly
technologies, and other high-tech industrial products.” (Cool Japan
Strategy Promotion Council 2015.9 Original English. Author’s emphasis)
The document was available in both Japanese and English, and in the
Japanese original, the term “foreigners” was used in place of “non-
Japanese.” It appears that the Cool Japan strategy is a money-making
venture aimed at promoting products and services that foreigners will
purchase overseas and in Japan because they find them “cool,” rather than
because these products and services represent what Japanese people value
and want to share with the world. In this sense, the actual meaning of
“cool” does not really matter as long as foreigners purchase the goods
and services, because the ultimate goal is financial gain.10 This explains
why Japanese language and education were not included in the features
of Japan that MOFA has tried to project as part of the image of Japan in
the opinion polls—they are not a source of quick financial gains. Because
the coolness of Japan’s products and services is dependent on foreigners’
perceptions, to incorporating “views of foreigners,” particularly those of
foreigners who are “Japan fans,” was seen as essential for the success of
the Cool Japan strategy. It is unlikely, however, that such foreigners will
have a critical view of Japan if they are already “Japan fans.” The practice
of using “views of foreigners” to promote Japan and Japanese culture is
also observed in education for Japanese children.
After the “bakery” incident in the textbook authorisation process out-
lined earlier, the same newspaper reported on how some of the approved
school textbooks presented Japan, in line with the government’s directives
that they should incorporate Japanese tradition and culture (Sugiyama
et al. 2017). The newspaper article gave two examples of stories about
the re-discovery of “Japan’s goodness” from foreigners’ perspectives in
primary school textbooks—one was about a Brazilian restaurant owner

praising the honesty of Japanese people, saying “Japanese and people of
Japanese descent do not cheat”; the other was about American school
children enjoying the tastiness of Japanese lunch boxes. In these examples,
“views of foreigners” were used as a form of “endorsement” of what the
government wants to promote as Japanese tradition and culture. What
kind of message, however, are these stories sending to school children?—
Japanese are honest people, unlike Brazilians? Children should bring
Japanese-style lunch boxes to school because even Americans like them?
The article also reported that one high school history textbook featured
pop culture such as anime, games and fashion as “Japanese culture spread-
ing around the world.” These examples suggest that there is some confu-
sion between the cultural items that Japan has been marketing for financial
gain and the culture Japan has fostered throughout its history. This confu-
sion also allows the artificial differentiation of Japanese culture and people
from the rest of the world, and the convenient use of “views of foreigners”
as evidence of Japan’s goodness, which leads to an uncritical approach to
Japanese culture.
As Groot points out in Chap. 2, there are certain negative features
associated with the pop culture represented by anime and manga. One of
the issues that reflect the problems in the contemporary Japanese society is
“characters,” which are a distinctive part of pop culture. Doi (2014) argues
that to play a certain “character” in daily life is one way to cope with stress-
ful relationships in a society that tends to exclude people who do not con-
form, but that because of the superficial and temporary nature of playing a
character, it does not allow people to grow as individuals through solving
problems by themselves. This is related to withdrawal (hikikomori) and
bullying in schools and in the workplace, which have been serious prob-
lems in Japan. The term otaku, which refers to people who are obsessed
with games and manga to the detriment of their social skills, is not used
in a pejorative sense outside Japan, as Nomura and Mochizuki explain
in Chap. 9. But in Japan it is often associated with social withdrawal and
likely targets for bullying. In fact, some of my Australian students who
had been to Japan were aware of the different applications of the term to
foreigners and Japanese—they told me that when they were in Japan they
often introduced themselves to Japanese people saying “I’m otaku” in
Japanese, which was usually received with a smile, but they were also aware
that Japanese people would not use the term in the same way as they did.
54 K. HASHIMOTO
Another issue is the sexually explicit nature of the character presenta-

tions.11 In 2015, when the G7 Summit was held in Ise-Shima in West
Japan, the local government endorsed posters and panels that featured
a promotional (anime) character of a woman diver, but they were with-
drawn due to protests by locals, who saw them as sexist and an insult to
women divers (Asahi Shimbun 5 November 2015). Similarly, in Gifu, a
promotional poster for the local tourism industry, which featured a female
character in a sexually explicit pose, was taken down because of public
complaints (The Huffington Post 1 December 2015). In both cases, the
local authorities seemed to assume that using anime was an effective pub-
lic relations (PR) practice because of its popularity and did not consider
the sexually explicit messages to be a problem because they were using
“characters,” not real human beings. Although gender issues are not a
focus of this study, it should be noted that this is not unrelated to Japan’s
international standing in terms of gender equality, which has worsened in
recent years (Thomas and Mie 2016).12
The uncritical and self-congratulatory nature of the promotion of
Japanese culture, however, could be interpreted as a reflection of the need
for reassurance as Japan tries to revitalise itself.
COOL JAPAN, JAPANESE LANGUAGE AND JAPAN’S

SOFT POWER
In 2011, MOFA submitted a budgetary request for “special projects
for revival of vigorous/active Japan” (元気な日本復活). “Expansion
of growth opportunities through soft power”13 was one of the projects
included in this request. The purposes and effects of the project were:
• The creative power of “Cool Japan,” such as anime and fashion, and the
power of Japanese culture, including Japanese language, are Japan’s “Soft
Power.” The strategic dissemination of these and improvement of Japan’s
brand power will strengthen Japan’s diplomacy and support the overseas
development of related industries, which have not had the opportunity
for growth.
• The expansion of Japanese language courses overseas will increase the num-
ber of excellent local human resources with Japanese language skills includ-
ing nurse and care-worker candidates under the EPA. The expansion of
Japanese language learning, which is a gateway for understanding Japanese
culture, society, politics and economy, will increase the number of people
who understand and feel attachment to Japan. (Author’s translation and
emphasis)
In the document, spreading Japanese language was described as part of

Japan’s economic strategy in Asia. The definition of Japan’s soft power
as a combination of the creative power of Cool Japan and Japanese cul-
tural power including Japanese language is interesting because it explains
MOFA’s efforts to project an image that foreigners want to learn Japanese
language because of an interest in pop culture in the opinion polls on
Japan, as discussed earlier. In fact, at around the same time as this bud-
getary request for the soft power project was made, MOFA began to
ask about interest in Japanese language in the opinion polls. The issue
of Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA) nurses and care workers as
human resources with Japanese language skills needs further explana-
tion. As investigated in Kusunoki’s chapter (Chap. 6), after its popula-
tion began to decline in around 2005, Japan signed EPA with Indonesia
and the Philippines in 2008 and 2009 respectively (and with Vietnam in
2014). The employment of trainee nurses and care workers in Japanese
hospitals was part of these agreements, with the ultimate goal of enabling
the trainees to pass the national exams and be qualified to work in Japan
in the longer term, which requires a high level of Japanese language pro-
ficiency. In this sense, the inclusion of Japanese language as an element
of Japan’s soft power seems to be reactive, and not based on a long-term
language policy.
The view that foreigners who are learning Japanese language are “Japan
fans” and that Japan needs to increase the number of such foreigners is
another form of rhetoric that is used consistently in government policy
documents. In 2008, MOFA’s international exchange council produced a
report entitled “Measures and framework to strengthen our country’s dis-
semination power: in order to increase the number of ‘Japan’ sympathisers
and fans” (author’s translation).14 The report was based on the understand-
ing that, due to the globalisation of the economy and the development
of media and IT technology, it was no longer possible to achieve diplo-
macy without so-called public diplomacy, which involves direct engage-
ment with people in target countries and their opinions. The term “public
diplomacy” was written in katakana in the report, which indicates that the
concept was still new to Japan. As many studies on Japanese diplomacy
point out, Japan’s diplomacy has been heavily focused on “exchange” or
“trade,” and consequently Japan has not been particularly adept at directly
engaging with local people. It seems that pop culture was regarded as an
ideal source of such “public diplomacy” that would facilitate engagement
with locals. Although the role of Japanese language was not clearly defined
56 K. HASHIMOTO
in the report, the diversity of Japanese language learners was recognised

in relation to foreign workers, such as those involved in the EPA schemes.
Issues relating to Japanese language are handled by different ministries
and agencies within the Japanese government. While MOFA is in charge
of overseas Japanese language education through the Japan Foundation,
MEXT is responsible for Japanese language education for Japanese and
foreigners living in Japan through the Agency of Cultural Affairs. In 2005,
just after the publication of Nye’s Soft Power: The Means to Success in World
Politics (2004), MEXT proposed “MEXT’s International Strategies.”15
The proposal began with the following statement:
Given the on-going globalisation of the economy and society, in order to

continue to be acknowledged and trusted as “a nation with dignity” and to
maintain an intellectual presence, we need to establish a long-term national
vision for the future of our country over the next two or three decades. In
the process of establishing such a national vision, it is essential to consider
strengthening the so-called soft power that lies in the appeal of aspects of
Japanese culture such as science and technology, academic research, art and
cultural assets, and lifestyle, as well as developing and expanding hard power
such as economic power within the international society through the culti-
vation of human resources as the basis of the nation. (Author’s translation
and emphasis)
The use of the expression “a nation with dignity” coincides with the pub-
lication of the popular book The Dignity of the Nation (Fujiwara 2005),
which was written by a conservative academic who called for a return to
Japan’s ancient values to counter the wave of globalisation. The use of
this expression suggests that MEXT endorsed some of the views outlined
in the book. In its statement, MEXT used the term “power” in the sense
of self-containment, rather than as a way to influence other nations and
people. The above statement could be read as meaning that Japan wanted
to maintain its “dignity”—whatever that was—in the face of the adverse
effects of globalisation. Japanese language was not mentioned in the pro-
posal, presumably because the language was regarded as part of Japanese
culture. But in Fujiwara’s book, Japanese language or the national language
was presented as the embodiment of the motherland. This self-contained
view of the world that is based on the inseparable relationship between the
language, the nation and the people was foreshadowed in the 2001 report
on the place of Japanese language in international society16 delivered by
the national language council of the Agency of Cultural Affairs:
I. Japanese language in international society

3. Basic view on the international spread of Japanese language
Dissemination of information in Japanese language means dissemina-
tion of the Japanese way of thinking and Japanese culture in a broad
sense. Although it is important for people around the world to deepen
their understanding of Japan and Japanese people by receiving a range of
information and communicating in Japanese, the international spread of
Japanese language requires the condition that Japanese language, Japan
and Japanese people are attractive, and that Japanese people themselves
are proud of them. It is therefore necessary for Japanese people to make a
conscious effort to be attractive personally and culturally to people from
other countries. (Author’s translation)
The rhetoric that Japanese language will spread because Japan, its people
and the language are attractive to the rest of the world again suggests a
self-contained view about engagement with the international community.
In what sense are they attractive to people around the world? What do
they offer? What are the shared values? More specifically, language is not a
consumer item—it requires continuous effort and commitment from each
individual to enable them to use the language. So why do individual learn-
ers make such an effort? What do they want to achieve? Certainly not to
become Japan sympathisers or fans, as the government wishes. In Japan’s
policy documents on foreign nationals, however, these language learners
are not recognised as individuals but are seen as useful “human resources”
for Japan.
“JAPANESE LANGUAGE HUMAN RESOURCES”

The term “human resources” has been used in Japanese government poli-
cies on foreign nationals to describe foreign workers, which indicates an
emphasis on the usefulness of foreigners to Japanese society. This instru-
mental view of foreigners is evident, for example, in the new immigra-
tion scheme to attract skilled workers, which is known as “points-based
preferential immigration treatment for highly-skilled foreign profession-
als.”17 The original Japanese term for “highly-skilled foreign professionals”
is in fact “high-level human resources.” In relation to Japanese language,
the new expression 日本語人材 (Japanese language human resources),
which is defined as “foreigners who are learning or have learned Japanese
language,” was used by MOFA:
58 K. HASHIMOTO
If we call foreigners who are learning (or who have learned) Japanese
language “Japanese language human resources,” such “Japanese language
human resources” are certainly valuable assets for Japan. In other words,
these kinds of human resources who can play an active role in the interna-
tional community will be core members of pro-Japanese groups who are
interested in Japanese people, society and culture, and develop a deeper
understanding of Japan. (MOFA 2013. Author’s translation)
This statement is taken from the final report of MOFA’s advisory panel on
the overseas promotion of Japanese language in 2013. The report is the
summary of the meetings organised to discuss measures to promote the
role of Japanese language in politics, economics and culture. In this case,
Japan sympathisers or fans were described as “pro-Japanese groups.” The
panel believed that foreigners with Japanese language skills would offset
the loss experienced through Japan’s ageing population:
As the government has promoted the intake of highly-skilled human

resources as a response to the aging population and the low birth rate, culti-
vating and utilising skilled “Japanese language human resources” will poten-
tially help to achieve Japan’s recovery and development. It is very important
to consider measures to promote Japanese language overseas, in line with
this view. (MOFA 2013. Author’s translation)
CONCLUSION
As I have discussed in this chapter, the Japanese government’s view of
engagement with the international community by exercising cultural
influence, including that of the language, has changed significantly over
the past 15 years. The concept of soft power does not seem to have been
well digested in Japan yet, and “public diplomacy” is not one of Japan’s
strengths because it requires direct engagement with local communities
and responses suited to the local context—such requirements certainly
cannot be met based on the Japan versus the other dichotomy. Because
of its perception of the inseparable relationship between the nation, the
people and the language, the government initially did not see the need
to promote Japanese language. Faced with changing demographic condi-
tions, however, the government came to see Japanese language teaching as
an urgent matter, but this led to the treatment of Japanese language learn-
ers as useful “resources” for Japan without acknowledging the individual
relationships between foreigners and Japanese language.
The rhetoric that foreigners want to learn Japanese language because of

their interest in anime and manga, which originated with the Cool Japan
marketing strategy, has been so entrenched that it has produced confusion
and misconceptions. As MOFA’s opinion polls demonstrate, each country
and region has different views and expectations of Japan, and such gener-
alisations about Japanese language learners do not help to address specific
local conditions and issues. The uncritical and self-congratulatory nature
of the promotion of Japanese culture mirrors a tendency within Japanese
society to seek reassurance based on their belief in an unchanging Japanese
culture and tradition that is unique to Japanese people. Above all, the fact
that such rhetoric is often quoted and accepted by the public as well as
policymakers and educators indicates a lack of expertise in language teach-
ing and planning in contemporary Japan.
NOTES
1. http://softpower30.portland-communications.com/. Accessed 15 March
2017.
2. http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/culture/pr/index.html. Accessed 2 April
2017.
3. For example, “Survey in the Russian Federation of the public opinion on
Japan” in 2005 and “Opinion poll on Japan” in Australia in 2015.
4. According to Japanese dictionaries, the Japanese adjective is defined as
something that stands and looks good to other people (Kojien 3rd edi-
tion), including attitudes and behaviour that are refreshing and therefore
attractive (Digital Daijisen).
5. 2016 Better Life Index. http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/topics/
education/. Accessed 31 March 2017.
6. They were science/technology, tourism, culture (including traditional cul-
ture, pop music, Japanese food), economy, companies/business, economic
and technical cooperation, history and politics/diplomacy and security.
7. The poll used the expression “contemporary Japanese culture (pop
culture).”
8. According to the website of the Cool Japan strategy, the money-making
mechanism has three steps: (1) dissemination of information (create Japan
boom), (2) overseas development by providing goods and services (mak-
ing money overseas) and (3) inbound promotion to encourage visitors’
consumption (making money in Japan). http://www.cao.go.jp/cool_
japan/about/about.html. Accessed 31 March 2017.
9. Cool Japan Strategy Public–Private Collaboration Initiative. http://www.
cao.go.jp/cool_japan/english/pdf/published_document2.pdf
60 K. HASHIMOTO
10. Although attracting international students has been an important part of

the education industries in many countries, including those in Asia, this has
not been the case in Japan, partly due to language problems. For details see
Hashimoto (forthcoming).
11. See McLelland (2017) for legal and ethical issues surrounding Japanese
pop culture.
12. According to the Global Gender Gap Report 2016 by the World Economic
Forum (WEF), Japan ranked 111th in a global gender inequality listing,
down from 101st in the previous year.
13. The Japanese original document is ソフトパワーを通じた成長機会の拡大.
Accessed 25 March 2017. http://www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/annai/yosan_
kessan/mofa_yosan_kessan/fukkatsuwaku/index.html
14. The Japanese title of the report is 我が国の発信力強化のための施策と体制-
「日本」の理解者とファンを増やすために http://www.mofa.go.jp/
mofaj/annai/shingikai/koryu/toshin_ts_k.html. The full report is available at:
http://www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/annai/shingikai/koryu/pdfs/toshin_ts.pdf
15. 文部科学省における国際戦略(提言) [MEXT’s international strategies:
proposal]. Accessed 30 March 2017. http://www.mext.go.jp/a_menu/
kokusai/senryaku/index.htm
16. The Japanese original is 国際社会に対応する日本語の在り方. Accessed
25 February 2017. http://www.bunka.go.jp/kokugo_nihongo/sisaku/
joho/joho/kakuki/22/tosin04/index.html.
17. See http://www.immi-moj.go.jp/newimmiact_3/en/index.html. Accessed
28 March 2017.
REFERENCES
Burgess, Chris. 2012. “It’s Better if They Speak Broken Japanese?” In Language
and Citizenship in Japan, edited by Nanette Gottlieb, 37–57. New York:
Routledge.
Doi, Takayoshi. 2014. きゃら化する・される子どもたち–排除型社会における
新たな人間像 [Children Who Become Characterised or Being Characterised:
New Human Beings in the Society of Exclusion]. Tokyo: Iwanami.
Fairclough, Norman. 2001. “Critical Discourse Analysis as a Method in Social
Scientific Research.” In Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis, edited by Ruth
Wodak and Michael Meyer, 121–38. London: Sage Publications.
Fujiwara, Masahiko. 2005. 国家の品格 [The Dignity of the Nation]. Tokyo:
Shinchosha.
Hashimoto, Kayoko. 2013. “The Japanisation of English Language Education:
Promotion of the National Language Within Foreign Language Policy.” In
Language Polices in Education: Critical Issues, Second edition, edited by James
W. Tollefson, 175–90. London: Routledge.
Hashimoto, Kayoko. forthcoming. “Japan’s ‘Super Global Universities’ Scheme:

Why Do Foreign Student Numbers Matter?” In Reciprocal Responses Regarding
Adaptability: International Students and Stakeholders, edited by Ly Tran, Abe
Ata and Indy Liyanage. London: Routledge.
Hidaka, Nao and Ikuho Maeda. 2017. 「パンこそ日本らしい文化では」パン屋
さんたちの憤り [“Bread Is Proper Japanese Culture, Isn’t It?” Bakers’
Resentment]. 6 April. Asahi Shimbun Digital.
Iwabuchi, Koichi. 2015. “Pop-culture Diplomacy in Japan: Soft Power, Nation
Branding and the Question of ‘International Cultural Exchange.” International
Journal of Cultural Policy 21:419–32.
Kato, Shuichi. 2006. 悲しいカタカナ語 [Sad Katakana Words]. 19 April. Asahi
Shimbun (evening edition).
Kato, Shuichi. 2010. 私にとっての20世紀-付最後のメッセージ [My 20th
Century: With Last Message]. Tokyo: Iwanami.
Maeda, Ikuho, Yusuke Sugano, Tsukasa Kimura and Kaori Sawaki. 2017. パン屋
「郷土愛不足」で和菓子屋に-道徳の教科書検定 [Bakery Became Japanese-
Style Confectionery Store Due to Lack of Attachment to Hometown:
Authorisation of Moral Education Textbooks]. 24 March. Asahi Shimbun
Digital.
McCrum, Robert. 2010. Globish: How the English Language Became the World’s
Language. London: Penguin.
McGray, Douglas. 2002. “Japan’s Gross National Cool.” Foreign Policy 130:45–54.
McLelland, Mark, ed. 2017. The End of Cool Japan: Ethical, Legal and Cultural
Challenges to Japanese Popular Culture. Oxon: Routledge.
Miller, Roy Andrew. 1982. Japan’s Modern Myth: The Language and Beyond.
New York: Weather Hill.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 2013. 海外における日本語の普及促進に関する有識
者懇会-最終報告書 [Advisory Panel for Promotion of Japanese Language
Overseas: Final Report]. Accessed 25 January 2017. http://www.mofa.go.jp/
mofaj/files/000022908.pdf
Stanlaw, James. 2004. Japanese English: Language and Culture Contact. Hong
Kong: Hong Kong University Press.
Sugiyama, Mariko, Shintaro Kaji, Koki Mori and Kaori Sawaki. 2017. 伝統・愛国
心・郷土愛…教科書に描かれる「日本」とは? [Tradition, Patriotism, Love
for Hometown: “Japan” Described in Textbooks]. 17 April. Asahi Shimbun
Digital.
Sun, Jing. 2013. Japan and China as Charm Rivals: Soft Power in Regional
Diplomacy. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
Suzuki, Takao. 2001. 英語はいらない!? [We Don’t Need English!?]. Tokyo: PHP.
Thomas, Beatrice and Ayako Mie. 2016. “Japan Slides to 111th in WEF Gender
Equality Rankings.” The Japan Times. 26 October.
62 K. HASHIMOTO
van Dijk, Teun A. 2008. Discourse and Power. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Weber, George. 1999. “The World’s 10 Most Influential Languages.” AATF
National Bulletin 24:22–8.
Yoshino, Kosaku. 1995. Cultural Nationalism in Contemporary Japan. London:
Routledge.
PART II
Japanese Language and the Historical

Construction of Asia
CHAPTER 4
Japanese Language Education

in the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity
Sphere and the Kokuji Mondai
(National Script Problem)
Astghik Hovhannisyan
In 1942, in an article written for the journal Nihongo (Japanese), linguist

and bureaucrat Andō Masatsugu (1878–1952), when discussing the issue of
the “expansion” of Japanese language to the “southern territories”,1 wrote:
“When it comes to the expansion and spread of Japanese language … it is
impossible to teach them [Southeast Asians] high quality Japanese from the
beginning. Giving them the minimum amount of Japanese that they will need
and then gradually raising its level would be a good policy” (Andō 1942,
10).2 While noting that it would be premature to argue that Japanese was
a particularly difficult language to learn, Andō added that its writing system
was extremely complicated even for native speakers and went on to suggest
that the first step towards the easy spread of Japanese would be the simplifica-
tion of its writing system. In particular, he suggested that those responsible
for language dissemination and education should “choose either hiragana or
A. Hovhannisyan (*)
Graduate School of Language and Society, Hitotsubashi University,
Kunitachi, Tokyo, Japan

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_4
66 A. HOVHANNISYAN
katakana, simplify the kana orthography, use only kana for both reading and
writing, and limit the use of kanji to a few characters, such as one, two, three,
four” (Andō 1942, 11). Andō, who might have taken a different stand on
Japanese language teaching in Taiwan and Korea,3 was in favour of spreading
Japanese in the Great East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere by non-coercive means.
For instance, in an article written in 1943, while claiming that it was “Japan’s
duty” to teach its language, he noted that the coercive spread of Japanese
language in the “southern territories” was not advisable (Andō 1943, 8). One
of the first steps towards making Japanese language attractive to learn and
giving it universal characteristics, according to Andō and many others, was to
simplify its writing system.
Andō was hardly alone in his conviction about the need for the “soft”
spread of Japanese. As Duus (1996) argues, in the post-WWI world, colo-
nialism was no longer legitimate and “new systems of domination” were
justified either by the concept of mandates or by the ideology of pan-
nationalism. According to Duus, “the principal Japanese response to the
intellectual dilemma of interwar imperialism was the vision of a Greater
East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere” (Duus 1996, 58), where nations were sup-
posed to cooperate with each other. While in the official colonies such as
Taiwan and Korea Japanese language education was often associated with
coercion and the suppression of local languages, in the case of “unofficial
colonies”, at least in terms of rhetoric, local languages were meant to be
respected and Japanese was meant to coexist with them (Yasuda 1997, 16).
In 1942, after Japan’s advance into Southeast Asia, Japan adopted an
educational policy that, among other things, aimed to teach Japanese as
the lingua franca of the area (Akashi 2008, 48). As Matsuoka (Chap. 5, this
volume) demonstrates, those involved in the implementation of Japanese
language education at that time, such as Jinbo Kotaro, often made little
effort to make the language attractive to learn, taking it for granted that
Southeast Asians would want to learn Japanese. However, Nye suggests
that “when a country’s culture includes universal values and its policies
promote values and interests that others share, it increases the probability
of obtaining its desired outcomes because of the relationships of attrac-
tion and duty that it creates” (Nye 2004, 11). What, then, makes a lan-
guage attractive to learn? Is it the economic might of the country where
it is spoken or the qualities of the language itself? Could script reforms
make Japanese language more universal and thus more appealing to learn,
as many reform advocates such as Andō asserted? Although we cannot
know the answer, this chapter examines various advocates’ arguments for
JAPANESE LANGUAGE EDUCATION IN THE GREATER EAST ASIA... 67
script reform, which they suggested would facilitate the successful spread
of Japanese language in Southeast Asia.
Calls to rationalise the Japanese script by abolishing kanji or limiting
the number and adopting a phonetic alphabet (this, along with attempts
to reform the kana orthography, is known as the “national script problem”
or 国字問題) started in the early Meiji period, when people of various
political and ideological backgrounds campaigned for the simplification
of the “national script” for various reasons such as advancing civilisation
and the spread of education. As Yasuda (2016) notes, while arguments
for kanji abolition for the sake of civilisation and enlightenment lost their
appeal in the early twentieth century, advocates of script reform kept com-
ing up with new arguments to suit the changing times.
This chapter will discuss the arguments for kanji abolition during the
wartime period, when Japanese policymakers, bureaucrats, and linguists
were occupied with the issue of the spread of Japanese language in the
“southern territories”. Analysing articles published in various journals at
the time, this chapter will demonstrate that the advocates of kanji abolition
and limitation viewed the expansion of the Japanese Empire as an oppor-
tunity to renew and reinvent their arguments for script reform. They were
convinced that only the simplification of the overly complicated Japanese
writing system would enable the spread of the language in the Greater
East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere.
Given the sheer number of articles written about Japanese language
education in the late 1930s and 1940s, the analysis in this chapter will focus
on the journals Rō maji (Roman letters) published by Rō maji Hirome-
kai (Society for Propagation of Romanisation) and Kana no Hikari (The
Light of Kana) published by Kanamoji-kai (The Kana Society). It also
makes reference to other journals such as Nihongo (Japanese), Kotoba
(Language), and Kokugo kyoiku (National language education), as well as
books and articles by linguists and educators that were published in the
1930s and 1940s. The particular journals and periodicals were chosen for
analysis because of their focus on issues such as language policy and educa-
tion in the overseas territories.
MODERN JAPAN AND ATTEMPTS TO REFORM

THE “NATIONAL SCRIPT”
As recently as 2011, Tanaka Katsuhiko published a book entitled 漢字

が日本語をほろぼす (Kanji are destroying Japanese language), in which
he argued that the excessive use of kanji made Japanese a “closed-off ”
68 A. HOVHANNISYAN
language and advocated a reduction in the number of kanji in order to

make the language more “open”. Tanaka’s position, which could be
categorised as kanji abolitionism (漢字廃止論), while far from being
mainstream, is not rare either. While some, such as Sasahara (2014)
and Watanabe (1995), hail kanji as a form of script strongly connected
with the Japanese mind and spirit, others such as Abe (2002, 2015) and
Kadoya (2009) see kanji as a form of oppression that makes life harder
for the most disadvantaged members of society. Abe (2002) gives the
example of the blind, who often have to use Braille kanji rather than kana-
based Japanese Braille, and argues that kanji-based Braille is needlessly
time consuming and simply unnecessary for the blind.
As mentioned above, the question of how Japanese language should be
written, which later came to be known as the “national language and script
problem” (国語国字問題) or simply “national script problem” (国字問題),
emerged with Japan’s modernisation in the Meiji period. As Hirai (1948) and
Twine (1983) point out, criticisms of kanji appeared as early as the Edo era
when scholars Arai Hakuseki (1657–1725), Honda Toshiaki (1744–1821),
and a few others who had contact with Westerners expressed admiration for
the conciseness of the alphabet. However, organised attempts to reform the
script began only after Japan entered the modern period. The reason that
written Japanese only came to be seen as a problem in the modern period is
provided by Twine.
Central to the modernization process is the nationwide dispersion through

improved systems of communication of information deemed by leaders nec-
essary to permit the effective reshaping of political, social, and economic
structures. In Japan, as we know, aspects of the national language also
required reshaping in order to permit it to function effectively as a vehicle
for the spread of this information. It became increasingly apparent as the
Meiji Period advanced that modernization of the written language would be
a prerequisite for the smooth attainment of modernisation across the board.
(Twine 1991, 109)
In other words, reshaping the language, which included simplification

of the writing system, was deemed necessary for the modernisation of
Japan. One of the early advocates of script reform was Maejima Hisoka,
known for his role in the establishment of the Japanese postal system, who
famously outlined his proposals in “On the abolition of Kanji” (漢字御
廃止之議, 1866) and “Proposal for teaching Japanese language” (国文教
育之儀ニ付建議, 1869). Maejima argued for the need to abandon kanji
and adopt a syllabic kana script for the more effective delivery of modern
education (Lee 2009, 24–7).
Those who made a case for reforming the Japanese writing system
usually argued for kanji abolition or limitation, and supporters of kanji
abolition mainly advocated the adoption of phonetic scripts such as
katakana or the Roman alphabet. Maejima was an advocate of kana, and,
as well as submitting recommendations about script reform to authori-
ties, he published the Mainichi Hiragana Shinbunshi (Everyday Hiragana
Newspaper) from 1873 to 1874. Among the other early advocates of kana
were Watanabe Shūjirō and scholar of “Western learning” and business-
man Shimizu Usaburō . The Roman alphabet attracted intellectuals such as
Nanbu Yoshikazu, Nishi Amane, and Tanakadate Aikitsu. Soon kana and
Rō maji advocates formed societies to promote their respective causes. The
Kana Club (Kana no kai) was formed in 1883 with the merging of three
groups, Kana no tomo (Friends of Kana), Iroha-kai (Iroha Club), and
Irohabun-kai (Irohabun Club), and the Rō maji Club (Rō maji-kai) was
formed in 1885. Differences in opinions about orthography, style, and so
on within the clubs led to divisions and the establishment of new clubs.
Among these were the Rō maji Hirome-kai (Society for Propagation of
Romanisation), which was established in 1905 and published the monthly
magazine Rō maji to promote its cause, and Nippon no Rō mazi-sya
(Japanese Association for Romanisation), which was established in 1909
and published journals such as Romazi no Nippon (Rō maji’s Japan) and
Romazi syonen (Rō maji for Youth).4 Another club, Nihon no Rō mazi-kai
(Romanisation Society of Japan), was established in 1921. The last two
societies still exist but are no longer very active.
Rō maji Hirome-kai had a strong supporter in Prince Saionji Kinmochi
(1849–1940) (Kakigi 2011), while the face of Nippon no Rō mazi-sya was
the physicist Tanakadate Aikitsu (1856–1952). The reason for the exis-
tence of several different societies lay in their preferred Romanisation style.
For instance, Rō maji Hirome-kai favoured the Hepburn style, which they
often called the “standard” style, developed by medical missionary James
Curtin Hepburn (1815–1911) in 1887, while Nippon no Rō mazi-sya
preferred the “Japanese style” Romanisation developed by Tanakadate
Aikitsu in 1885.5 At the same time, supporters of kana also formed vari-
ous societies. The most notable was Kanamoji-kai, established in 1920 by
businessmen Yamashita Yoshitarō , Itō Chūbee, and others. Since 1922,
Kanamoji-kai has produced the journal Kana no Hikari (The Light of
Kana), which is still being published, although somewhat irregularly.6
70 A. HOVHANNISYAN
There were also some who proposed to abolish the existing scripts
altogether and create an “ideal” alphabet that would fulfil the require-
ments of a modern nation. This position is known as the new national
script movement (新国字論). While the Romanisation and Kana move-
ments attracted well-known scholars and businessmen, the proponents of
shin-kokuji (new national script) were less well-known figures, several of
whom quit their jobs to dedicate their time to the creation of a new script.
The most prominent supporter of this movement was world-renowned
ophthalmologist Ishihara Shinobu (1879–1963), who argued that kanji,
apart from being too numerous and cumbersome, also caused myopia.
As close work such as reading and sewing can cause myopia or near-
sightedness, Ishihara believed that kanji contributed to increasing myopia
rates by imposing excessive strain on young people’s eyes. He created his
own alphabet, known as Tokyo University Ophthalmology Faculty-Style
New Kana letters (東眼式新仮名文字), in 1939 (Hovhannisyan 2014).
However, his was not an organised movement; nor was it at all influential.
As noted earlier, arguments for script reform varied considerably
depending on the period and the ideological background of the advocate.
As Yasuda (2016) argues, advocates of kanji abolition or limitation believed
that it was necessary for the advance of “civilisation”, “efficiency”, “mobili-
sation”, “revolution”, “ideological warfare”, and so on. For instance, the
“for the sake of civilisation” argument was particularly popular during the
Meiji era, when it was often argued that simplification of the script would
be instrumental for spreading education and advancing “civilisation and
enlightenment”. From the 1920s to the 1930s, many argued that kanji abo-
lition was necessary to achieve “industrial efficiency”, while in the 1930s,
with Japan’s increasing militarisation, arguments were made for kanji limi-
tation for the sake of “mobilisation”. In the immediate post-WW II period,
one of the main arguments for script reform was the “democratisation of
Japanese language”, while supporters of kanji abolition or limitation in the
new century, such as Abe Yasushi, Kadoya Hidenori (2009), and Mashiko
Hidenori (2003),7 tend to build their arguments around minority and lan-
guage rights. Abe (2015) argues that people with certain disabilities, the
elderly, and foreigners have difficulty living and thriving in a society where
knowledge of several thousand kanji is taken for granted.
So, what kind of arguments did script reform advocates put forward
during the Asia-Pacific War? By analysing journal articles as well as books
and opinion papers published in this period, the next section will demon-
strate that advocates of kanji abolition or limitation proposed reforms in
order to make Japanese language more attractive to learn.
“WHAT KIND OF JAPANESE LANGUAGE SHOULD WE TEACH

THESE PEOPLE?”
In a radio speech on 29 June 1940, Foreign Minister Arita Hachirō pro-
posed a new vision of Asia under Japan’s leadership:
The countries of East Asia and the regions of the South Seas are geographi-
cally, historically, racially, and economically very closely related to each other.
They are destined to cooperate and minister to one another’s needs for their
common well-being and prosperity and to promote peace and progress in
their regions. The uniting of all these regions under a single sphere on the
basis of common existence and insuring thereby the stability of that sphere
is, I think, a natural conclusion. (de Bary et al. 2006, 308–9)
Given that “uniting of all these regions under a single sphere” was deemed
to be “a natural conclusion”, in 1941–1942, Japan occupied southern
Indochina, Malaya, and Singapore. In November 1942, the Ministry of
Greater East Asia (大東亜省) was created in order to administer Japan’s
overseas territories (Gotō ̄ 2011). The establishment of the Greater East
Asia Co-prosperity Sphere sparked debate over the status of Japanese lan-
guage in these territories. Should Japanese be the official language of the
Co-prosperity Sphere, or a common language? Should coercive or liberal
methods be used to spreading Japanese? How should Japanese be taught
in the southern territories, and finally “what kind of” Japanese should be
taught? These and other issues were central to discussions in numerous
books, journals, and newspaper articles about the “expansion of Japanese
language in the south”.8
While almost all commentators, mainly linguists and educators, agreed
that it was necessary to teach the Japanese language in the southern ter-
ritories, opinions diverged on whether Japanese should be the official lan-
guage or a common language, although the majority settled on “common
language” (共通語 or 通用語) status.9 Now let us look at discussions about
how Japanese language was to be spread. Many agreed that in the southern
territories the spread of Japanese language should not be implemented
through coercive measures. For instance, Matsumiya (1942) pointed out
that the Co-prosperity Sphere was “neither a colony nor a mandated ter-
ritory” but a space where people would “co-prosper” and argued against
any coercive means of spreading Japanese, claiming instead that Japan
should make an effort to encourage inhabitants of these territories to want
to learn Japanese. Andō (1943) also expressed the view that the use of
72 A. HOVHANNISYAN
coercive methods for spreading Japanese in the southern territories would

be inappropriate. Similarly, scholar of Japanese literature Shida Nobuyoshi
(1942) wrote that when spreading Japanese, every effort should be made
not to give the impression that it was being imposed. Shida added that it
was important to convince people in the southern territories that it was
beneficial for them to learn Japanese. Educator Okamoto Chimatarō also
emphasised the importance of cooperation, arguing that:
Whatever the reasons or purposes of the Manchurian Incident or the

China Incident, we cannot construct an ideal East Asia while using existing
methods, that is capitalism, imperialism, and more recent Red Russia-style
aggression… No matter what its name is, in order to make East Asia a uto-
pia, we have no other way but cooperation… Moreover, Japan has to be the
leader [of this utopia]. We can only build a language policy based on this
worldview. (Okamoto 1942, 35–8)
As we see, many favoured a “soft” approach when it came to Japanese

language teaching, although that hardly speaks to their liberal attitudes. It
was more likely an effort to contribute to the rhetoric that regions in the
Co-prosperity Sphere were cooperating.
There were diverse opinions not only about the method of implementa-
tion of Japanese language teaching, but also about what kind of Japanese
should be taught. These discussions started to emerge in the late 1930s but
became more intense in the early 1940s. One of the central issues was the
simplification of the Japanese language. While numerous commentators,
for instance, the above-mentioned Shida (1942), did not favour simplifying
the language for the sake of teaching it to foreigners, many others saw it as
a sensible solution. Hoshina Kō ichi (1872–1955), a linguist and bureau-
crat who was actively involved in language policy,10 stated:
There remain numerous important problems about this issue [Japanese lan-
guage education]. First, what kind of Japanese language should we teach to
these people? Needless to say, Tokyo dialect, the standard language of our
country should be its base. However… how many words should we choose
for the basic vocabulary?… Next, should we use both kanji and kana, or
exclusively use kana? (Hoshina 1942, 210–1)
Hoshina’s own answer to these questions was that “Our national lan-
guage is extremely complicated and inconsistent. Unless we adjust and
simplify it, we cannot expect it to become the common language (通用語)
of Greater East Asia” (Hoshina 1942, 427). Hoshina’s recommendations

for simplification were (1) teaching the vernacular, (2) using easy vocabu-
lary, (3) unifying pronunciation, (4) using katakana, (5) reforming the
kana orthography, and (6) using left-to-right horizontal writing (Hoshina
1942, 429–35). As noted above, Andō also advocated the simplification
of the Japanese language to facilitate its teaching in the Co-prosperity
Sphere, although he did not consider the language to be particularly com-
plicated or difficult. Linguist Koshimizu Minoru, stating that “the Greater
East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere should become the Japanese Language
Co-Prosperity Sphere (日本語共栄圏)” recommended, among other
things, “improving the Japanese language”—that is, making it “simple,
clear, easy to learn and use” (Koshimizu 1942). Okamoto Chimatarō ,
who had experience in teaching Japanese to foreigners, also suggested
“improving” the Japanese language by “rationalising” the complicated
writing system (Okamoto 1939, 94–103). He expanded his arguments on
the rationalisation of the script in his book Japanese Language Education
and the Japanese Language Problem (日本語教育と日本語問題). In the
book, he stated that “Now that Japan has become the leader of East Asia
and Japanese is about to become its lingua franca, there is absolutely no
need for ordinary Japanese people to learn Chinese in order to butter up
the Chinese and the Manchurians” and asked “should we not teach our
language instead?” (Okamoto 1942, 24). Okamoto identified a few prob-
lems that needed to be addressed, which included making the language
less inconsistent and the rationalisation of kanji and kana (Okamoto 1942,
24–9). Okamoto believed that ideograms did not have “universality”, a
quality that phonetic alphabets possessed, and that if Japanese was to be
a truly international language, there was no choice but to rationalise the
script (Okamoto 1942, 58–9).11 Linguist and Esperantist Ishiguro Yoshimi
(1899–1980) also discussed the issue of the “universality” of Japanese,
claiming that “In order to sufficiently manifest the universality of Japanese
language, there is an urgent need to make it more orderly, and to solve
the long-standing national language and script problem”. Ishiguro also
believed that only a national determination to solve the language problem
would speed up the spread of Japanese language and make it the lingua
franca of “New East Asia” (新東亜) (Ishiguro 1941, 26–7). The simplifi-
cation of the language and script was a matter of concern for the authori-
ties as well, and the Ministry of Education and the Army Ministry took
steps in that direction (Tani 2000, 2–17).
74 A. HOVHANNISYAN
DEBATES ON SCRIPT REFORM IN THE WARTIME PERIOD

IN RŌ MAJI AND KANA NO HIKARI
In this section, I will discuss kanji abolition advocates’ responses to the

popular views on the “expansion” of the Japanese language in the Greater
East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere. Supporters of kanji abolition seem to
have seen the expansion of the Japanese Empire as an opportunity to
resume their long-standing call for script reform, arguing that especially
in South East Asia, where people were used to phonetic scripts because
of the European colonial influence, Japanese language would be difficult
to spread, unless kana or Roman letters were adopted. In 1940, articles
and editorials on the need to simplify the Japanese script for the sake of
language expansion started to appear in journals such as Kana no Hikari,
Rō maji, and Rō mazi sekai. In this chapter I analyse the monthly journals
Kana no Hikari and Rō maji, which are available in Japan’s National Diet
Library Digital Collections. Almost every month, these journals featured
articles on the need to adopt a phonetic script to facilitate the implemen-
tation of Japanese language education, and the content of the articles in
both journals is similar in many ways. The authors of the articles seemed
to have no doubt about the need for Japanese language education in the
“south”. As Japan was now the leader (盟主) of Greater East Asia, they
assumed that Japanese must be the lingua franca of this new entity. All
shared the view that Japan needed to adopt a simpler writing system to
accommodate learners. They did not believe that coercive language teach-
ing methods would be effective in the Co-prosperity Sphere even though
Japan was the leader of East Asia. Many also argued that if Japan wanted
people in South East Asia to learn its language, there was a need to make
the language more attractive for them by simplifying the script. The main
difference of opinion lay in the authors’ preferred script. While Rō maji
advocates played the “universality” and “simplicity” cards, supporters of
kana emphasised the “Japaneseness” of the kana script. For example, in
an article entitled “Dai-Tô-a Sensô to Rômaji”12 (Great East Asia War
and Roman Script), scholar and statesman Hayashi Kiroku emphasised the
importance of cooperation with the people of Greater East Asia, adding
that the Roman alphabet was essential in building this mutual understand-
ing as it was a very convenient script used by people all over the world
(Hayashi 1942). Similarly, Okunaka Kō zō , while expressing delight at
South East Asians’ perceived eagerness to learn Japanese, stated that the
Rō maji letters that the locals were familiar with would assist in the easy
spread of Japanese (Okunaka 1942).
Kana proponents, such as linguist and long-term member of

Kanamoji-kai Matsuzaka Tadanori (1902–1986), pointed out that
kana was a phonetic yet Japanese script. In “On the National Policy
of the Spread of Japanese” (日本語普及ノ国策ニツイテ) for Kana no
Hikari, Matsuzaka argued that the purpose of the spread of Japanese
in Greater East Asia was to enhance the local people’s understanding of
Japan through its language, make them trust Japan by introducing them
to Japanese culture, and create a new Greater East Asia Co-prosperity
Sphere under Japanese leadership. “However”, Matsuzaka argued,
“presently our national script is [too difficult] even for Japanese people
themselves. It goes without saying that we will fail to make other nations
understand our learning and culture if we use [our national script]”
(Matsuzaka 1941, 23). His preference was for kana, a phonetic script
that would make the appreciation of Japanese culture easier.
Politician, writer, former president of the Japan Broadcasting Company
(NHK), and member of Kanamoji-kai Shimomura Hiroshi (1875–1957)
also advocated the use of kana, stating that Rō maji, while convenient, was
the script of “enemy nations” who tried to assimilate Asians through the
letters. He stressed that it would be difficult to eradicate Western influence
as long as Roman script was still in use.
If Japanese was to be taught in Greater East Asia, the script reformers
argued, “truly international letters” such as Rō maji13 or “truly Japanese”
but phonetic script such as kana needed to be used.14
CONCLUSION
Since at least on the rhetorical level the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity
Sphere was based on the principle of cooperation (pan-Asian nationalism),
Japanese was often positioned as a “common language” rather than an
official language for the region. However, no consistent language policy
was adopted. Linguists and educators writing for Japanese journals and
periodicals generally agreed that Japanese language should be spread by
non-coercive, “soft” means, but opinions differed on the type of Japanese
to be taught in the “southern territories”. While some suggested that a
simpler version of the language would be useful, in reality, those who
were responsible for implementing Japanese language education often
insisted on teaching archaic forms of the language—for instance, the
historical kana orthography—which may have hindered language learn-
ing. In contrast, script reform advocates often argued that adopting a
76 A. HOVHANNISYAN
new kana orthography or reducing the number of kanji was necessary to

make the language more “universal” and more “attractive” to learn. It is
possible that they understood that promoting “universal” values would
increase the likelihood that they would achieve their desired outcomes
(Nye 2004, 11). But it is more likely that they were merely adjusting their
rhetoric to the ongoing political context, in order to obtain the outcome
they wanted, which was script simplification.
With its defeat in the Asia-Pacific War, Japan ceased to be the “leader
of Greater East Asia” in August 1945, and advocates of the rationalisa-
tion of the Japanese writing system once again had to adjust their line
of argument. This time it was to campaign for the simplification of the
script for the sake of “democratisation”. Many years have passed since the
end of war, but the arguments for simplifying the Japanese writing system
appear time and again. In an article published in 1997, Tanaka Katsuhiko
argued that no language was qualified to be an international language if
its writing system posed an obstacle for the learners (Tanaka 1997, 6–13).
As recently as 2016, Kanamoji-kai listed seven reasons to abolish kanji on
its webpage, outlining the difficulties faced by foreigners when learning
kanji.15 However, these arguments tend to be built less on ideas about the
“global expansion of Japanese language” and more on the actual prob-
lems faced, for instance, by Filipino nurses (see Kusunoki, Chap. 6, in
this volume) who need to pass arduous examinations (which often require
advanced kanji knowledge) in order to be formally qualified to work as
nurses in Japan.
NOTES
1. The southern territories were the Southeast Asian countries and regions
occupied or controlled by Japan during the war.
2. All translations are mine unless otherwise noted.
3. Although Andō did not openly approve of the coercive spread of Japanese
language, for instance, in Taiwan, where he spent years first as a professor
(1928–1940) and then as the president (1941–1945) of Taihoku Imperial
University, he openly disapproved of the “bilingual situation” in the col-
ony, expressing the hope that the island would become a monolingual
region speaking Japanese. For details, see Yasuda (2000).
4. Currently Nippon no Rōmazi-sya publishes the journal Kotoba to moji
[Language and Script], which is written in conventional kanji and kana
scripts.
5. For more detail about the types of Romanisation in Japan, as well as the
Romanisation movement in general, see Gottlieb (2010).
6. Attempts by various individuals and organisations to reform the national
script at different times are discussed in the following publications: in
English language, Twine (1983), Gottlieb (1995, 2010), Unger (1996),
Hannas (1997); in Japanese language, Hirai (1948), Ō no and Shibata
(1977), Kida (1994), Watanabe (1995) and Tsuchiya (2005). The most
comprehensive and analytical work is Yasuda (2016).
7. Mashiko is one of the few who not only argues for the abolition of kanji
and adoption of kana, but also puts his theory into practice by writing
entire chapters in kana.
8. See, for instance, Nihongo 2, no. 5 (May 1942), special issue “Nanpō
kensetsu to nihongo fukyū” [Construction of the South and the Spread of
Japanese], and Kotoba 4, no. 1 (January 1942), special issue “Nihongo
kyō eiken” [Japanese Language Co-prosperity Sphere]. See also Hoshina
(1942), Ishiguro (1940), Ishiguro (1941), Matsumiya (1942), Okamoto
(1942), and Sakuragi (1942).
9. For a discussion of the status of Japanese language in the Greater East Asia
Co-prosperity Sphere, see Yasuda (1997).
10. See Lee (2009) for a critical discussion of Hoshina’s career and activities.
11. Okamoto used examples of students from India and the Philippines who
were unwilling to study kanji and commented that “Even if we leave
Japanese language and script as it is now, if Japan manages to become the
world number one in everything (not just world-class), we may not have to
worry about anything, as foreigners will study our language regardless [of
how difficult it is]. However, at present, when Japan does not have such
political power, only a few would be brave enough [to learn its language],
as there are other cultures in the world that possess more universal lan-
guages and scripts”.
12. Transliteration as in the source.
13. See, Kadono Chō kyurō . 1940. “Nippon Bunka no Sekaiteki Hatten niwa
Hyō junshiki Rômaji o Môchiiru Hoka Nashi” [There Is No Other Way to
Develop Japanese Culture Internationally but to Use Standard-Style
Roman Letters], Rômaji 35, no. 10: 158; Amano Kageyas. 1941. “Tôa
Kyôeiken to Rômaji-Undô” [East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere and
Romanization Movement], Rō maji 36, no. 5: 2–3; Okunaka Kôzô. 1942.
“Dai-Tô-a Sensô to Rômaji-Hirome-Kai no Shimei” [Great East Asia War
and the Mission of Rō maji Hirome-kai], Rō maji 37, no. 2: 9–11.
14. Yamashita Okiie. 1942. 戦争トトモニススムカナモジ [Kana Letters
Advancing with War], Kana no Hikari 245: 4–15; Miyamoto Yō kichi.1943.
漢字ツカイノ合理化 [Rationalization of the Use of Kanji], Kana no
78 A. HOVHANNISYAN
Hikari 259:5–6; Shimomura Hiroshi. 1943. カナモジヲ大東亜ノ共通

文字タラシメヨ [Let’s Make Kana the Common Script of Greater East
Asia], Kana no Hikari 261:1–3.
15. Kanamoji-kai, わたしたちはうったえる [We Demand]. Last modified
March 13, 2016. http://www.kanamozi.org/
REFERENCES
Abe, Yasushi. 2002. “漢字という障害” [An Obstacle Named Kanji]. Shakai gen-
gogaku 2:37–55.
Abe, Yasushi. 2015. ことばのバリアフリー: 情報保障とコミュニケーションの
障害学 [Barrier-free Language: Disability Studies of Information Assurance and
Communication]. Tokyo: Seikatsu shoin.
Akashi, Yoji. 2008. “Colonel Watanabe Wataru: The Architect of the Malayan
Military Administration, December 1941–March 1943.” In New Perspectives
on the Japanese Occupation in Malaya and Singapore, 1941–1945, edited by Yoji
Akashi and Mako Yoshimura, 33–64. Singapore: NUS Press.
Amano, Kageyas. 1941. “Tôa Kyôeiken to Rômaji-Undô” [East Asia Co-Prosperity
Sphere and Romanization Movement]. Rō maji 36(5):2–3.
Andō , Masatsugu. 1942. “日本語のむづかしさ” [The Difficulty of Japanese
Language]. Nihongo 2(3):4–11.
Andō , Masatsugu. 1943. “日本語普及の将来” [The Future of the Spread of
Japanese]. Nihongo 3(6):4–14.
De Bary, Wm. Theodore, Gluck, Carol, and Tiedemann, Arthur E., eds. 2006.
Sources of Japanese Tradition, Volume Two: 1600 to 2000, Abridged. New York:
Columbia University Press.
Duus, Peter. 1996. “Imperialism Without Colonies: The Vision of a Greater East
Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.” Diplomacy and Statecraft 7(1):54–72.
Gotō , Ken’ichi. 2011. “アジア太平洋戦争と「大東亜共栄圏」 : 1935–1945”
[Asia-Pacific War and “the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere”:
1935–1945]. In 岩波講座東アジア近現代通史第 6 巻 [Iwanami General
History of Modern East Asia, 6], edited by Haruki Wada et al., 1–41. Tokyo:
Iwanami shoten.
Gottlieb, Nanette. 1995. Kanji Politics: Language Policy and Japanese Script.
New York: Kegan Paul International.
Gottlieb, Nanette. 2010. “The Rō maji Movement in Japan.” Journal of the Royal
Asiatic Society 20(1):75–88.
Hannas, William C. 1997. Asia’s Orthographic Dilemma. Honolulu: University of
Hawai’i Press.
Hayashi, Kiroku. 1942. “Dai-Tô-a Sensô to Rômaji” [Great East Asia War and
Roman Letters]. Rômaji 37(2):18–9.
Hirai, Masao. 1948. 国語国字問題の歴史 [A History of the National Language

and Script Problem]. Tokyo: Shō shinsha.
Hoshina, Kō ichi. 1942. 大東亜共栄圏と国語政策 [The Greater East Asia
Co-prosperity Sphere and National Language Policy]. Tokyo: Tō seisha.
Hovhannisyan, Astghik. 2014. “近代日本における眼科学者の国字研究”
[Ophthalmologists’ Kokuji (National Script) Research in Modern Japan].
Shakai gengogaku 14:121–40.
Ishiguro, Yoshimi. 1940. 国語の世界的進出: 海外外地日本語読本の紹介 [Global
Expansion of the National Language: Introduction of Japanese Language
Reading Books in Overseas Territories]. Tokyo: Kō seikaku.
Ishiguro, Yoshimi. 1941.日本語の世界化: 国語の発展と国語政策 [The Internalisation
of Japanese: Development of the National Language and National Language Policy].
Osaka: Shūbunkan.
Kadono, Chō kyurō . 1940. “Nippon Bunka no Sekaiteki Hatten niwa Hyō junshiki
Rômaji o Môchiiru Hoka Nashi” [There Is No Other Way to Develop Japanese
Culture Internationally but to Use Standard-Style Roman Letters]. Rômaji
35(10):158.
Kadoya, Hidenori. 2009. “識字運動の構造” [The Structure of the Literacy
Movement]. Shakai gengogaku 9:17–42.
Kakigi, Shigetaka. 2011. “藤岡勝二とローマ字ひろめ会: 言語政策学的観点から
みた機関誌『ROMAJI』の資料的価値について” [Fujioka Katsuji and Romaji
Hirome-kai: About the Documentary Value of the Journal ROMAJI from the Point
of View of Language Policy Studies]. Saga tanki daigaku kenkyū kiyō 36:65–78.
Kida, Jun’ichirō . 1994. 日本語大博物館: 悪魔の文字と闘った人々 [The Great
Japanese Language Museum: The Men Who Battled the Devil’s Own Characters].
Tokushima: Jasuto shistemu.
Koshimizu, Minoru. 1942. “日本語共栄圏確立の具体策” [A Concrete Plan for the
Establishment of a Japanese Language Co-prosperity Sphere]. Kotoba 4(1):11–8.
Japan. Translated by Maki Hirano Hubbard. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i
Press.
Mashiko, Hidenori. 2003. イデオロギーとしての「日本」[“Japan” as Ideology].
Tokyo: Sangensha.
Matsumiya, Kazuya. 1942. 日本語の世界的進出 [Global Expansion of Japanese
Language]. Tokyo: Fujokai-sha.
Matsumiya, Kazuya. 1942. “太平洋の共通語: 日本語の新しい躍進” [Common
Language of the Pacific: New Breakthrough of Japanese Language]. Kotoba
4(1):4–10.
Matsuzaka, Tadanori. 1941.“日本語普及ノ国策ニツイテ” [About the National
Policy of the Spread of Japanese]. Kana no Hikari 240:20–3.
80 A. HOVHANNISYAN
Miyamoto, Yō kichi. 1943. “漢字ツカイノ合理化” [Rationalization of the Use of

Kanji]. Kana no Hikari 259:5–6.
Nye, Joseph S. Jr. 2004. Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics.
New York: Public Affairs.
Ō no, Susumu, and Shibata, Takeshi, eds. 1977. 岩波講座日本語 (3): 国語国字問題
[The Iwanami Lectures of Japanese Language (3): National Language and Script
Problem]. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten.
Okamoto, Chimatarō . 1939. “日本語の海外発展” [Overseas Development of
Japanese Language]. Kokugo kyō iku 24(12):94–103.
Okamoto, Chimatarō . 1942. 日本語教育と日本語問題 [Japanese Language
Education and Japanese Language Problem]. Tokyo: Hakusuisha.
Okunaka, Kôzô. 1942. “Dai-Tô-a Sensô to Rômaji-Hirome-Kai no Shimei”
[Great East Asia War and the Mission of Rō maji Hirome-kai]. Rō maji
37(2):9–11.
Sakuragi, Toshiaki, ed. 1942. 国語文化講座 (6) 国語進出編 [National Language
Culture Lectures (6) Expansion of the National Language]. Tokyo: Asahi
shinbun sha.
Sasahara, Hiroyuki. 2014. 漢字に託した「日本の心」 [“Japanese Spirit” Entrusted to
Kanji]. Tokyo: NHK shuppan shinsho.
Shida, Nobuyoshi. 1942. “日本語をひろめるために考ふるべき若干の問題”
[Several Issues About the Spread of Japanese Language]. Nihongo 2(4):22–8.
Shimomura, Hiroshi. 1943. “カナモジヲ大東亜ノ共通文字タラシメヨ” [Let’s
Make Kana the Common Script of Greater East Asia]. Kana no Hikari 261:1–3.
Tanaka, Katsuhiko. 1997. “世界・日本・ローマ字” [The World, Japan, Roman
Letters]. Kokubungaku 62(1):6–13.
Tanaka, Katsuhiko. 2011. 漢字が日本語をほろぼす [Kanji Are Destroying
Japanese Language]. Tokyo: Kadokawa SSC Shinsho.
Tani, Yasuyo. 2000. 大東亜共栄圏と日本語 [Greater East Asia Co-prosperity
Sphere and Japanese Language]. Tokyo: Keiso Shobo.
Tsuchiya, Michio. 2005. 国語問題論争史 [A History of National Language
Debates]. Tokyo: Tamagawa University Press.
Twine, Nanette. 1983. “Toward Simplicity: Script Reform Movements in the
Meiji Period.” Monumenta Nipponica 38(2):115–132.
Twine, Nanette. 1991. Language and the Modern State: The Reform of Written
Japanese. London: Routledge.
Unger, J. Marshall. 1996. Literacy and Script Reform in Occupation Japan:
Reading Between the Lines. New York: Oxford University Press.
Watanabe, Shintarō . 1995. 国語国字の根本問題 [Fundamental Problems of
National Language and Script]. Osaka: Shinpū shobō .
Yamashita, Okiie. 1942. “戦争トトモニススムカナモジ” [Kana Letters
Advancing with War]. Kana no Hikari 245:14–5.
Yasuda, Toshiaki. 1997. 帝国日本の言語編制 [Language Composition of Imperial

Japan]. Yokohama: Seori shobō .
Yasuda, Toshiaki. 2000. 帝国化する「日本語」と「言語問題」 : 近代日本言語史
再考 [Imperialising “Japanese Language” and “Language Problems”:
Reconsidering Language History of Modern Japan]. Tokyo: Sangensha.
Yasuda, Toshiaki. 2016. 漢字廃止の思想史 [A History of Kanji Abolition Thought].
Tokyo: Heibonsha.
CHAPTER 5
Media and Cultural Policy and Japanese

Language Education in Japanese-Occupied
Singapore, 1942–1945
Masakazu Matsuoka
Cultural policy has been widely discussed in Japan since the early 2000s.
Policymakers emphasise the significance of soft power, and the govern-
ment has been promoting the export of cultural content and services under
the rubric of “Cool Japan” (Satō 2012a). Joseph Nye Jr.’s Soft Power has
attracted the attention of students of international politics, business people
and government personnel alike in Japan since its publication in 2004, and
the power of culture is now prominent in discussions of Japan’s national
power. While most believe that the term “cultural power” (文化力) was
first used by Kawai Hayao in 2002 when he was Commissioner of the
Agency of Cultural Affairs, the term had already been used as a wartime
slogan in the first half of the 1940s when Japan was engaged in the total
war (Satō 2012a, 12–3). Even before the Second World War, Japanese
foreign affairs bureaucrat Saegusa Shigetomo had touted the idea of “a
culture-oriented nation-building policy” (文化立国策) in the 1920s and
1930s (Satō 2012b). Media historian Satō Takumi claims that the concept
M. Matsuoka (*)
Graduate School of Language and Society, Hitotsubashi University,
Kunitachi, Tokyo, Japan

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_5
84 M. MATSUOKA
was a product of the paradigm of total war and resulted in ideological

warfare (思想戦) between Japan and its enemies (Satō 2012b, 157). The
idea of “cultural power” was strongly connected to the total war regime.
This chapter examines the view of the Japanese intellectual (文化人)
Jimbo Kō tarō , a poet of the Japanese Romantic School, on Japanese lan-
guage policy and Japanese language education. Jimbo was drafted by the
Japanese Imperial Army and served the Propaganda Department (宣伝班)
of the Japanese Military Administration (軍政部) in Singapore during
the Second World War. He also worked as the headmaster of a Japanese
language school in Singapore, which was a strategically important city,
both economically and militarily, for the British Empire in Asia. For the
Japanese, the occupation of Singapore on 15 February 1942 meant the
seizure of the central city of the Japanese-occupied Southern Area, which
formed the major part of the “Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere”
(大東亜共栄圏). By examining the ideological aspect of Japanese language
education as a cultural policy in a Japanese-occupied area, this study sheds
light on an under-researched aspect of soft power in wartime Japan.
In the 1970s, Akashi Yō ji conducted research on Japanese educational
policy in wartime Singapore, and revealed the actual conditions of war-
time school education. Akashi’s “Education and Indoctrination Policy
in Malaya and Singapore under the Japanese Rule, 1942–1945” (1976)
was a pioneering study on school education in Malayan society dur-
ing the Second World War, and incorporated statistics and translations
of historical documents. Akashi showed that Japanese education had a
significant impact in Malaya, albeit not intentionally: it stimulated the
Malay nationalist movement. “Malays rejected many features of Japanese
education, but they learned what was useful for their nationalist move-
ment” (Akashi 1976, 21). In the 2000s, Matsunaga Noriko’s work (2002)
on Japanese language education in Malaya under the Japanese military
administration demonstrated that Japanese language education in Malaya
was most affected by the idea of a “pure Japanese language” (醇正な日
本語) among southern Japanese-occupied territories (南方占領地). In
Malaya, the Japanese language did not become a symbol of assimilation
or national integration (Matsunaga 2002). However, Japanisation on a
spiritual level through Japanese language education was attempted, using
“direct method ideology” (直接法イデオロギー) and the rensei (錬成,
edification) method, in an attempt to construct the “Greater East Asian
Co-Prosperity Sphere” (Matsunaga 2002, 220–1). Matsunaga also stated
that the discipline of the Japanese spirit was for character building of some
MEDIA AND CULTURAL POLICY AND JAPANESE LANGUAGE EDUCATION... 85
Malayans. It is worth noting here that this was not a matter of the quality
of Japanese language education but of the Japanese spirit.
While historians on Southeast Asia such as Akashi and Matsunaga have
dealt with language policy in the Japanese empire, media historians have
not sufficiently examined this issue. However, studies of media and cultural
policy provide us with important clues to the connection between Japanese
media and cultural policy and language policy in the Japanese empire.
ソフト・パワーのメディア文化政策 (Media and cultural policy of soft
power), edited by Satō Takumi, Watanabe Yasushi and Shibauchi Yasufumi
(2012), examines Japan’s soft power in historical and comparative per-
spective. Although this volume does not analyse the role of the Japanese
language itself as a source of soft power, a bibliographical review article in
this volume refers to Japanese language policy in the context of soft power.
This bibliographical review article by Matsunaga Tomoko (2012) men-
tions two significant studies on the history of Japanese language policy. One
is Lee Yeounsuk’s The Ideology of Kokugo. Originally published in Japanese
(国語という思想, Iwanami Shoten, 1996), this work analyses the ideo-
logical aspects of the process of building a kokugo (national language) from
the Meiji period to the Second World War, focusing on the linguists Ueda
Kazutoshi and Hoshina Kō ichi. Lee concludes that “the coerciveness of
kokugo policy in modern Japan was a sign not of the strength of kokugo
but of its weakness, just as the coercion of the Great Japanese Empire
indicated Japan’s tenuous modernity” (Lee 2010, 212). The other study
referred to by Matsunaga is Kawaji Yuka’s 日本語教育と戦争 (Japanese
language education and war). Kawaji examines Japanese language educa-
tion policy from the mid-1930s to the end of the Second World War from
the perspective of “International Cultural Work” (国際文化事業).1 She
states that “cultural invasion” and “cultural exchange” are inextricably
linked to language education (Kawaji 2011, 303). She also points out
that Japan had been promoting Japanese language education since the
pre-war period without a vision for Japanese language education and that
the organisations that had promoted Japanese language education had
repeatedly used “learner demand” as a justification (Kawaji 2011, 309).
Based on the arguments presented by Lee and Kawaji, this chapter
considers three research questions: What did the intellectuals who pro-
moted the Japanese language in Singapore think of the Japanese lan-
guage? What kind of vision of Japanese language education did they have?
What sources of soft power did the Japanese authorities use to implement
Japanese language education in Singapore? In order to answer these three
86 M. MATSUOKA
questions, this chapter examines wartime Japanese language education in

the Japanese empire from the perspective of soft power. It first provides
an overview of school education policy in wartime Singapore. Next, it
examines Japanese language education as part of media and cultural policy,
focusing on the “Nippon-Go Popularising Week” campaign launched by
the Propaganda Department of the Japanese Military Administration. The
katakana newspaper Sakura that is analysed in this chapter was first pub-
lished during this campaign. The chapter then discusses the ideology of
Jimbo, a Japanese intellectual who worked for the Propaganda Department
to promote Japanese language. The analysis demonstrates that the educa-
tional policy that sought to Japanise the local people in wartime Singapore
failed to take the local cultural context into consideration.
LANGUAGE POLICY AND EDUCATIONAL POLICY

IN JAPANESE-OCCUPIED SINGAPORE
In Singapore, the Japanese military administration implemented educa-

tional measures to Japanise the local people. On 15 February 1942, the
25th Army of Japan defeated the British troops in Singapore and formed
a military administration that ruled Malaya and Sumatra. Singapore was
situated in the centre of this area and was renamed Syonan (lit. the light
of the south in Japanese). The Japanese military administration retained
direct control of Malaya as a possession of the empire until the end of the
Second World War (Akashi 1991).
Colonel Watanabe Wataru, deputy chief military administrator, later
chief military administrator and finally head of the General Affairs
Department, was a central figure in the formation and execution of
administrative policy in Malaya during the early period of the Japanese
occupation. His administration was characterised by a “hard-line” pol-
icy and he “wanted indigenous people to repent their subserviency and
to be born again through a spiritual purification” (Akashi 2008a, 10).
He promoted a policy of Japanising the local people through educa-
tion “to construct a new order under Japan’s leadership” (Akashi
2008b, 48). However, this policy was not the basic principle of the
Southern Area occupation by the headquarters of the Japanese Army.
The Imperial Headquarters–Government Liaison Conference (大本営
政府連絡会議) laid down three principles for the military administra-
tion in the Southern Area in the “Principles for the Implementation of
Military Administration in the Occupied Southern Area” (南方占領地

行政実施要領): acquisition of strategic materials, establishment of the
self-sufficiency of the occupying army and restoration of law and order.
These three principles gave the highest priority to the acquisition of
petroleum while imposing the cost of the war and the occupation on the
local people (Nakano 2012, 65). Little attention was paid to education.
Colonel Watanabe strongly criticised the absence of any “fundamental
principles for constructing a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere”
in the “Principles for the Implementation of Military Administration in
the Occupied Southern Area” (Akashi 2008b, 35). He sought to abolish
the Western educational curriculum and the Western way of life, includ-
ing its materialism and individualism, and to impose on the local people
Oriental moral culture based on the Emperor system and the ideology
of “universal brotherhood” (八紘一宇) and “spiritual cleansing” (禊)
(Akashi 2008b, 48). Under his leadership, the military administration
forced the local people to participate in ceremonies celebrating Japan’s
national holidays, in which the local people bowed to the Imperial Palace
(宮城遥拝), cheered for the Emperor and sang the Japanese national
anthem Kimigayo (Akashi 2008b, 48–9). During his tenure, Watanabe
implemented a thorough Japanisation policy.
On 6 October 1942, Watanabe notified the regional governors and the
mayor of Singapore of his “Principles for Reforming School Education
(draft)” (学校教育整備刷新要綱 (案)), which stated that “the core cur-
riculum ought to be centred on the Emperor system, with the under-
standing that the indigenous people of Malaya were to be citizens of
Imperial Japan in the future” (Akashi 2008b, 48). He also “directed
primary schools to offer instruction only in Japanese or Malay, to abolish
the use of English and Dutch, and to ban Chinese for the time being”
(Akashi 2008b, 48). Watanabe’s educational policy was tied to his ideas
on languages. He considered it necessary to abolish Western languages
in order to eliminate Western culture, and to impose the Japanese lan-
guage on the local people to popularise Japanese spiritual culture. Even
before Watanabe issued these principles, the Japanese-controlled English
newspaper Syonan Times proclaimed that “Nippon-Go” (Japanese lan-
guage) was the new “Lingua Franca” in Malaya (Syonan Times, 28
February 1942).2 Watanabe’s ideology of language and culture was far
more essentialist: for him, the Japanese language was the only medium
that could convey Japanese culture.
88 M. MATSUOKA
MEDIA AND CULTURAL POLICY AND JAPANESE

LANGUAGE EDUCATION
Japanese language education was conducted not only in the public
schools and training institutes, which were examined by Akashi (1976)
and Matsunaga (2002), but also in Jimbo’s Japanese language school and
through various media in wartime Singapore. Japanese intellectuals who
had been drafted by the Army were involved in teaching Japanese lan-
guage through Jimbo’s school and various media. Japanese intellectuals
such as the literary critic Nakajima Kenzō promoted Japanese language
through the media, and Jimbo served as the headmaster of Japanese
language school Syonan Nippon Gakuen (昭南日本学園), where novel-
ist Ibuse Masuji gave a lecture on Japanese history. The involvement of
Japanese intellectuals in teaching and promoting Japanese language shows
the connection between media and cultural policy and Japanese language
education in wartime Singapore.
Under the National Service Draft Ordinance (国民徴用令), enacted in
1939, Japanese intellectuals such as literary figures, painters, cartoonists,
film-makers, theatre people, journalists, religious leaders, photographers
and interpreters were drafted into the Japanese Army. At least 70 liter-
ary figures were mobilised; their periods of service differed depending
on where they were deployed (Kamiya 1996). Ibuse (1974) noted that
120 people were on the military transport with him. Jimbo and Nakajima
were also deployed in Singapore, and were assigned to the Propaganda
Department of the Japanese Military Administration. The major duties
of the intellectuals were to disseminate propaganda among the local peo-
ple, to convey news about Japan’s southern territories to mainland Japan,
and to counsel officers and soldiers. The first of these duties entailed
editing newspapers in various local languages and carrying out cultural
programmes. As already noted, Jimbo took the initiative in promot-
ing Japanese language education and became the headmaster of Syonan
Nippon Gakuen, a Japanese Language School for local youth. He also
published the katakana newspaper Sakura (lit. cherry blossom) for school-
children. He carried out his duties in Singapore according to his personal
beliefs. Until he left Singapore for Japan in November 1942, he played the
central role in Japanese language education in Singapore.
In June 1942, the Propaganda Department launched the campaign,
“Nippon-Go Popularising Week”3 (日本語普及運動), with the slogan
“Manabe! Tukae! Nippon-Go!” (Study! Use! Japanese!) (Syonan Times,
1 June 1942). Created by Japanese intellectuals, the campaign mobilised

various media, pamphlets, posters and newspapers for children, radio
broadcasts, theatre performances and exhibitions to promote Japanese
language among the local people. Even before this campaign, Japanese
language lessons were available through the media. As early as February
1942, the English newspaper Syonan Times began to serialise “Nippon-Go
Lessons” (Syonan Times 28 February 1942; Guo 2014). However, the
new campaign employed various media on a much larger scale. After this
campaign, the Syonan Times started to serialise another Japanese lan-
guage programme in conjunction with radio broadcasts. “Nippon-Go
Popularising Week” formed the basic framework for the collaboration
between Japanese language education and the media in Singapore.
The implementation procedures for “Nippon-Go Popularising Week”
were designed by the intellectual Nakajima Kenzō . The major initiatives
of this campaign were to publish a children’s newspaper in katakana, to
install radio receivers in primary schools in Syonan city, to run school
programmes that started on the first day of the week, and to popularise
Japanese language by teaching educational songs in schools (Jimbo 1943).
These programmes were all implemented, and Nakajima and Jimbo were
proud of the success of the campaign (Nakajima and Jimbo 1943). The
katakana newspaper was launched on 10 June 1942 under the title Sakura.
Jimbo was its chief editor until his return to Mainland Japan in November
1942.4 He expected this newspaper to be used for educational purposes,
and set down four objectives for the publication (Jimbo 1943, 126). First,
by providing information in katakana characters, it sought to help local
children and others to understand the Japanese spirit. Second, it aimed to
contribute to Japanese language education by providing training materi-
als, and supplementary readings, for Japanese language teachers. Third,
in line with the local people’s Japanese proficiency level, the newspaper
would begin by publishing basic materials and proceed to more complex
content and texts. Finally, it aimed to include as many photos, paintings
and readings as possible to provide enjoyable reading. At the same time, it
sought to convey the Japanese spirit through Japanese script.
Sakura contained a variety of content, such as Japanese educational
songs, news, Japanese folk tales, manga, and stories on Japan and the
war. It usually included an illustrated musical score for a Japanese educa-
tional song on the front page of the four-page spread. The lyrics and other
articles could be found on the remaining pages. The songs were mostly
adapted from music (唱歌) textbooks used in primary schools in Japan;
90 M. MATSUOKA
some were Japanese children’s songs (童謡). The themes of the songs
mostly related to nature, the seasons and everyday life in Japan rather than
morality, militarism or the Japanese Emperor system. The Japanese manga
artist Kurakane Yoshiyuki provided illustrations for these songs, and his
illustrations generally incorporated Japanese schoolchildren and Japanese
scenery. The songs and the illustrations expressed the culture and imag-
ined milieu of Japanese children.
The songs published in Sakura were also broadcast in radio programmes
for schools. As outlined in the schedule for “Nippon-Go Popularising
Week,” school broadcast programmes started in June 1942. On 9 June
1942, the first school broadcast was listed in the radio schedule published
in the Syonan Times. The morning’s schedule included “Nippon-Go
Lesson for Chinese Schools broadcast in Mandarin,” “Nippon-Go Lesson
for Malay and Indian Schools broadcast in Malay,” “Nippon-Go Lesson
for Common Public Schools” and “Nippon-Go Songs for all Schools.”
According to the schedule published in Sakura, each song was to be
broadcast three or four times. Although it is not clear whether the school
broadcast programmes were used widely in Singapore’s public schools,
the Japanese military administration was proactive in encouraging the use
of radio broadcasts in school education. Tokugawa Yoshichika (1999), an
advisor to the military administration, wrote that the radio station had made
an effort to have closer contact with the Department of Education of the
Japanese military administration and the local governments of Syonan and
each province of Malaya. It sent technicians to the schools and lent radio
receivers to schools to make the school broadcasts more effective. Japanese
intellectuals emphasised the effect of the popularisation of Japanese songs
among local children. According to Ibuse Masuji (2005, 180), “the effect
of the Japanese Popularising Week was not expected to be immediately
evident, but we actually saw that Japanese educational songs and war
songs became popular among local children.” Jimbo also wrote that “we
set the radio receivers in the schools in the city of Syonan and started
school broadcast programmes. And then we started [the broadcast of]
educational songs. As the Malay people are good at singing, they will learn
[Japanese language] quickly if we use songs” (Nakajima and Jimbo 1943,
37). The Japanese songs in Sakura and the school radio broadcasts served
as a tool for teaching Japanese.
The manga artist Kurakane contributed manga and other illustrations
in addition to his illustrations for the songs, which encouraged readers
to study Japanese language using Sakura. His manga, which followed
the style of Japanese four-cell manga, described the everyday lives of two
Malay children in Singapore. Sakura ran Kurakane’s manga from the 1st
(10 June 1942) to the 9th (1 September 1942) issue and from the 19th
(15 February 1943) to the 26th (15 May 1943) issue with a few inter-
ruptions. The 1942 manga it depicted a Malay boy called Mā-chan and a
Malay girl called Rē-chan who enjoyed studying Japanese language, and
followed their everyday lives under Japanese occupation. In 1943, the
two children travelled to the Malay Peninsula and visited an agricultural
training institute in Kuala Lumpur and a tin mine in Perak. Only three
adults appeared in Kurakane’s manga: Kurakane himself, a Japanese youth
who guided the children on the Malay Peninsula and a Malay youth at
the agricultural training institute. No adults were portrayed teaching or
disciplining the two children, and they willingly studied Japanese language
as if they were playing. No one taught them Japanese language or forced
them to study. Their journey to the Malay Peninsula was also depicted as
Kurakane’s response to their request. The central theme of Kurakane’s
manga was the efforts of the local children to learn about Japan. There was
no overt attempt in the manga to promote Japanese language education
or to justify the Japanese occupation of Malaya. Rather, what Kurakane
depicted was two children who accepted the Japanese occupation and the
language.
“Nippon-Go Popularising Week” was a large-scale media event that
sought to promote Japanese language in local communities, and Sakura
was launched as part of the campaign as an educational medium for teach-
ing Japanese language to schoolchildren. Japanese intellectuals such as
Jimbo and Kurakane used various media, including Japanese educational
songs and Japanese-style manga, to encourage local children to study
Japanese language. They did not, however, offer any practical reasons for
studying Japanese; they simply showcased Japan and the Japanese lan-
guage and expected the local children to accept and study them.
JIMBO AND NIPPON-GO
Jimbo’s ultranationalistic ideology, which was based on the close connec-
tion between Japanese language, Japanese spirit and virtue, led him to
promote the idea of Japanising education in Singapore. His philosophy
was reflected in Syonan Nippon Gakuen5 and Sakura. What was taught
in Syonan Nippon Gakuen—originally called Syonan Nichigo Gakuen
(昭南日語学園)—was not only language but the essence of the Japanese
spirit, virtue and so on. Jimbo changed the school’s name after he was
appointed its headmaster soon after its opening. He did not accept the
92 M. MATSUOKA
word Nichigo (日語), because it is an abbreviated word for Japanese lan-

guage used in Chinese. He replaced it with the word Nippon instead
of Nippon-go (Japanese language) because Jimbo and other teachers
“wanted not only to teach Japanese language itself but also to teach Japan
through Japanese language” (Jimbo 1943, 61). He expressed his views on
Japanese language education in three ways.
First, he often expressed his opinion on the desirable attitude towards
Japanese language learning and his critical view of the attitude of the local
students. At the first Syonan Nippon Gakuen graduation ceremony, held
at Dai Toa Gekizyo (sic) (the former Cathay Theatre), Jimbo spoke of the
significance of studying Japanese language:
I would like to take this opportunity in advising you not to treat Nippon-Go
as another language you are required to learn. You must show your real
and pure feelings and love Nippon-Go. You cannot master Nippon-Go
without love. To love Nippon-Go is no less than to love Nippon. To love
Nippon means that you have won the distinction of being a glorious and
good Nippon-zin.6
For Jimbo, Japanese language should be learned not for its practical bene-
fits but out of sincere love. This love (愛すること), Jimbo thought, should
not be forced on the students or generated artificially, but should grow
naturally in their minds. Jimbo insisted that Japanese language should not
be imposed by force, but should be offered as a gift to the local people
(Jimbo 1943, 28). To Jimbo’s way of thinking, true Japanese education is
accomplished through the students’ love for the Japanese language.
Jimbo believed that Japanese should be learned free from any economic
or social interests. He therefore despised students who were forced to go
to the school or who went for purely practical reasons. Syonan Nippon
Gakuen received many enquiries about its Japanese language classes.
Jimbo (1943, 80–1) wrote in his book about negotiations with a pastor
over providing lessons at the school. His description of the negotiations
demonstrates his critical view of the attitude of the local people.
One day, a pastor from the Salvation Army came to the school. “We want
to learn Japanese. Please come to us. The venue is far,” said the pastor. “We
wish we could come but because we are so busy, come to school on the day
we specify,” I answered. “We cannot. Please come to us on a different day of
the week,” the pastor grumbled. He requested this presumptuously. “Who
do you think we are? If you want to make a request, be more polite. Think
again and come back,” I replied. (Original Japanese, author’s translation)
Jimbo did not forgive learners who imposed such conditions, and he and
the other teachers at the school were particularly critical of the behav-
iour of the schoolteachers who attended the teachers’ training sessions at
Syonan Nippon Gakuen. They felt that the teachers displayed a lukewarm
attitude, as if they could hardly be bothered to come and learn Japanese
(Jimbo 1943, 92–3). This evoked a feeling of antipathy in Jimbo. To
him, the ideal students were those who showed a strong interest in study-
ing Japanese, and demonstrated their trust in the teachers from Syonan
Nippon Gakuen (Jimbo 1943, 92).
Jimbo was generally critical of the local people in Singapore. His critical
gaze even fell on the students who were enrolled in the regular sessions
at Syonan Nippon Gakuen. He criticised their ill-mannered behaviour,
buying food and drinks at the stalls in front of the school during recess
and leaving their litter on the floor (Jimbo 1943, 55–6). He even “cor-
rected” the religious customs of the Malay students, and forced them to
take off their songkok (caps worn by Southeast Asian Muslim males) dur-
ing kyūjō yō hai (宮城遥拝, bowing in the direction of the Emperor’s pal-
ace in Tokyo) (Jimbo 1943, 69). He regarded the local people as lazy,
ignorant and sequacious, and attributed their character failings to British
colonial rule. He introduced a Japanese style of conducting lessons and
disciplined his students strictly. In a speech at a Syonan Nippon Gakuen
graduation ceremony, Jimbo praised the students for taking “a step nearer
to understanding Nippon’s Spirit, Nippon’s Strength, Nippon’s Beauty
and Nippon’s Great Spirit which at present seems to puzzle the people
of the world.”7 In his book Syonan Nippon Gakuen, Jimbo describes how
“lazy” local students became disciplined subjects of the Emperor through
learning Japanese language.
Second, Jimbo retained his view on the Japanese language. As he
equated Japanese language with the Japanese spirit and Japanese virtues,
he was critical of simplifying Japanese language for the sake of promot-
ing it in newly occupied areas. In teaching Japanese language at Syonan
Nippon Gakuen and publishing Sakura, the issue of whether to employ
phonetic kana usage or historical usage arose.8 While some teachers at
Syonan Nippon Gakuen claimed that historical kana usage would give the
impression that Japanese language was difficult to learn, others argued that
students should learn historical usage because they would eventually need
to be able to understand texts written in historical kana (Jimbo 1943,
125). Jimbo himself expressed the view that phonetic kana usage was
unattractive and that は (pronounced “wa”) and わ (pronounced “wa”)
94 M. MATSUOKA
were not the same (Jimbo 1943, 123–4). In the end, Jimbo reluctantly
accepted phonetic kana usage, because it was the policy of the military
administration (Jimbo 1943, 130). Nevertheless, he did not stop teaching
historical usage at Syonan Nippon Gakuen. He allowed teachers at the
school to teach it alongside with phonetic usage, and employed historical
usage in the textbook for the advanced course (Jimbo 1943, 131–2).
From the late 1930s, “the overseas advancement of Japanese [language]
was already widely discussed in Japan” (Lee 2010, 199). In these discus-
sions, there was debate over which kana system to use in the Japanese
language textbooks used in Japan’s overseas territories.
At the First Conference on the Provision of Kokugo9 (国語対策協議
会), representatives of Korea and Manchukuo asserted that “Japanese lan-
guage education overseas must focus on aural and oral skill rather than on
reading” and “kana usage in gaichi (Japanese overseas territories) must
absolutely follow the phonetic system” (Lee 2010, 201). Hoshina Kō ichi,
a Japanese linguist who promoted the overseas advancement of Japanese
language, “asserted that the most effective method to teach people in the
Co-Prosperity Sphere was ‘using not the classical usage [the historical kana
system] but the phonetic kana system that correctly reflects the modern
standard pronunciation’”10 (Lee 2010, 202). On the other hand, Japanese
conservative nationalist linguists asserted that the historical kana system
was the only genuine kana system (Lee 2010, 201). The nationalist view
of Japanese language and “the overseas advancement of Japanese” were
not really compatible, and this was the dilemma Jimbo faced. Although
he never questioned the legitimacy of historical kana usage, his primary
concern was not with Japanese language policy but rather with the gap
between the Japanese language that would be taught in overseas territories
using phonetic kana and the kokugo taught in Japan.11 It is natural that
Jimbo, who sought to Japanise his students, was worried that they would
face difficulties understanding historical kana usage in the future.
Finally, Jimbo introduced Japanese-style discipline to Syonan Nippon
Gakuen. When a teacher entered the classroom, one student would give
the command “起立” (stand up) in Japanese and the students would all
stand and bow in unison, at the command “礼” (bow); they would only
be seated when they were given the command “着席” (sit down). This
practice was first adopted at Syonan Nippon Gakuen and was later fol-
lowed by other schools around Malaya (Jimbo 1943, 66). For Jimbo, skill
in the Japanese language alone was not enough to become truly Japanese.
He believed that his students would acquire the Japanese spirit through
strict physical discipline.
Jimbo thus sought to Japanise the local students through discipline, and
expected that his students would develop a genuine “love” for Japanese
language and make every effort to acquire Japanese spirit. He did not see
Japanese language as a medium for achieving actual economic and social
benefits. Although his view on education and Japanese language had previ-
ously only been applied in Japan, Jimbo extended it to Japanese language
education overseas without hesitation, and his educational methods were
adopted by the other schools in Singapore. His views on education and
Japanese language therefore continued to influence policy on Japanese
language education in wartime Singapore in the subsequent period.
JAPANESE LANGUAGE EDUCATION AND SOFT POWER

IN JAPANESE-OCCUPIED SINGAPORE
Japanese language education in Japanese-occupied Singapore was a means

of Japanising the local people, both for intellectuals such as Jimbo and for
the Japanese military administration, even though the Japanese Empire
at the time did not have a unified policy of indoctrination of the peo-
ple in Japan’s overseas territories. There was no established norm for the
Japanese language that should be taught to the local people at that time.
The controversy over kana usage in the school textbooks used in Japanese
overseas territories such as Korea and Manchukuo continued until around
1940. Japanese language education in Japanese-occupied Singapore was
inconsistent in many ways. The Japanisation policy was implemented
under the ideology of the “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere,”
but Japan’s objectives in constructing the “Co-Prosperity Sphere” them-
selves changed constantly after the concept was first introduced in 1940
(Kawanishi 2016). This is not necessarily to suggest that the concept of
the “Co-Prosperity Sphere” was meaningless. Rather, arguments about
the construction of “Greater East Asian” culture were put forward to jus-
tify the ambiguous concept of a “Co-Prosperity Sphere.” The “hard-line”
Japanisation policy in Singapore was such a manifestation of the justifica-
tion for the “Co-Prosperity Sphere.”
In order to implement the Japanisation policy, the Japanese mili-
tary administration, Jimbo and other intellectuals who worked for
the Propaganda Department mobilised various media such as news-
papers, music, manga and radio broadcasts. Through the “Nippon-Go
Popularising Week” campaign, local children were encouraged to use the
popular media that are now considered resources of Japanese soft power.
96 M. MATSUOKA
Could these popular media be understood as resources of soft power of the

period? A resource that “the soft power of a country rests primarily on,”
according to Nye, is “its culture (in places where it is attractive to others)”
(Nye 2004, 11). Nye also states that “when a country’s culture includes
universal values and its policies promote values and interests that others
share, it increases the probability of obtaining its desired outcomes.” On
the other hand, “narrow values and parochial cultures are less likely to
produce soft power” (Nye 2004, 11). The popular media that Japanese
intellectuals and the Japanese military administration employed may also
have been attractive to learners in Singapore, but their style had been tai-
lored to the indoctrination of Japanese nationals. The local people were
required to assimilate the “narrow” and “parochial” Japanese culture and
spirit, and Japanese culture therefore did not need to be packaged attrac-
tively for them. As Satō Takumi notes, “the Cultural Work” (文化事業)
of pre-war Japan was primarily “a concept of imperialism” (Satō 2012b,
150). Under a regime of total war, the “International Cultural Work” that
promoted international cultural relations became blatant cultural invasion
in Japanese overseas territories.
Japanese intellectuals such as Jimbo did not doubt the validity of the
Japanese cultural invasion. Jimbo did not dispute the logic of Japanese
cultural policy or Japanese language education. He saw there is no need
to encourage learners to want to learn Japanese language (although the
students of Syonan Nippon Gakuen actually had a highly practical moti-
vation: obtaining better jobs under Japanese rule). Jimbo believed that
Japanese language should naturally appeal to the local people; if not, they
were at fault because they lacked the ability to appreciate the language.
Jimbo believed strongly in the beauty and tradition of Japanese language
and was not able to see the language objectively. He therefore did not see
a need to simplify the way the language was written (e.g. kana usage) for
the convenience of learners. His view of the Japanese language resem-
bled that of ultranationalistic Japanese ideologues of Japan, and was at
odds with the concept of promoting the language overseas. The form of
Japanese language education advocated by Jimbo required local learners’
unconditional acceptance of the Japanese language and culture.
Because Japanese intellectuals took it for granted that the local people
would learn the Japanese language, they made no effort to present it as
an attractive language to learn. Rather, they relied on the learners’ own
initiative. Jimbo often questioned his students’ motivation. He considered
children who had a strong desire to learn the Japanese language “good
children of Greater East Asia,” and believed that students who were
reluctant to learn were “people who were adversely affected by Western
ideas.” Because of this way of thinking, Jimbo and other intellectuals
involved in Japanese language education in Singapore failed to create their
own vision of Japanese language education (Kawaji 2011, 309).
When we consider Japanese language education in wartime Singapore
in the context of Japan’s soft power, we find Japanese military personnel
and intellectuals who irrationally applied the “narrow values” of Japanese
ultranationalism to education in overseas territories that had completely
different cultural values. We cannot find a vision among them of the con-
struction of a “Greater East Asian” culture. During the Second World
War when the concept of “cultural power” was prominent, Japanese lan-
guage education in Japan’s overseas territories lacked a long-term vision.
There was no clear vision of the kind of Japanese language that should
be taught, and the language was simply seen as a means to instil the
Japanese spirit in people in the overseas territories. In Singapore, Japanese
language policy was coercive, and this coerciveness was an indication
of Japan’s tenuous modernity (Lee 2010, 212). Before Japan occupied
Southeast Asia, in its “Cultural Work towards China” (対支文化事業),
it promoted Japanese language and Oriental culture rather than indus-
trial technology, and this approach met with protests from the Chinese.
Satō points out that the project itself reveals the dilemma faced by the
Japanese people, who were torn between an inferiority complex in rela-
tion to Western civilisation and a feeling of superiority to other Asians
(Satō 2012b, 152). A similar dilemma can be found in Japanese language
education in Japanese-occupied Southeast Asia. In the pre-war and war-
time periods, “the criterion of cultural level (民度) was often used as an
arbitrary and ambiguous ranking measure to claim Japanese supremacy
and to place other Asian peoples under the rule of Japan” (Nakano 2012,
99). However, this criterion was not enough to justify Japan’s rule over
Southeast Asia as the successor to the Western powers, and the Japanese
began to use the new criterion of “spirit” (精神), to enable them to
place Southeast Asian people who had a higher cultural level below the
Japanese (Nakano 2012, 100–1). Before the period of “Cultural Work
towards China” and the Japanese invasion of Southeast Asia, Governors
General (総督府) in Taiwan and Korea (which were colonised by Japan in
1895 and 1910, respectively) advocated modernisation through education
and the “benefits of civilisations,” although they rejected political mod-
ernisation (Komagome 1996, 371). In Japanese colonies, modernisation
98 M. MATSUOKA
and the “benefits of civilisation” became the rationalisation for Japan’s

superiority in Asia (at least for Japanese people). However, in Singapore
and other parts of Southeast Asia, the modernity Japan promised did not
justify Japanese domination.
Jimbo, who was familiar with the ideology of Japanese ultranational-
ism, tried to eliminate the influence of Western civilisation. It may have
been natural for Japanese intellectuals such as Jimbo to emphasise the
unification of the Japanese language, spirit and virtue rather than moder-
nity. Japanese language education was reduced to a means of wielding
the Japanese spirit to counter the influence of Western countries, but
ultimately wartime Japanese language education lacked sufficient under-
standing of the target learners because of Japan’s tremendous inferiority
complex in relation to Western civilisation.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has examined Japan’s soft power in wartime Japanese-
occupied territories by analysing Jimbo Kōtaro’s involvement in
Japanese language education in wartime Singapore. Jimbo promoted
Japanese language education through a large-scale media event—
“Nippon-Go Popularising Week”—and various media such as newspa-
pers that included Japanese songs and manga. On the other hand, his
ideology in relation to Japanese language and Japanese language edu-
cation was ultranationalistic. This chapter set out three research ques-
tions. The first concerned Japanese intellectuals’ view of the Japanese
language. Jimbo, who introduced a number of initiatives in Japanese
language education in Japanese-occupied Singapore, retained the his-
torical manner of writing and opposed the simplification of Japanese
language for the convenience of overseas learners. The second question
related to the vision of these Japanese intellectuals for Japanese language
education. Jimbo’s view was based on the close relationship between
language, spirit and virtue. He endeavoured to teach not only Japanese
language but also about Japan itself, which led him to call his school
Syonan Nippon Gakuen. He encouraged his students to embody the
Japanese spirit and expected them to genuinely love the Japanese lan-
guage, regardless of any practical benefits it might bring. At the same
time, he sought to introduce Japanese-style discipline to his classrooms.
He sought school education based on Japanese spirit and virtue in war-
time Singapore. The third question related to the sources of soft power
the Japanese authorities used to promote Japanese language education

in Singapore. Jimbo’s educational methods influenced Japanese lan-
guage education policy in wartime Singapore in the subsequent period.
Educational policy during the Japanese occupation sought to achieve
the Japanisation of local students. On the other hand, Jimbo and other
intellectuals never seemed to question the appeal of Japanese language for
these students. They took it for granted that the local people should learn
Japanese. When the students were reluctant to learn, he saw this as a mat-
ter of their lack of initiative. Japanese intellectuals and others engaged in
Japanese language education in Singapore did not create their own vision
for Japanese language education. While “cultural power” was important
in the midst of total war, Japanese intellectuals did not make an effort to
present Japanese language as a source of soft power. Their lack of under-
standing of the target learners and their coercive educational practices in
Southeast Asia can be attributed to the Japanese people’s inferiority com-
plex in relation to Western civilisation. As this chapter has demonstrated,
in the case of wartime Singapore, Japan was unable to realise the poten-
tial of Japanese language education as a source of soft power because of
its failure to formulate a coherent vision for the promotion of Japanese
language in its overseas territories.
NOTES
1. The English translation “International Cultural Work” follows Teow See
Heng’s usage (Teow 1999).
2. “Nippon-Go” as in the original source. In fact, the slogan itself was written
in English and an English newspaper continued to be published until the
end of the war.
3. English translation by Syonan Times. “Nippon-Go Popularising Week” as
in the source.
4. Sakura continued to be published by the Propaganda Department after
Jimbo’s return to Japan.
5. Syonan Nippon Gakuen opened on 1 May 1942. Jimbo was appointed as
its headmaster on 9 May. Since there were no age restrictions and no
tuition costs for enrolment, there were more than 1000 applicants.
Eventually, 373 students were chosen and they entered a three-month-
study programme. Students attended morning lessons, and in the after-
noon there were special programmes for schoolteachers. The graduation
ceremony for members of the inaugural class was held on 2 August 1942.
Two weeks later, the school accepted a second intake of students and intro-
duced an advanced course. For the second intake, the school placed a
100 M. MATSUOKA
restriction on age (16–25 years old) and introduced an entrance

examination. Despite this, there were 2500 applicants, and the school
accepted 427. The second group completed the same programme as the
first group, within two months. Before the second group completed their
study, the school accepted a third group of students, who completed the
course within a month and graduated on 4 November, just before Jimbo
returned to Japan (Jimbo 1943, 300–2). On 31 October 1942, the
Japanese military administration Superintendent took over the school from
Jimbo, and it was therefore renamed Gunsei-kambu Kokugo Gakkō
(Military Administration Superintendent’s National Language School).
6. “Graduation Of First Batch Of Nippon-Go Students: IMPRESSIVE
CEREMONY AT DAITOA GEKIZYO,” Syonan Times, 4 August, 1942.
Original in Japanese (Jimbo 1943, 303–5), English translation by Syonan
Times.
7. “Graduation Of First Batch Of Nippon-Go Students: IMPRESSIVE
CEREMONY AT DAITOA GEKIZYO,” Syonan Times, 4 August 1942.
Original in Japanese (Jimbo 1943, 303–5), English translation by Syonan
Times.
8. Historical kana usage is the system of orthography of Japanese kana char-
acters that was used until 1940s. Historical usage is not often in accord
with pronunciation. On the other hand, phonetic kana usage represents
the actual pronunciation of the spoken Japanese language. For further dis-
cussion of these two orthographies, see Lee 2010.
9. English translation by Maki Hirano Hubbard (Lee 2010, 201).
10. Original text Hoshina, Kō ichi. 1942. 大東亜共栄圏と国語政策 [The
Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere and Kokugo Policy]. Tokyo:
Tō seisha, p. 410. English translation by Maki Hirano Hubbard.
11. The term kokugo (lit. national language) is usually used to indicate the lan-
guage taught to Japanese people in Japanese schools, while the term
nihongo (lit. Japanese language) is generally used as a neutral term to objec-
tively describe or name the Japanese language as one of the many languages
of the world as well as the language taught to “non-Japanese” as a second
or foreign language (Hirano Hubbard 2010, xiv–xv). Historically, the for-
mer term was usually used for the language taught in Mainland Japan and
its colonies where Japan had sovereignty, and the latter was generally used
for the language taught in other Japanese territories and foreign countries.
REFERENCES
Akashi, Yō ji. 1976. “Education and Indoctrination Policy in Malaya and Singapore
Under the Japanese Rule, 1942–1945.” Malaysian Journal of Education
13:1–46.
Akashi, Yō ji. 1991. “Japanese Cultural Policy in Malaya and Singapore, 1942–45.”
In Japanese Cultural Policies in Southeast Asia During World War 2, edited by
Grant K. Goodman, 117–172. Basingstoke: Macmillan.
Akashi, Yō ji. 2008a. Introduction to New Perspectives on the Japanese Occupation
in Malaya and Singapore, 1941–1945, edited by Akashi Yō ji and Yoshimura
Mako, 1–20. Singapore: NUS Press.
Akashi, Yō ji. 2008b. “Colonel Watanabe Wataru: The Architect of the Malayan
Military Administration, December 1941–March 1943.” In New Perspectives
on the Japanese Occupation in Malaya and Singapore, 1941–1945, edited by
Akashi Yō ji and Yoshimura Mako, 33–64. Singapore: NUS Press.
Guo, Jun Hai. 2014. “Popularizing Japanese Language During the Japanese
Occupation of Singapore, 1942–1945: An Analysis of the Nippon-Go Lesson
Columns in the Syonan Times.” In Japan and Southeast Asia: Continuity and
Change in Modern Times, edited by Teow See Heng, Lydia N. Yu-Jose, Ricardo
Trota Jose and Yoshimura Mako, 93–113. Manilla: Ateneo de Manilla Press.
Hirano Hubbard, Maki. 2010. “Translator’s Introduction” to The Ideology of
Kokugo: Nationalizing Language in Modern Japan. Authored by Yeounsuk
Lee, ix–xviii. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.
Ibuse, Masuji. 1974. Preface to 戦争の横顔: 陸軍報道班員記 [Profile of War:
Chronicle of Journalist Troop of the Army], by Terasaki Hiroshi, 7–11. Tokyo:
Taihei Shuppansha.
Ibuse Masuji. 2005. 徴用中のこと [Matters During the Draft]. Tokyo: Chūō kō ron
Shinsha.
Jimbo, Kō tarō . 1943. 昭南日本学園 [Syonan Japanese School]. Tokyo: Ai no Jigyō
Sha.
Kamiya, Tadataka. 1996. Introduction to 南方徴用作家 [Drafted Literary Figures
to Southern Area], edited by Kamiya Tadataka and Kimura Kazuaki, 1–14.
Tokyo: Sekai Shisō Sha.
Kawaji, Yuka. 2011. 日本語教育と戦争:「国際文化事業」の理想と変容 [Japanese
Language Education and War: The Ideals and Transformation of “International
Cultural Work”]. Tokyo: Shinyō sha.
Kawanishi, Kō suke. 2016. 大東亜共栄圏: 帝国日本の南方体験 [Greater East Asia
Co prosperity Sphere: Japanese Empire’s Experience of Southern Area]. Tokyo:
Kō dansha.
Komagome, Takeshi. 1996. 植民地帝国日本の文化統合 [Cultural Integration of
the Japanese Colonial Empire]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten.
Japan. Translated by Maki Hirano Hubbard. Honolulu: University of Hawaii
Press.
Matsunaga, Noriko. 2002. 日本占領下マラヤにおける日本語教育 [Japanese
Language Education in Malaya Under the Japanese Military Administration].
Tokyo: Kazama Shobō .
102 M. MATSUOKA
Matsunaga, Tomoko. 2012. “出版メディアにおける『武士道』と『1Q84』

のあいだ [The In-between of Bushido and 1Q84 in Publication Media].” In
ソフト・パワーのメディア文化政策 [Media Cultural Policy of Soft Power],
edited by Satō Takumi, Watanabe Yasushi and Shibauchi Yasufumi. Tokyo:
Shinyōsha.
Nakajima, Kenzō , and Jimbo, Kō tarō . 1943. “特輯マライの日本語 [Special
Feature: Japanese Language in Malaya].” 日本語 [Japanese Language], 3–5.
Nakano, Satoshi. 2012. 東南アジア占領と日本人: 帝国・日本の解体 [Southeast
Asia and the Japanese Occupiers: The Dismantlement of an Empire]. Tokyo:
Iwanami Shoten.
Nye, Joseph Jr. 2004. Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics. New York:
Public Affairs.
Satō, Takumi, Watanabe Yasushi, and Shibauchi Yasufumi, eds. 2012. ソフト・パワー
のメディア文化政策 [Media Cultural Policy of Soft Power]. Tokyo: Shinyōsha.
Satō , Takumi. 2012a. Introduction to ソフト・パワーのメディア文化政策
[Media Cultural Policy of Soft Power]. Edited by Satō Takumi, Watanabe
Yasushi and Shibauchi Yasufumi, 9–23. Tokyo: Shinyō sha.
Satō , Takumi. 2012b. “「文化立国」日本におけるメディア論の貧困 [Poverty
of the Discussion of Media Communication in Japan as a Culture-Oriented
Nation].” In ソフト・パワーのメディア文化政策 [Media Cultural Policy of
Soft Power], edited by Satō Takumi, Watanabe Yasushi and Shibauchi Yasufumi,
143–176. Tokyo: Shinyō sha.
Teow, See Heng. 1999. Japanese Cultural Policy Toward China, 1918–1931.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Tokugawa, Yoshichika. 1999. “マライ教育事情 (第一巻) [The Conditions of
Education in Malaya, Volume 1].” In 南方軍政関係史料 19軍政下における
マラヤ・シンガポール教育事情史・資料: 1941~1945 [Documents on Education
in Malaya and Singapore Under Military Administration: 1941–45], edited by
Akashi Yō ji, 57–188. Tokyo: Ryūkei Shosha. Originally published (Singapore:
Department of Education, Japanese Military Administration Superintendent
of Malaya, 1943).
PART III
Japanese Language Teaching in Asia

CHAPTER 6
Japanese Language for Trainee Nurses

from Asia: The EPA Scheme as a Missed
Opportunity
Rika Kusunoki
“もう疲れ果ててしまった (I’m exhausted)”, stated an Indonesian trainee

care worker in an article in the Asahi Shimbun, one of the Japan’s largest
daily newspapers, on 18 September 2016. The article reported on how
tough the trainee’s life in Japan was—this trainee subsequently left Japan
after working in a nursing home for six years.
Japan began to employ trainee nurses and care workers as part of its
Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) with Indonesia (in 2008), the
Philippines (in 2009), and Vietnam (in 2014) (Ministry of Health, Labour and
Welfare 2017). EPAs generally deal with economic arrangements between two
parties such as tariff cuts and investment rules, so the employment of trainee
nurses and care workers is only one aspect of these agreements. Therefore, to
avoid confusion, in this chapter I use the term “the (EPA) scheme” to refer to
the part of the EPA that involves the employment of trainee nurses and care
workers from these three countries.
R. Kusunoki (*)

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_6
106 R. KUSUNOKI
The scheme sparked a strong reaction from the public and the media
because it differs in a number of ways from the past immigration poli-
cies of the Japanese government. In particular, this is the first time that
Japan has opened up a path to permanent residency for foreign work-
ers, apart from highly skilled workers and Japanese descendants such as
Japanese Brazilians, on the condition that the trainees pass the national
nursing exam within three years. Under the EPAs, the Japanese govern-
ment also supports the trainees’ Japanese language study. However, the
scheme has not been a success to date in two respects—the low pass rate
for the exam and the growing number of returnees. As of 2016, the train-
ees’ pass rate was still less than 10% compared to an overall pass rate of
90%, and this means that a large number of trainees have to return home.
Further, in recent years trainees have experienced considerable difficulty
staying and continuing to work in Japan, even after passing the exam (see
Kurniati et al. 2017). The quote that began this chapter is from one of
these returnees, and Matsukawa and Morimoto state that more than 30%
of the trainees who have passed the exam have since left the EPA scheme
(Asahi Shimbun, 18 September 2016).1 When the problems experienced
by the trainees are discussed, a major focus of discussions is the Japanese
language—how difficult the language is, and how hard it is for foreigners
to learn. In these discourses, Japanese language is seen as nothing but an
obstacle for the trainees and the major cause of the scheme’s failures. At
the same time, the trainees’ lack of sufficient Japanese language is a major
concern shared by Japanese doctors, nurses, and care workers represented
by the Japan Medical Association, Japanese Nursing Association, Japan
Federation of Medical Workers’ Unions and the Japanese Trade Union
Confederation (Suzuki 2007).
This study, which focuses on the case of trainee nurses, investigates
whether Japanese language has the potential to be a source of soft power,
which attracts foreigners rather than being an obstacle, by analysing for-
eign trainee nurses’ perceptions of the language. Gil (2009) argues that
language can be a source of soft power, and notes that China’s efforts
to promote Chinese language learning around the world have been suc-
cessful in creating a positive image of Chinese language and attracting
new learners of the language. Vyas (2008) also mentions the success of
The Japan Foundation in promoting Japanese language for elite Chinese
to have knowledge of Japanese language and Japanese culture in the
early years after Japan and China reopened diplomatic relations in 1972.
However, Vyas, at the same time, expresses a sceptical view of Japanese
JAPANESE LANGUAGE FOR TRAINEE NURSES FROM ASIA... 107
language as a soft power when Chinese people study Japanese purely to

gain employment. Nye (2009) also does not see Japanese language as a
source of soft power. Rather, he considers it an impediment to Japan’s
image, as it “is not widely spoken” (Nye 2009) internationally. Given that
the EPA scheme deals with important issues in contemporary Japanese
society, it is important to identify how Japan and Japanese language are
perceived by the trainee nurses taking part in the scheme. To this end, this
study asks two questions (RQ1 and 2):
RQ1: Why do trainee nurses take part in the EPA scheme and come to
Japan?
RQ2: What is their perception of Japanese language?
This study is part of a larger research project on the EPA scheme. The
data used in this chapter will therefore also contribute to the outcomes of
this broader research into communication between native and non-native
speakers of Japanese at Japanese medical workplaces.
This chapter comprises five sections. After this introduction, the fol-
lowing section presents an overview of the EPA scheme that entailed
the employment of trainee nurses from Indonesia, the Philippines, and
Vietnam, focusing on its potential to serve as a vehicle for promoting
Japanese soft power. The chapter then turns to the situation in the three
EPA partner countries, focusing on the status of Japanese language educa-
tion. The fourth section presents the results of the trainee interviews. It
discusses how Japan and Japanese language affect the trainees’ decision to
participate in the EPA scheme, and how the trainees view and deal with
Japanese language. The final part of the chapter discusses the responses to
the research questions, and argues that the Japanese government needs to
take advantage of the current Japanese boom in Asian countries and imple-
ment the EPA scheme based on a long-term vision. This vision should not
only focus on the national nursing exam but also assist the trainees to find
future opportunities in Japan.
THE POTENTIAL OF THE EPA SCHEME

An EPA is a “bilateral or multilateral agreement among states to eliminate
customs and domestic regulations other [than] import/export regula-
tions, to harmonise economic systems, and to facilitate the free move-
ment of natural persons, goods, and capital within a region” (Ministry
108 R. KUSUNOKI
of Economy, Trade and Industry 2005, 1). Therefore, all EPAs vary and
contain provisions tailored to the interests and needs of the partner coun-
tries or regions. The employment of trainee nurses and care workers is
included in Japan’s EPA with Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam
under the provisions for movement of natural persons. Under the EPA
scheme, designated agencies in each country recruit trainee nurses. These
trainee nurses then undergo preparatory training, focusing on Japanese
language training, before and after their arrival in Japan, and are sent to
hospitals in Japan to work/study. Trainees are given a three-year visa and
can stay and work as registered nurses in Japan permanently if they pass
the Japanese national nursing exam. If not, they must leave Japan and
return home. This is why they are considered trainee nurses in Japan even
though they are qualified nurses in their home countries (see Asato 2014).
The employment of foreign trainee nurses through the EPA scheme
touches on important issues in contemporary Japanese society including
foreign labour policy, Japanese language education policy for foreigners,
and medical practices in a greying population. The Japanese government
has clearly stated that the scheme is not a response to a domestic labour
shortage in the medical field, and that the objective of the scheme is for
trainees to pass the national nursing exam to qualify to work in Japan
as registered nurses (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2007). However, the
EPA scheme can be seen as a test case for employing foreign labour in
various workplaces in the future as Japanese society continues down its
path of rapid greying. In fact, even though the objective of the scheme is
simple and clear, the interpretation of this objective varies between agen-
cies at the ministerial level in Japan. The Japanese government went to
considerable lengths to implement the EPA scheme by involving three
ministries—the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW); the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA); and the Ministry of Economy,
Trade and Industry (METI). There has been a range of responses to the
EPA scheme amongst ministries (Ford and Kawashima 2013), and each
ministry has its own agenda and concerns regarding the scheme which
results in different interpretations of the scheme’s objective. For exam-
ple, MHLW, which works closely with the host hospitals that are the
operational providers of the scheme, includes additional information in
its statement of the scheme’s intentions, and uses wording that reflects
the impact of the scheme on its position. Specifically, the statements from
each ministry do not rule out the possibility that the EPA scheme is a test
case for employing foreign labour. Consequently, the EPA scheme could
be a unique opportunity for the Japanese government to promote a high
level of Japanese language proficiency in Asian countries. In other words,

the EPA scheme has the potential to be used as a vehicle for promoting
Japanese language for skilled labour in Asia. The following section
provides an overview of the situation of the three EPA partner countries,
focusing on Japanese language education.
JAPANESE LANGUAGE EDUCATION IN INDONESIA,

THE PHILIPPINES, AND VIETNAM
In the EPA scheme, trainees who have passed the N2 level of the Japanese
Language Proficiency Test (JLPT) are exempt from pre-departure
Japanese language training.2 The number of trainees obtaining this
exemption has been low, which tells us that many trainees take part in
the EPA scheme with little, if any, knowledge of Japanese language. This
low level of Japanese language proficiency at the time of arrival in Japan
is a serious issue for the current EPA scheme as the trainees’ length of
stay in Japan is limited under the scheme. It is impossible for the trainees
to pass the exam without improving their Japanese language proficiency
in this limited time, and if they cannot pass the exam, they must leave
Japan. So why do trainees take part in the EPA scheme despite this
extremely tough hurdle, even if they have not studied Japanese before?
This section outlines the current status of Japanese language education
in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam, as well as Japan’s engage-
ment with these countries.
The three Southeast Asian countries with which Japan has signed EPAs
have both similarities and differences in terms of Japanese language edu-
cation and their relationships with Japan. Two characteristics shared by
all three countries are the large number of Japanese language learners and
a recent Japan boom. First, according to a survey on Japanese language
education abroad conducted by the Japan Foundation in 2015, the num-
ber of Japanese language learners was 745,125 in Indonesia, 50,038 in
the Philippines, and 64,863 in Vietnam, ranking them second, ninth,
and eighth in the world, respectively (Japan Foundation 2016a). This
means that almost 24% of Japanese language learners in the world live in
these three countries. Second, all three countries have been experiencing
a Japan boom recently, which has also boosted Japanese language learn-
ing. There are practical reasons for studying the Japanese language in
Indonesia, such as future employment, because of the strong economic
relationship between Indonesia and Japan. In addition, recent years have
seen an increased interest in Japanese pop culture, such as anime, manga,
110 R. KUSUNOKI
and J-POP, which provide another reason to study Japanese (Japan

Foundation 2016b). The Philippines has long hoped to send human
resources such as IT engineers, nurses, and care workers to work in the
Japanese labour market, so many Japanese-language teaching institutions
sprang up in the country after negotiations on the Japan–Philippines EPA
in 2004 in anticipation of the need for Japanese language education. The
employment of trainee nurses and care workers under the EPA spurred
this phenomenon, and the number of Japanese learners increased from
22,362 in 2009 to 50,038 in 2015. This increase was accompanied by
a growing interest in Japanese culture such as anime and manga among
young people (Japan Foundation 2016c). Vietnam had 64,863 Japanese
language learners in 2015, which represented a more than 38% increase
since 2012. More than half of these learners study Japanese at private
schools—for example, for employment in a Japanese company, as prepa-
ratory education for the Technical Intern Training Program, or simply
because of an interest in Japanese anime and manga (Japan Foundation
2016d).3
These two similarities between the three countries—a large number
of Japanese learners and a recent Japan boom—could be great advan-
tages for the EPA scheme. For instance, many of the trainees in these
three countries may have had a chance to learn Japanese before, or may
have a positive impression of Japan/Japanese because of the Japan boom.
Nevertheless, Japanese language learning has always been and still is the
toughest hurdle of the scheme for the trainees, which indicates that the
Japanese government has failed to fully utilise this great opportunity to
promote the scheme. There are also some differences between the situ-
ations in the three EPA countries, including their historical relationships
with Japan.
First, the educational stage at which Japanese language is taught varies
in each country. In Indonesia, more than 95% of Japanese learners were
at secondary level (junior high school and high school) in 2012 (Japan
Foundation 2016b), as Japanese is one of the foreign languages taught as a
compulsory elective subject. This is why most learners in Indonesia do not
study Japanese beyond the beginner level, and may be one reason for the
low level of Japanese language proficiency of Indonesian applicants for the
EPA scheme. However, there was a more than 25% increase in the number
of Japanese language learners at the tertiary level in Indonesia from 2012
to 2015, partly because of growing interest in Japanese culture. During the
same period, the total number of Japanese language learners declined by
15.8% as a foreign language became an elective subject at secondary school

level (Japan Foundation 2016a). The focus of Japanese language education
in Indonesia has been shifting from secondary to tertiary education, and
this trend is likely to continue. Given that most EPA trainee nurses have
studied nursing at tertiary level, there may be room for creating further
language pathways that could lead directly to the EPA scheme, such as
providing Japanese language subjects in the nursing course at tertiary level.
The Philippines has always been more Western oriented than other
Southeast Asian countries, so it is only recently that Japanese language has
gradually begun to gain in popularity. Sixty percent of Japanese learners
are at the tertiary level, but the number of institutions that can provide
more than beginners’ level Japanese is extremely limited due to the lack
of support for second language education and practical policies to increase
education quality in the country (Japan Foundation 2016c). Whatever
the reasons, this is a similar situation to that in Indonesia, where learn-
ers’ opportunities to go beyond beginners’ level Japanese are limited.
In Vietnam, more than half of the learners have been studying Japanese
language at private schools (Japan Foundation 2016d), but Japanese lan-
guage education in elementary schools was introduced from 2016. This
makes Vietnam “the first Southeast Asian country to introduce Japanese
language as a formal subject in elementary education” (The Japan Times,
20 September 2016). Japanese has become increasingly popular in recent
years, partly because many Japanese companies have moved their opera-
tions from China to Vietnam (Asahi Shimbun, 4 March 2016). Further,
Vietnam sends the highest number of university students to Japan, and
had the largest number of JLPT applicants in 2013 among Southeast Asian
countries. Providing Japanese language education at the elementary school
level is likely to expand Japanese language learning at the grass-roots level.
Second, the historical relationships with Japan differ by country. The
Philippines and Vietnam have a history of sending workers to Japan before,
which may have affected the EPA schemes. Early “relations between Japan
and the Philippines were structured through the experience of Filipina
entertainers and hostesses” (Lopez 2012). Filipinas have come to Japan to
work as entertainers since the 1970s, and the dominant image of them was
as prostitutes (Tyner 1996) although their services varied considerably.
Filipina entertainers also increasingly entered into international marriages
in rural Japan, so the number of Filipinas who are foreign residents in
Japan has increased over the past three decades. Furthermore, the Japanese
government started to allow housekeeping services by foreign nationals in
112 R. KUSUNOKI
special deregulated zones in 2016, aiming to boost the domestic labour

force, particularly in light of the country’s rapidly ageing society and
declining birth rate. Most of the initial workers who enter Japan for this
purpose “are expected to come from the Philippines, which is dispatching
more than 100,000 housekeeping workers abroad” (The Asahi Shimbun,
20 October 2016). The Japanese government needs to take advantage of
these situations, which would encourage Japanese language learning in
the Philippines, and could therefore also have a significant impact on the
EPA scheme.
Vietnam embarked upon its EPA scheme with better provisions than
Indonesia and the Philippines in terms of Japanese language training. The
scheme provides 12 months’ pre-departure training, instead of six months,
and has a requirement of JLPT level N3 to enter Japan. This is largely
based on the tough experience of the trainee nurses from the other two
countries, but it should be noted that there is another factor that may also
have greatly influenced the current Japan–Vietnam EPA scheme. A sup-
port program for the training of Vietnamese, which was carried out from
1992 to 2010, was concluded between the Ministry of Labour—Invalids
and Social Affairs of Vietnam and the (current) AHP network in Japan in
1992.4 The program provided 16 months’ Japanese language training to
students in Vietnam aiming to pass the entrance examination for nursing
schools or nursing universities in Japan. After three or four years of study-
ing nursing, the students took the national nursing exam upon graduation
like other Japanese students, and were issued with working visas in Japan
if they passed. Although stays in Japan were limited to four years under
this program, 56 Vietnamese obtained nursing qualifications in this way.
The experience and achievements of this program turned out to be an
important substrate for the Japan–Vietnam EPA scheme, which included
12 months’ pre-departure Japanese language training and a JLPT require-
ment for entry into Japan, unlike the EPAs with the other two countries.
In summary, the common points and differences among the three
countries were discussed in terms of Japanese language education status
and Japan’s engagement. It was indicated that these factors can positively
affect in the scheme but this opportunity has been missed. The current
status of each country does not hold back but generates a multiplier effect
for the EPA scheme. The following section reveals the interview results of
the trainee nurses from these three countries.
INTERVIEWS WITH EPA TRAINEE NURSES

This study uses semi-structured interviews with five EPA trainee nurses
as its primary instrument. Interviews were conducted mainly in Japanese,
supplemented by some English. The data were translated into English
where needed. Two Japanese hospitals (hereafter Hospitals A and B)
located in southwest Japan were contacted to arrange interviews with the
EPA trainee nurses in 2013.
Three trainees were interviewed at Hospital A (hereafter TA1, TA2,
and TA3). Hospital A started to employ EPA trainee nurses in 2008 and
has employed trainees every year since then. There were six trainees at the
hospital at the time of the interviews—four from Indonesia and two from
the Philippines. The total number of trainees the hospital has employed
is 13, but none of these trainees have passed the national nursing exam.
Because they were unable to pass the exam within the government-
mandated period, seven trainees had already returned home at the time
of the interviews.
Hospital B also began to employ EPA trainee nurses in 2008, and has had
trainees every year since that time. Two Indonesian and two Filipino trainees
at this hospital have already returned home, including one who passed the
Japanese national nursing exam. Two Indonesian trainees at the hospital at
the time of the interviews were interviewed (hereafter TB1 and TB2).
Data were transcribed before being analysed qualitatively. Hsieh and
Shannon (2005) define qualitative content analysis as “a research method
for the subjective interpretation of the content of text data through the
systematic classification process of coding and identifying themes or pat-
terns” (p. 1278). The analysis in this study began with the initial coding
of text for key themes, guided by the following questions derived from
the research questions: (a) How do the trainees describe their reasons
for coming to Japan? (b) Are the reasons related to Japan or Japanese
language, and if so, how? (c) How are Japanese language (varieties) repre-
sented? (d) How is this representation linked to the trainees’ attitudes at
work/towards the scheme?
One theme was used to summarise the findings regarding research
question 1—Japan-related reasons and non-Japan-related reasons. Two
broad themes were identified regarding research question 2—Japanese for
the national nursing exam versus Japanese for other occasions; and text-
book Japanese versus practical Japanese. The following section reveals the
interview results and discussions in relation to these themes.
114 R. KUSUNOKI
Why Did the Trainees Come to Japan?

The trainee nurses were asked why they had applied for the EPA scheme
and come to Japan. The answers are briefly classified into two categories—
Japan-related reasons and non-Japan-related reasons.
TA1 and TA3 provided Japan-related reasons: TA1 had always been
interested in Japanese culture and technology, and TA3 chose to apply for
the EPA scheme because it provided training, such as Japanese language
training, before work, unlike programs in other countries. TA3 particu-
larly emphasised the pre-work study/training, by repeating the word “勉
強 (study)” several times. These Japan-related factors suggest that Japan’s
soft power—in TA1’s case, Japanese culture and technology—contributed
to TA1’s reasons for coming to Japan. In fact, like TA1, many trainee nurses
have applied to the EPA scheme because of their interest in Japan and
other Japan-related factors (see Hamzali 2011; Matsukawa and Morimoto
2016). Furthermore, TA3’s response also suggests that Japanese language
study was one reason he came to Japan. Hamzali (2011) also finds that
9% of 45 questionnaire respondents, who were all EPA trainee nurses and
care workers, were motivated by a desire to practise Japanese language and
increase their proficiency. Hamzali’s (2011) results and TA3’s response to
my study confirm that Japanese language is a source of soft power in the
EPA scheme.
The answers of TB1 and TB2 were simple and clear. Although the peer
effect of group interviews must be considered here, TB1 and TB2 both
stated that they had come to Japan to secure a good income and gain
experience. Achieving a good income is classified as a Japan-related reason
here because it refers to income that can be achieved in Japan. Experience,
on the other hand, is classified as a non-Japan-related reason, so it is con-
sidered that TB1 and TB2 had both Japan-related and non-Japan-related
reasons for applying for the EPA scheme. TA2 also gave experience as a
reason for applying for the scheme. In the cases of TB1 and TB2, experi-
ence referred to the experience of working as a nurse—that is, to further
their career. Even though this is a non-Japan-related reason, for TB1 and
TB2 it was accompanied by another reason—a good income—which is a
Japan-related factor that gave them a reason to choose Japan over other
countries. However, TA2’s case was different. The sole reason given by
TA2 was to gain new experience, and he clearly stated that there was no
reason he chose Japan in particular. Thus, the target country did not mat-
ter to TA2 as long as he could gain new experience.
In summary, four of the five trainee nurses gave at least one Japan-related
reason—that is, a reason for choosing Japan in particular—for coming to
work in Japan. These answers indicate the influence and effect of Japan’s
soft power on the EPA scheme, and suggest the potential of Japanese lan-
guage as a source of soft power for Japan. However, it should be noted that
Japan is merely one of many work options for trainee nurses. Some may find
Japan appealing because of its soft power but their needs could easily be
satisfied by other options. In fact, TA1 already had experience working in
Saudi Arabia before coming to Japan, TB1 talked about her plans to work
in Germany after four or five years of working in Japan, and TB2 aspired
to work in Saudi Arabia after Japan. Obviously, Japan is a transit point for
these trainee nurses. This means that the effect of Japan’s soft power is
limited and not fully utilised in the EPA scheme, especially in the long run,
even though it was one of the reasons several of the trainee nurses came to
Japan. Given that a number of the trainees left Japan even after gaining their
nursing qualifications, the scheme has not been a success in terms of provid-
ing trainees with options and opportunities for staying in Japan.
What Do They Think of Japanese Language?

Throughout the interviews, the trainees showed that they perceived
Japanese language in binary terms, in two senses. The first binary was
Japanese language for the national nursing exam and Japanese language
for other occasions, including work. The second was textbook Japanese
and practical Japanese. This section explores these two binaries and dis-
cusses how they reflect the potential of Japanese language as a source of
Japanese soft power in the EPA scheme.
In the binary confrontation between Japanese language for the national
nursing exam and Japanese for other occasions, the trainees’ dispropor-
tionate emphasis on Japanese language for the exam was most striking. All
of the five trainees I interviewed showed almost the same attitude in this
regard. Their disproportionate emphasis on Japanese for the exam was
evident in a number of their responses. Firstly, it was obvious that some
trainees saw the Japanese language used in the exam as the sole reason for
their inability to pass the exam. At the time of interview, TA2 and TA3
had taken the exam twice while TA1, TB1, and TB2 had taken it once.
TA3 declared that the exam was not difficult in itself, but that because it
was all in Japanese he did not understand the questions despite having
116 R. KUSUNOKI
the requisite nursing knowledge. TB1 also stated that Japanese language
was the aspect that made the exam difficult. These examples highlight the
trainees’ strong belief that they were unable to pass the exam because it is
in Japanese and they simply do not understand the language well enough.
In other words, they believe that they would be able to pass the exam if it
was not in Japanese. In fact, TA3 asserted confidently that he would have
no problem passing the exam if it was in English or his own language. TB1
and TB2 concurred that if the exam was not in Japanese they would have
been able to complete most of it based on the knowledge and experience
they had obtained in Indonesia. While Japanese language may well be one
of the factors that keep the trainees’ pass rate low, there is room for further
discussion regarding whether Japanese is in fact the major or only reason
for the low pass rate.
Kawaguchi et al. (2012) conducted an English version of the 98th
national nursing exam, which was taken in February 2009 by 38 Filipino
trainee nurses; only nine of them (23.7%) achieved a pass mark. This result
indicates that the low pass rate for the EPA trainee nurses is not a result
of their Japanese proficiency level alone. The trainees’ perception of the
Japanese used in the exam is therefore rather intriguing, and based heavily
on assumptions. This strongly reflects the Japanese government’s percep-
tion of and stance towards the EPA scheme, which focuses heavily on the
exam. When none of the trainees passed the national nursing exam in 2009
at their first attempt, the Japanese government formed a team of experts in
2010 to conduct a review of the exam. Based on the results of this inves-
tigation, the Japanese government made some modifications to the 2010
national nursing exam, such as the inclusion of furigana for difficult kanji
and English translations for disease names. A further review of the exam
was conducted in 2012. As a result, furigana is now included for all kanji,
not just the difficult ones, and the trainees are given more time than other
candidates to complete the exam. The trainees interviewed were aware of
these modifications and special provisions introduced by the Japanese gov-
ernment. However, TA1 and TB1 commented that “furigana provides
the reading but not the meaning”, and this seems to be a common view
among the trainees. In fact, the modifications to the exam have not sig-
nificantly affected the pass rate. Nevertheless, no further action has been
taken by the government since 2012, even though the initial modifica-
tions are still widely advertised as a sign of the government’s commitment
to the scheme. Despite the rhetoric, this example clearly illustrates the
government’s reluctance to accommodate the trainees’ needs.
The trainees’ disproportionate emphasis on Japanese language for the

exam also, conversely, results in their neglect of Japanese language for
other occasions, especially for work. This is illustrated by the fact that,
when asked, none of the trainees mentioned any issues at work due to
their Japanese language proficiency. While it is possible that the trainees
do not actually experience any language-related issues at work, especially
as the scheme only allows them to work as nurses’ aides, who usually
engage in more straightforward tasks than registered nurses, analysis of
this point is beyond the scope of this study. And yet, the contrast between
the trainees’ perception of the Japanese used in the exam and at work is
still significant—very difficult for the exam and no issues for work. This
is difficult to believe because both relate to the medical field, so it is rea-
sonable to assume that they use similar language. This contrast indicates
either the inappropriate style of the national nursing exam or inappropriate
scheme settings, or both. In other words, it suggests a need to investigate
whether the exam accurately measures the ability to work as a registered
nurse in Japan, and whether working as nurses’ aides at the beginning of
the scheme provides appropriate training for the trainees, who are already
qualified nurses in their home countries.
Another binary perceived by the trainees in relation to Japanese lan-
guage is between textbook Japanese and practical Japanese. In the inter-
view with TA1, TA2, and TA3, they talked about the contrast between the
Japanese they learned before starting work and the Japanese they currently
used at work. TB1 and TB2, on the other hand, told me about their two
Japanese language classes, one of which was for the national nursing exam
(hereafter textbook Japanese) and the other for daily Japanese (hereafter
practical Japanese). The focus in this section is on the trainees’ perception
of the Japanese used in their daily lives, including work.
First of all, the trainees perceive the two types of Japanese very dif-
ferently. TA2 expressed the view that they were different because the
Japanese language he learned in training was “普通の日本語 (normal
Japanese)”. TB2 asserted that the two types of Japanese were “全然違い
ます (totally different)” because the Japanese learned for the exam was “
専門の言葉 (special/technical words)” and the Japanese for daily use was
“方言がたくさん (a lot of dialects)”. Dialects seem to play a major part
in trainees’ lives, especially at work. TA3 found it difficult to communi-
cate with patients because many of them speak dialects. TA1 reported
that some Japanese colleagues were easy to understand but others were
not, depending on the frequency of their dialect use. TB1 joked that she
118 R. KUSUNOKI
had forgotten “普通の日本語 (normal Japanese)” because she always uses

dialect at work. It is interesting that at Hospital B, which provides sepa-
rate Japanese language classes for the exam and daily use, the Japanese
used at work is seen to fall into the latter category, at least by TB1 and
TB2, even though the exam and trainees’ work are in the same field. This
is another finding that calls into question the validity of the national nurs-
ing exam, as in this case it raises the question of whether or not the exam
is a practical test of ability to work in the medical field.
The second point here relates to the trainees’ positive attitude to dia-
lects. Although the trainees were slightly confused at first by the clear
differences between the Japanese they learned in training and regional
dialects, this did not directly lead to a negative perception of dialects.
As in TB1’s response quoted earlier, there were many smiles and laughs
when talking about dialects in both interviews. TB1 and TB2 even hap-
pily demonstrated some dialect phrases, which sounded fairly good, in
terms of accent and intonation, to me as someone who grew up with that
dialect. This example demonstrates a positive aspect of the EPA scheme.
These trainees started to learn Japanese from scratch under the scheme,
and are now working in a Japanese local community and fluently using a
Japanese regional dialect. The trainees enjoy their ability to communicate
with colleagues and patients in dialect, after being given the opportunity
to learn Japanese and work in a local Japanese community by the EPA
scheme. This is an excellent example of Japanese language as a source
of soft power. Nevertheless, the scheme does not allow these trainees to
stay and work in Japan if they do not pass the national nursing exam. In
the near future, Japan is likely to need such trainees, who happily adapt
to and accommodate Japanese society and offer their skills to local com-
munity. However, the Japanese government persists with the require-
ment that trainees must pass the exam within three years. This lack of
a long-term vision by the government means that the scheme misses a
number of opportunities and wastes its considerable potential to be of
benefit, not only to both countries, but also to individual trainees and
the Japanese people.
At the end of the interview at Hospital B, I asked one final question:
what do you think about the new EPA scheme (that employs trainees
from Vietnam, and requires an N3 level of JLPT before arrival)? TB1 and
TB2 both responded forcefully “いいと思います (I think it is good)” as
it will make the national nursing exam easier for the Vietnamese trainees
to pass. TB2 added a half joking comment that was especially memorable.
She observed that the Vietnamese would become good “seniors” and that
they (the current trainees) would become “juniors” at work (because she
assumed the Vietnamese trainees’ Japanese would be better than theirs).
She concluded by saying that she can speak dialect while the Vietnamese
trainees cannot. The pride TB2 takes in this achievement may be subtle,
but it represents the benefit TB2 gained from the EPA scheme, which
shows the great potential of the scheme. What the Japanese government
needs to do for these trainees is not place more pressure on them to pass
the exam, but provide them with a wider range of future opportunities.
By doing so, Japanese language will become much more influential in the
EPA scheme as a source of Japanese soft power.
CONCLUSION
This study has explored the potential of Japanese language to be a source
of soft power by examining foreign trainee nurses who came to Japan
under the EPA scheme. Firstly, the significance of the EPA scheme in
Japan’s foreign labour policy revealed its huge potential to promote
Japanese language for professionals in Asia. However, the EPA trainee
nurses’ pass rate in the national nursing exam has been extremely low,
and more than 30% of the trainees have not remained in the scheme even
after passing the exam, which suggests that the scheme is failing to realise
its potential. The interview results highlighted the Japanese government’s
lack of a long-term vision for the EPA scheme. For example, it was noted
that the scheme places too much emphasis on the national nursing exam,
which means trainees focus disproportionately on the exam and neglect
the Japanese language they need at work. This further calls into ques-
tion the validity of the national nursing exam. The Japanese government’s
reluctance to accommodate the needs of the trainees was also evident in
the modifications made to the exam, and is again rooted in its lack of long-
term vision.
Consequently, this chapter has confirmed that the EPA scheme pres-
ents opportunities for making Japanese language a source of soft power
by equipping trainees with a high level of Japanese language proficiency in
order to make them employable as much-needed skilled workers in Japan.
As all three EPA partners rank in the top ten countries in terms of num-
bers of Japanese language learners and have been experiencing Japanese
language learning booms boosted by Japan’s soft power, the Japanese gov-
ernment needs to take advantage of the opportunity this presents. Given
120 R. KUSUNOKI
that the trainees view Japanese regional dialects positively and successfully
identify themselves as local community members by communicating in
these dialects, this study suggests that the EPA scheme should be con-
ducted with a long-term vision that guides the trainees towards various
future opportunities and does not focus solely on the exam. By doing so,
the scheme could serve as a vehicle for promoting Japanese language for
skilled workers in Asia, as well as attracting an increasing number of train-
ees in the longer term.
NOTES
1. The 30% of trainees who left the EPA scheme does not just include trainees
who left Japan. It may include, for example, trainees who married Japanese
and left the scheme (due to a change in their visa) but who are still working
in Japan as nurses or care workers.
2. The Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT) has been offered by the
Japan Foundation and Japan Educational Exchanges and Services (formerly
the Association of International Education, Japan) since 1984 as a means of
evaluating and certifying the Japanese proficiency of non-native speakers.
The JLPT has five levels: N1, N2, N3, N4 and N5. The easiest level is N5
and the most difficult is N1. According to Japanese Language Proficiency
Test (2017), the linguistic competence required for each level is summarised
as follows:
N1: The ability to understand Japanese used in a variety of circumstances.

N2: The ability to understand Japanese used in everyday situations,
and in a variety of circumstances to a certain degree.
N3: The ability to understand Japanese used in everyday situations to
a certain degree.
N4: The ability to understand basic Japanese.
N5: The ability to understand some basic Japanese.
3. The Japanese government has created the “Technical Intern Training

Program” to transfer skills to technical intern trainees who will form a basis
for economic development in their home countries and play an important
role in Japan’s international cooperation and assistance (Japan International
Training Cooperation Organisation 2017).
4. The non-profit organisation Asian Human Power Networks (AHP networks)
mainly focuses on human resource development and support for medical and
welfare services in Asia (Nonprofit Organisation AHP NETWORKS 2017).
REFERENCES
Asato, Wako. 2014. “不足するケアと外国人受け入れ政策: 看護・介護・家事を
めぐって (特集 I グローバルな視点から日本社会のこれからを問う) [Deficit
of Care and Foreign Worker Policy: Domestic Work, Care Work and Nursing
(Special Section I: Japan’s Challenges for the Future from a Global Perspective)].”
フォーラム現代社会学 [Forum modern sociology] 13:93–101.
Ford, Michele, and Kawashima, Kumiko. 2013. “Temporary Labour Migration
and Care Work: The Japanese Experience.” Journal of Industrial Relations
55(3):430–44.
Gil, Jeffrey. 2009. “The Promotion of Chinese Language Learning and China’s
Soft Power.” Asian Social Science 4(10):116–22.
Hamzali, Mutiawanthi. 2011. “The Concerns and Motivations of Indonesian
Nurses and Care Workers in Japan in the Frame of IJ-EPA (Indonesia-Japan
Economic Partnership Agreement).” 日本の文化と社会の潮流 [Understanding
Contemporary Japan] 17:217–28.
Hsieh, Hsiu-Fang, and Sarah E. Shannon. 2005. “Three Approaches to Qualitative
Content Analysis.” Qualitative Health Research 15(9):1277–88.
Japan Foundation. 2016a. “2015 年度海外日本語教育機関調査結果 [Survey
Report on Japanese – Language Education Abroad 2015].” Accessed 13 April
2017. https://www.jpf.go.jp/j/about/press/2016/dl/2016-057-2.pdf
Japan Foundation. 2016b. “日本語教育国・地域情報インドネシア (2014 年度
[Japanese Language Education: Country/Regional Information Indonesia
2014].” Accessed 5 April 2017. https://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/
survey/area/country/2014/indonesia.html
Japan Foundation. 2016c. “日本語教育国・地域情報フィリピン (2014 年度)
[Japanese Language Education: Country/Regional Information Philippines
survey/area/country/2014/philippines.html
Japan Foundation. 2016d. “日本語教育国・地域情報ベトナム (2014 年度)
[Japanese Language Education: Country/Regional Information Vietnam
survey/area/country/2014/vietnam.html
Japan International Training Cooperation Organisation. 2017. “Outline of
Technical Intern Training Program.” Accessed 5 April. http://www.jitco.or.
jp/english/overview/itp/index.html
Japanese Language Proficiency Test. 2017. “N1-N5: Summary of Linguistic
Competence Required for Each Level.” Accessed 5 April. http://www.jlpt.
jp/e/about/levelsummary.html
Kawaguchi, Yoshichika, O. Yuko Hirano, Reiko Ogawa, and Shun Ohno. 2012.
“Exploring Learning Problems of Filipino Nurse Candidates Working in Japan:
122 R. KUSUNOKI
Based on the Results of a Practice National Board Examination of Japan Given

in English.” Japanese Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 49(4):643–51.
Kurniati, Anna, Ching-Ming Chen, Ferry Efendi and Reiko Ogawa. 2017. “A
Deskilling and Challenging Journey: The Lived Experience of Indonesian
Nurse Returnees”. International Nursing Review 0–8.
Lopez, Mario. 2012. “Reconstituting the Affective Labour of Filipinos as Care
Workers in Japan.” Global Networks 12(2):252–68.
Matsukawa, Kimi, and Miki Morimoto. 2016. “医療・介護の外国人難しい定着
[Foreigners in Medical and Nursing Fields: Difficult to Establish].” Asahi
Shimbun, September 18.
Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. 2005. “Japan’s Policy on FTAs/EPAs.”
Accessed 5 April 2017. http://www.meti.go.jp/english/information/down-
loadfiles/FTAprogress200503.pdf
Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 2007. “Annex 10 Referred to in Chapter 7 Specific
Commitments for the Movement of Natural Persons.” Accessed 5 April 2017.
http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/indonesia/epa0708/annex10.pdf
Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. 2017. “インドネシア、フィリピン
及びベトナムからの外国人看護師・介護福祉士候補者の受入れについ
て [Employment of Foreign Nurse/Care Worker Trainees from Indonesia,
Philippines and Vietnam].” Accessed 5 April. http://www.mhlw.go.jp/stf/
seisakunitsuite/bunya/koyou_roudou/koyou/gaikokujin/other22/index.html
Nonprofit Organisation AHP NETWORKS. 2017. “AHP ネットワークス [AHP
Networks].” Accessed 5 April. http://www.ahp-net.org/information.html
Nye, Joseph S. 2009. Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics. New York:
Public Affairs.
Suzuki, Nobue. 2007. “Carework and Migration: Japanese Perspectives on the
Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement.” Asian and Pacific
Migration Journal 16(3):357–81.
Tyner, James A. 1996. “Constructions of Filipina Migrant Entertainers.” Gender,
Place and Culture: A Journal of Feminist Geography 3(1):77–94.
Vyas, Utpal. 2008. “The Japan Foundation in China: An Agent of Japan’s Soft
Power?” Electronic Journal of Contemporary Japanese Studies. Accessed 20
April 2017. http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/articles/2008/Vyas.html
CHAPTER 7
The Roles of Native Japanese Speaker

Teachers in Japanese Language Programmes
at High Schools in South Korea, Indonesia
and Thailand
Kaoru Kadowaki
According to the “Survey Report on Japanese-Language Education

Abroad 2012” published by the Japan Foundation, the number of
Japanese language learners outside Japan was approximately 3.986 million
(Japan Foundation 2013b). Ten surveys conducted between 1979 and
2012 show annual increases in the numbers of overseas Japanese language
learners. Many of these learners study Japanese language at secondary
schools (middle and high schools), accounting for 52.1% of all Japanese
language learners abroad in 2012. This means that Japanese language edu-
cation in secondary schools is important for Japanese language education
abroad. Many of the Japanese teachers who teach in secondary schools
outside Japan are non-native Japanese speaker teachers (NNJSTs) who
have a teaching license in their country of residence (Japan Foundation
2013a). The number of students learning Japanese language in second-
ary schools in the Asian region has been increasing since the early 2000s
K. Kadowaki (*)
Faculty of Foreign Studies, Setsunan University, Neyagawa, Osaka, Japan

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_7
124 K. KADOWAKI
(Japan Foundation 2013a). With an increase in the number of Japanese

language learners, there is a growing trend whereby native Japanese
speaker teachers (NJSTs) teach Japanese language in secondary schools
in conjunction with NNJSTs. While some NJSTs have been employed
directly by local schools in countries such as South Korea and Thailand
(Kadowaki forthcoming), the Japanese government sends native Japanese
speakers (NJSs) as teaching assistants to local secondary schools in coun-
tries such as Thailand and Indonesia in order to support overseas Japanese
language education. Such dispatch programmes are part of Japan’s policy
to facilitate the spread of Japanese language around the world.
In contrast to hard power, which is the use of military strength or eco-
nomic incentives to influence other nations, soft power entails exerting
influence by spreading the culture or values of a country to other nations.
This means that soft power aims to increase the positive perceptions of
a country (Aoyagi 2015). The Japanese government is endeavouring to
spread aspects of Japanese popular culture, such as manga (comics), anime
(animation) and games, to countries outside Japan under the banner of
“Cool Japan.” However, Japanese language is not included in the Cool
Japan campaign (see Hashimoto, Chap. 3, in this volume). NJSTs who are
sent overseas by the Japanese government could be one element of Japan’s
soft power—they teach Japanese language and introduce Japanese culture
to the world. To enable NJSTs to play such a role, we need to understand
what has been happening in relation to Japanese language teaching out-
side Japan. What kinds of NJSTs are needed in Japanese language courses
in local secondary schools? What kinds of roles do they play at the schools?
What kinds of Japanese language programmes are offered at these schools?
This chapter examines the roles of NJSTs in South Korea, Thailand and
Indonesia, where large numbers of students learn Japanese at secondary
school level. As noted above, in these countries, the number of students
who learn Japanese at secondary school has been increasing since 2000.
One of the reasons for this increase is curriculum changes in these coun-
tries: under the new curricula, Japanese language has become a second
foreign language (Japan Foundation 2014). Since the majority of second-
ary school students who learn Japanese in South Korea, Indonesia and
Thailand are high school students (Japan Foundation 2014), the author
visited local high schools in these countries between 2012 and 2017 to
conduct surveys of NNJSTs. The aims of the surveys were to examine
roles of NJSTs and expectations who taught Japanese language at these
high schools.
THE ROLES OF NATIVE JAPANESE SPEAKER TEACHERS IN JAPANESE... 125
This chapter comprises four parts. First, it provides a brief overview of

Japanese language education in South Korea, Thailand and Indonesia. It
then examines the roles and expectations of NJSTs who teach Japanese at
high schools in these countries. Third, it addresses the challenges posed
by the current practice of team teaching (TT) by NJSTs and NNJSTs, and
finally, it discusses how dispatch programmes could be a successful means
of exercising the soft power of Japanese language.
BACKGROUND TO THE NJS DISPATCH PROGRAMMES

As noted above, the majority of Japanese language learners outside Japan
study Japanese language at secondary school. Table 7.1 shows that sec-
ondary school learners account for a significant share of the total number
of learners in Indonesia, South Korea and Thailand.
Looking at the history of Japanese language education in countries
such as South Korea and Thailand, Japanese language classes were first
offered by universities and later by secondary schools (Japan Foundation
2014). The fact that Japanese language was offered as a foreign language
subject as part of the school curriculum in secondary schools means
that Japanese language was seen as important in those countries (Shiina
1991). Furthermore, Japanese language education in secondary schools
is important in helping students to decide whether to continue to study
Japanese language at university level. It is therefore crucial for the Japanese
Table 7.1 Number of Japanese language learners

Rank Country/Region Number of Number of learners Percentage of secondary
learners at secondary school school learners
1 China 1,046,490 89,182 8.5

2 Indonesia 872,411 835,938 95.8
3 South Korea 840,187 694,036 82.6
4 Australia 296,672 112,302 37.9
5 Taiwan 233,417 85,182 36.5
6 USA 155,939 68,087 43.7
7 Thailand 129,616 88,325 68.1
8 Vietnam 46,762 5496 11.8
9 Malaysia 33,077 17,034 51.5
10 Philippines 32,418 5382 16.6
Source: 2012 Survey by Japan Foundation, modified by the author

126 K. KADOWAKI
government to support Japanese language education in secondary schools

(MOFA 2013). The numbers of Japanese language learners overseas vary
according to the foreign language policy, educational policy, politics and
economy of the individual country, as well as its relationship with Japan.
In Indonesia, it became compulsory to learn a second foreign language
as a result of the revision of the curriculum in 2006, and since that time,
Japanese language has been offered to students of the first year to the third
year (Japan Foundation 2011). As a result, the number of Japanese lan-
guage learners studying the language at high school level increased signifi-
cantly from 244,305 in 2006 to 872,411 in 2012. In Thailand, Japanese
language has been taught as a second foreign language since 1981. In
2010, the Thailand Ministry of Education issued the “World-Class
Standard School” policy (Japan Foundation 2014), which emphasised the
importance of studying a foreign language. This policy allowed science
students to enrol in second foreign language classes, which had previously
been available only to humanities students. As a result, the number of stu-
dents learning Japanese language in secondary schools increased rapidly.
In South Korea, Japanese has been taught as a second foreign language
in high schools since 1972. The number of Japanese language learners
has increased significantly since 2000 due to growing bilateral interac-
tions between Japan and South Korea as well as the revision of the South
Korean national curriculum. Until 2009, South Korea had the largest
number of Japanese language learners in the world. In 2011, the “2009
Revised National Curriculum” was implemented, and it was no longer
compulsory to study a second foreign language. As a result, the number of
Japanese language learners declined from 871,200 in 2009 to 694,036 in
2012. Despite this, the number of students learning Japanese as a second
language is larger than the numbers for other languages such as German,
French and Chinese offered in schools. The decrease in the number of
high school students due to the decline in the number of children in the
country (Korean Educational Development Institute 2012) has also been
a factor that has contributed to the declining number of Japanese lan-
guage learners in South Korea.
As discussed above, the numbers of Japanese language learners in sec-
ondary schools in overseas countries vary, depending on the country’s
education policy and foreign language education policy. Since 2000, NJSs
have started to teach Japanese language in high schools in South Korea,
Thailand and Indonesia. There were a number of reasons for this trend.
The first relates to the perceived lack of proficiency and teaching skills
of NNJTs. In some cases, teachers of other subjects were expected to
undergo training to become Japanese language teachers in order to cope
with the shortage of Japanese teachers. This situation arose in Australia
in the 1990s, South Korea in the early 2000s and Thailand in the mid-
2000s (Japan Foundation 2014). These teachers underwent training for a
limited period and became Japanese language teachers without acquiring
adequate Japanese language proficiency or teaching skills. In Thailand,
because very few high school teachers majored in Japanese language edu-
cation at university (Bussaba 2009), the Thai Ministry of Education and
the Japan Foundation began to offer Japanese language training programs
for high school teachers (Japan Foundation 2014).
The second point relates to motivating students to learn the language.
Japanese language learners in schools outside Japan usually have limited
opportunities to use Japanese language in their daily lives. But with the
presence of native speakers, the learners need to use the language to com-
municate with them. It has been reported that some secondary students
studied Japanese language for negative reasons such as “I have no choice
but to take Japanese as it is compulsory to study a second foreign lan-
guage” (Kadowaki 2008). To motivate such students to learn Japanese
language, some NNJSTs asked their schools to allow them to invite NJSs
to their classes (Kadowaki 2008).
The third point concerns the presence of native speaker teachers
(NSTs) of foreign languages in schools. In high schools in Thailand and
South Korea, native speakers of English, Chinese and Japanese have been
employed to teach foreign languages in both public and private schools.
In Thailand, the parents of high school students want their children to
learn from NSTs. In Thailand, NSTs of foreign languages seem to have
been seen as a useful marketing tool for schools. In South Korea, in some
cases, NSTs are employed by Municipal Education Bureaus, which then
send NSTs to high schools upon request. South Korea and Thailand are
non-English speaking countries that have a high number of NJSTs in high
schools (Japan Foundation 2013a). In these two countries, NJSTs are often
employed even without a teaching license. In Thailand, the Ministry of
Education allows them to teach because of their experience, and in South
Korea, their employment is at the discretion of the school principal. It
appears that the factors contributing to the high number of NJSTs in high
schools in Thailand and South Korea include the existence of local Japanese
communities and the availability of foreign language instructor visas.
128 K. KADOWAKI
In South Korea, the seventh national curriculum was implemented in

2002, and “Understanding the culture of the target language” was added
to the learning goals of the national curriculum guidelines. Furthermore,
South Korean high schools have begun to promote foreign language educa-
tion in order to be competitive in the international community, and this has
led to an increased demand for native speaker teachers of Japanese (NJSTs)
(Kadowaki forthcoming). Active bilateral interactions between Japan and
South Korea have also contributed to TT by NNJSTs and NJSTs. In
Thailand, the number of high school students learning Japanese language
surged with the curriculum revision mentioned above, and this led to a
shortage of Japanese language teachers. Although efforts have been made
to improve language skills of NNJSTs, there is a growing need for NJSTs
in high schools. In Indonesia, too, the number of Japanese language learn-
ers rapidly increased, as has the demand for NJSTs. In contrast to Thailand
and South Korea, however, no NJSTs have been employed by schools
in Indonesia. In Indonesia, all NJSTs are sent by Japanese government
bodies—Japanese language experts and assistants by the Japan Foundation
and “Japan overseas cooperation volunteers” by the Japan International
Cooperation Agency (JICA). The situation changed in 2014 with the
launch of a new Japanese language teacher dispatch programme known as
the “NIHONGO Partners,” which will be discussed later in the chapter.
The following section provides an overview of TT by NJSTs and
NNJSTs, based on the survey of NJSTs in high schools in South Korea,
Thailand and Indonesia.
NJSTS AND TT
Between 2012 and 2015, the author visited high schools in South Korea
and Thailand and interviewed NNJSTs on their views of TT with NJSTs
(5 NNJSTs at 5 schools in South Korea, and 13 NNJSTs at 5 schools in
Thailand). In Indonesia, the programme of sending NJSs to high schools
began in conjunction with the launch of the NIHONGO Partners (NP)
dispatch programme in 2014, and I conducted interviews with seven
NNJSTs at seven high schools that employed NJSTs in 2016. The NP
dispatch programme was also launched in Thailand in 2014, and I inter-
viewed four NNJSTs about NP in Thailand in 2017. This section discusses
the situation in relation to NJSTs and TT by NJSTs and NNJSTs in each
country, referring to some of the findings of the survey on NJSTs who
were teaching in Thailand and South Korea (Kadowaki 2015).
Many NJSTs in South Korea, Indonesia and Thailand are not full-time
teachers but “assistants” or “foreign instructors” who are employed at
the discretion of school principals. There are five types of employment of
NJSTs:
1. Dispatch programme by the Japanese government;

2. Dispatch programme by Japanese or local private organisations;
3. Employment by local Education Department or Education Bureaus;
4. Employment by local schools; and
5. Volunteers residing in local communities.
In Thailand, all forms of employment apart from type 4 can be found,

whereas in South Korea, type 3 and type 4 are dominant due to the absence
of dispatch programmes (Kadowaki 2015). In Indonesia, most NJSTs are
employed under dispatch programmes organised by the Japanese government
(type 1). The roles of NJSTs in schools depend on their form of employment.
NJSTs in South Korea are generally full-time NJSTs employed by
Municipal Education Bureaus, and are employed as teaching assistants to
carry out TT with NNJSTs. In South Korea, both “foreign language high
schools” and ordinary high schools offer Japanese language courses. In
the foreign language high schools, NJSTs, who are employed at the school
principals’ discretion, can teach Japanese without a teaching license.
Municipal Education Bureaus also send NJSTs to these foreign language
high schools, but these NJSTs do not participate in TT as assistants; rather,
they teach Japanese language subjects such as “conversation” and “writ-
ing” by themselves. Most of the locally employed NJSTs are long-term
residents who hold permanent residence visas or spouse visas. Many of the
NJSTs have studied Japanese language teaching in Japan or South Korea
(Kadowaki 2015). Although they are fluent in Korean language, they are
expected to speak only Japanese to their students in class.
In Thailand, as noted earlier, NJSTs are dispatched from Japan under
private dispatch programmes or employed directly by local schools. Local
schools are able to employ NJTSs who do not have a teaching license if
they obtain the permission of the Ministry of Education. One of the char-
acteristics of NJSTs working in Thailand is their employment experience—
usually less than three years (Kadowaki et al. 2014). In many cases, they go
to Thailand to gain teaching experience after completing a Japanese language
teaching course in Japan. During the interviews, some NJSTs stated that they
are able to communicate in Thai language. They usually use a combination
130 K. KADOWAKI
of Japanese, English and Thai to communicate with Thai NNJSTs due to

Thai teachers’ lack of fluency in Japanese. In Thailand, NJSTs are employed
as assistant teachers to conduct TT with NNJTSs. However, they report that
they are sometimes asked to conduct classes by themselves. In such cases,
the NJSTs often face difficulties communicating with students if they are not
fluent in Thai or the students’ Japanese is not good enough to enable them
to understand the instructions provided by the NJSTs. In TT settings, the
problem of the dependence of NNJSTs on NJSTs has been reported, and it
appears that NNJSTs sometimes expect the NJSTs to handle classes on their
own (Kadowaki et al. 2014).
In contrast to the situations in Thailand and South Korea, in Indonesia,
NJSTs had not taught as full-time teachers in schools until recently. In
the past, only Japanese language experts (or assistants) were dispatched
to Indonesian high schools by the Japan Foundation and JICA. In major
tourist destinations such as Bali, some Japanese private organisations dis-
patch Japanese teachers, but these teachers usually work as volunteers in
schools for a limited time period. However, since the launch of the NP
dispatch programme in 2014, NJSs have been sent to high schools as
full-time teachers. Table 7.2 provides a summary of the findings on TT in
South Korea, Thailand and Indonesia.
Dispatch programmes by the Japanese government are one of the initia-
tives taken under Japan’s foreign policy; they aim to deepen understand-
ing of Japan and spread information about the country through direct
Table 7.2 TT by NNJST and NJST in South Korea, Thailand and Indonesia
Country Starting date Background Employment type of NJST
South Korea Mid-2000s Development of By local schools or Education

communication skills need Bureaus
to cope with globalisation No dispatch programmes
Thailand A drastic increase of By schools or private dispatch
Japanese language learners programmes, volunteer
Shortage of Japanese Governmental dispatch
language teachers programme since 2014
Indonesia 2014 Lack of Japanese proficiency Governmental dispatch
and teaching skills of programme since 2014
NNJSTs Volunteers
interaction between NJSTs and Japanese language learners. The following

section examines the workings of these dispatch programmes.
DISPATCH PROGRAMMES FOR NJSTS

Japanese teachers are dispatched overseas under the Japanese-Language
Specialists Dispatch Program organised by the Japan Foundation and the
Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers programme organised by JICA.
They are expected to visit high schools as advisors and assist local NNJSTs.
The number of teachers dispatched is limited. In addition to these pro-
grammes, the dispatch programmes listed below also send NJSTs as assis-
tants to secondary schools outside Japan.
1. REX (Regional and Educational Exchanges for Mutual Under-

standing) Program
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology

(MEXT), with the cooperation of MOFA, conducted this programme,
which sent young Japanese teachers in public elementary and secondary
schools abroad to teach Japanese language in schools for two years (includ-
ing four months of pre-departure training in Japanese language education).
One of the purposes of this programme was to provide Japanese teachers
with international experience that they could utilise in their teaching after
returning to Japan, for example by organising international exchange
activities. A total of 303 teachers were sent overseas between 1990 and
2004, mainly to English-speaking countries, although some were also sent
to China and South Korea (MEXT, REX Program). There was one NJST
dispatched under the REX Program who participated in the NJST survey
conducted in South Korea in 2013 (Kadowaki 2015).
The teachers sent overseas under the REX Program included some
English teachers who had experience in TT with teaching assistants of
native English speakers at Japanese junior high and high schools. Because
the REX Program participants were practising teachers, they were expected
to be able to handle TT with NNJST in Japanese language classes in local
schools. The REX Program was regarded as having benefits both for
Japanese language education in the host countries and for school education
in Japan. However, this programme ended in 2013 due to a lack of fund-
ing. According to my private conversations with one government official,
the programme was discontinued as a result of the government’s budget
132 K. KADOWAKI
screening process in 2012 because the review committee did not recognise
the significance of the REX Program in comparison to other dispatch pro-
grammes (i.e., the programmes by the Japan Foundation and JICA).
2. JENESYS (Japan-East Asia Network of Exchange for Students and

Youths)
Under this scheme, young Japanese who had majored in Japanese lan-
guage education at universities and had experience in teaching Japanese were
sent to teaching institutions in Southeast Asia and Oceania for around ten
months. This programme commenced with a five-year plan in 2007 under
the administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. The dispatch of Japanese
language teachers began in 2008 (with 48 teachers), but the programme
ended in 2011 after a change of government (Japan Foundation, JENESYS).
A new NP programme was launched in 2014, after the formation of the
second Abe Cabinet.
3. Japanese Language Education Assistant Program (J-LEAP)
J-LEAP was established as a result of a 2010 dialogue between the lead-

ers of Japan and the USA, to further promote cultural human resource
exchanges, which are one of the pillars of the USA–Japan relationship,
and to strengthen the support for Japanese language education in the
USA. A group of 10–13 young Japanese language teachers was sent to
educational institutions to teach Japanese language for one year (Japan
Foundation, J-LEAP).
4. NIHONGO Partners
This programme sends Japanese citizens to secondary schools in

mainly ASEAN countries for one year as partners of NNJST and students
who study Japanese in those countries. It began in 2014, and aims to
send 3000 Japanese citizens overseas by 2020, the year of the Tokyo
Olympics. Of these 3000, approximately 2000 will be sent to Indonesia.
NJSs aged 20–69 years are eligible for this programme, regardless of their
expertise or teaching experience in Japanese language. NPs play a role as
assistants in Japanese language and culture classes, but are also expected
to study the language and culture of the host country during their stay.
In 2014, a total of 100 Japanese citizens were sent overseas as part of

this scheme: 29 to Thailand, 5 to the Philippines, 48 to Indonesia, 10 to
Vietnam and 8 to Malaysia. Most of the first batches of NPs were mid-
dle-aged or senior citizens (Japan Foudation AsiaCentre, NIHONGO
Partners).
Among the above-listed government schemes that send NJSs to assist
with Japanese language education abroad, the first three programmes
focussed on young Japanese who had studied Japanese language educa-
tion or had experience teaching Japanese. In contrast, the NP programme
launched in 2014 set the eligibility age at up to 69, with no requirement
for expertise in Japanese language education or teaching experience. So,
do these dispatch programmes initiated by the Japanese government meet
the local needs for Japanese language education in the host countries? The
following section discusses the expected roles of NJSTs and the challenges
of TT, based on the results of surveys conducted with NNJSTs, followed
by an analysis of the NP programme, which is the sole dispatch program
to Asian countries currently operating.
EXPECTED ROLES OF NJSTS

In the survey, NNJSTs commented on the teaching experience, expertise
and age of the NJSTs. Their comments varied depending on their own
teaching experience and Japanese proficiency. A number of the NNJSTs
from all three countries felt that “teaching experience in Japanese language
education” was the most important attribute of an NJST. They considered
that NJSTs should preferably have studied Japanese language education at
university or completed a Japanese teacher training course, but they did
not see this as essential. One respondent stated that NJSTs should only use
Japanese to communicate with students. Depending on the level of Japanese
language proficiency of high school students, NJSTs might need to use so-
called teacher talk in the classroom, paying attention to the vocabulary and
grammar that the students had already learned. To be able to use this kind
of “teacher talk,” teachers needed experience in teaching Japanese to begin-
ners. At the same time, however, some NNJSTs with considerable teaching
experience felt that it did not matter if NJSTs had any teaching experi-
ence because they could guide them. The NNJSTs seemed to believe
that they were able to provide guidance to NJSTs based on their own experi-
ence of TT with NJSTs.
134 K. KADOWAKI
Some of the South Korean NNJSTs considered that NJSTs should

prepare teaching materials in conjunction with NNJSTs, should be able
to discuss class matters with NNJSTs, and should assist NNJSTs to
improve their teaching methods. Since the Japanese language proficiency
of Korean NNJSTs is generally higher than that of Thai and Indonesian
teachers, they were able to communicate with the NJSTs in Japanese, and
found it easy to talk to NJSTs about their classes. NJSTs are employed
as full-time teachers, not as volunteers, in South Korea, and are required
to have a higher level of expertise in Japanese language education. As a
result, NJSTs in South Korea are expected to design course plans and pre-
pare teaching materials. In other words, they are expected to work with
NNJSTs to deliver the classes.
In terms of age, survey participants in all three countries preferred
NJSTs who were closer to the ages of their students. While there were
comments such as “Students are eager to know about Japanese young
people” and “I hesitate to talk about the class or ask favours if the NJSTs is
much older than I,” some NNJSTs believed that the age of the NJST did
not matter as long as they had good teaching skills and taught with enthu-
siasm. Apart from age, many NNJSTs also mentioned NJSTs’ attitudes
towards teaching, with comments such as “the most important thing is
being a dedicated teacher” and “NJSTs should take education seriously.”
There were also some complaints about the NJSTs, in relation to their
insufficient understanding of local culture—“The NJST does not under-
stand the culture of the country and the school”—and their awareness
as teachers—“The NJST is over-friendly with the students and does not
exhibit proper behaviour as a teacher.” In other words, the NJSTs were
expected to have a certain level of knowledge of Japanese language teach-
ing, so that they could conduct “teacher talk” with students, as well as
designing course plans and preparing teaching materials in conjunction
with the NNJSTs.
The following section examines the Japanese government dispatch pro-
grammes based on the survey of NNJSTs in Indonesia and Thailand, the
NP host countries.
NNJSTS’ VIEWS ON NP

As stated above, the Japanese government has been sending NJSs to high
schools in Asian countries under the NP programme. In the interviews
with NNJSTs in Indonesia and Thailand, the following points were raised
by the participants in relation to the dispatch programmes.
• Prior to the introduction of the NP programme, we assumed that a

Japanese Language Expert (JLE) would be coming. Instead, an NP
with no experience of Japanese language teaching was sent to the
school.
• NP is supposed to teach Japanese culture. However, the NP did not
know much about Japanese culture.
• We hope that NJSTs who have experience in teaching Japanese will
be assigned to our school as we want them to show us Japanese
teaching methods.
JLEs were experts in Japanese language education who were sent over-
seas by the Japan Foundation and JICA. Some extent of expertise and
experience in Japanese language education were required to be chosen as
a JLE. While the local NNJSTs expected that experienced Japanese teach-
ers would be sent to their schools, NPs were sent not as “teachers” but as
“partners.” According to the application guidelines, applicants needed to
be an NJS, but teaching experience was not required. Despite their lack
of adequate training in Japanese language teaching, NPs were expected to
play the role of proper Japanese teachers who were able to provide expla-
nations of aspects of the language such as grammar and vocabulary, and
were called “teachers” despite their actual position as teaching assistants
(TA) (Source: Interviews with NJSTs dispatched as NP). This shows a
contradiction within the NP programme itself.
As discussed earlier, secondary schools in Indonesia and Thailand, two
of the destinations of NPs, have been facing a rapid increase in Japanese
language learner numbers, and the Indonesian and Thai governments
have been making a concerted effort to develop the language and teach-
ing skills of NNJSTs. According to my private conversations with a gov-
ernment official, it seems that the NP program has been implemented
in these countries in the belief that NJSs will support NNJSTs until the
NNJSTs gain adequate teaching skills. If this is the case, NJSTs who
are experts in Japanese language teaching should be sent to these coun-
tries. NNJSTs who are not equipped with sufficient teaching skills and an
adequate command of Japanese usually do not have much experience in
teaching Japanese, and it is therefore very difficult for them to conduct
Japanese classes with an NP. Noborizato (2016) suggests that the ideal
NP should be able to (1) demonstrate correct pronunciation and pres-
ent sample sentences; (2) provide information about Japan and Japanese
language; (3) design teaching plans; (4) explain Japanese people’s way
136 K. KADOWAKI
of thinking and body language; (5) support NNJSTs and (6) work with
NNJSTs in class. It requires knowledge and experience in Japanese lan-
guage education to be able to perform the first three functions, and
being an NJS does not necessarily mean that they are able to fulfil this
role. Noborizato’s study (2016) is based on a questionnaire survey con-
ducted with 85 NPs and 107 NNJSTs in Indonesian schools to which
NPs were sent from 2014 to 2015. Although Noborizato (2016) reports
that NNJSTs provided positive feedback on the performance of NPs as
assistants, it should be noted that it would be difficult for NNJSTs to
make negative comments about NPs in a questionnaire prepared by a
researcher who was a representative of the Japan Foundation, which was
the organiser of the NP programme. When the author interviewed the
NNJSTs about NPs, some commented that they had no specific expecta-
tions because all expenses associated with NPs were paid by the Japanese
government. Under such circumstances, it was difficult to obtain hon-
est feedback from the NNJSTs on the NP programme through the sur-
vey. Other methods, such as class observations, may be more effective in
revealing the issues surrounding NPs.
When the author visited high schools in other countries—namely South
Korea, Thailand, Indonesia and Australia—in order to observe Japanese
classes, it was apparent that NNJSTs did not work effectively with NJSs.
For example, the NJSs would sometimes simply read from a textbook or
just stand around in the class. It appeared that most NNJSTs did not know
how to TT with NJSTs (Kadowaki forthcoming). Under the current NP
programmes, NPs are provided with a one-month pre-departure training
course, and NNJSTs who will work with the NPs receive training at a local
Japan Foundation office. However, the duration of such training can be
as little as a few days, and NNJSTs do not have the opportunity to learn
how to conduct TT or how to deliver a course with the NPs. During the
interviews, both NNJSTs and NPs pointed out that their TT training was
insufficient.
In South Korea, no NJSTs have been dispatched as assistants by the
Japanese government under any programme since the above mentioned
REX Program came to an end. Recently, the Seoul Japan Cultural Centre
run by the Japan Foundation initiated the “Japanese Language Supporter
Project.” Under this project, NJSs such as students who are studying
Korean language at universities or language institutions, spouses of Korean
citizens, or spouses of Japanese expatriates are sent to South Korean high
schools as “Japanese language supporters” (Japan Foundation 2016).
As long as they are NJSs, they need no other qualifications to become

“Japanese language supporters.” Unlike NPs, the Japanese language sup-
porters do not work as assistants in high school on a full-time basis; they
visit high schools as guests. If this project aims to assist NNJSTs to prepare
teaching materials and to improve their teaching methods, these language
supporters need knowledge and experience in Japanese language teaching.
Further research is needed to determine the effectiveness of the Japanese
language supporters under this new initiative.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has examined various NJS dispatch programmes and related
projects organised by the Japanese government. It is not clear, how-
ever, whether these programmes and projects meet the actual needs of
schools in host countries such as South Korea, Thailand and Indonesia.
Although there is the potential for Japanese language to become a form
of soft power for Japan, the Japanese government’s policy on overseas
Japanese language education does not seem to incorporate this aspect of
Japanese language. In my view, if the Japanese government strategically
sends NJSTs to overseas educational institutions and the NJSTs effectively
teach local students Japanese language in collaboration with NNJSTs,
Japanese language can function as a form of soft power. As discussed ear-
lier, the success of Japanese language education in secondary schools is
vital because it influences learners’ decisions about whether to continue
learning the language. From the perspective of the schools, it is important
to cultivate an interest in Japan and Japanese culture among learners in
order to motivate them to continue studying Japanese. In this respect,
NJSTs can play an important role in helping learners to feel that Japan
is a familiar and friendly country. For example, when the author, who is
a NJST, conducted TT with NNJSTs at South Korean high schools at
the time when TT by NNJSTs and NJSTs was not so popular, and anti-
Japanese sentiment was storng, some students made comments after the
class such as “I was pleased to see our Korean teacher and the Japanese
teacher working together to teach Japanese,” “My anti-Japanese feelings
have disappeared,” and “My image of Japanese people has become better
since I had a Japanese teacher in my class.” In this sense, TT conducted
by an NNJST/NJST teaching pair could have a significant impact upon
students’ experience of learning the Japanese language (Kadowaki 2008).
Over the past ten years, NJSTs have been involved in various ways in
teaching Japanese language at high schools in South Korea, Thailand and
138 K. KADOWAKI
Indonesia. In Thailand and Indonesia, NNJSTs tend to depend on NJST

heavily because of their lack of Japanese proficiency and teaching skills;
consequently, TT does not work effectively. In the field of Japanese lan-
guage education, very few studies have been conducted on TT, and this
is an issue that needs urgent attention. Although the implementation of
NJST dispatch programmes is dependent on Japanese government’s inter-
national policy, it is important to examine the practices of TT by NNJST
and NJST and develop TT methods that are suited to local conditions,
until local NNJSTs are able to become confident about their Japanese
language proficiency and teaching skills.
Acknowledgements This study is based on my Grant-in-Aid for Publication

of Scientific Research 2012–2014 (Grant Number: 24520593) and 2015–2018
(Grant Number: 15K02669).
REFERENCES
Aoyagi, Masanori. 2015. 文化立国論–日本のソフトパワーの底力 [Culture-
Oriented Nation Theory: Potential Soft Power of Japan]. Tokyo: Chikuma
Shobo.
Bussaba, Banchongmanee. 2009. “タイにおける日本語教育” [Japanese Language
Education in Thailand]. Japanese Studies: Research and Education 18:117–22.
Japan Foundation. 2011. 海外の日本語教育の現状日本語教育機関調査 2009
年 [Survey Report on Japanese–Language Education Abroad 2009 of Overseas
Organizations Involved in Japanese Language Education]. Tokyo: Japan
Foundation.
Japan Foundation. 2013a. 海外の日本語教育の現状 2012 年度日本語教育機関
調査より [Survey Report on Japanese–Language Education Abroad 2012 of
Overseas Organizations Involved in Japanese Language Education]. Tokyo:
Japan Foundation.
Japan Foundation. 2013b. Survey Report on Japanese–Language Education Abroad
2012. Tokyo: Japan Foundation.
Japan Foundation. 2014. 日本語教育国・地域情報 2014 年度 [Country and
Regional Information on Japanese Language Education 2014]. Accessed
February 28, 2017. http://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/survey/area/
country/2014/index.html
Japan Foundation. JENESYS 若手日本語教師派遣プログラム [JENESIS
Programme]. Accessed March 6, 2017. https://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/
japanese/archive/jenesys/jenesys_yjt/index.html
Japan Foundation. 若手日本語教員 (J-LEAP) 派遣事業 [J-LEAP Programme].

Accessed March 6, 2017. https://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/teach/
dispatch/voice/j-leap/index.html
Japan Foundation. 2016. 世界の日本語教育の現場から [From Japanese-Language
Education Scenes Around the World]. Accessed March 6, 2017. http://www.
jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/teach/dispatch/voice/voice/higashi_asia/
korea/2016/report01.html
Japan Foundation Asia Centre. 日本語パートナーズ [NIHONGO Partners].
Accessed March 6, 2017. http://jfac.jp/partners/
Kadowaki, Kaoru. 2008. 韓国の高校における日本語協同授業の研究 [Study on
Team Teaching of Japanese Language in Korean High Schools]. PhD disserta-
tion, Dongduk University.
Kadowaki, Kaoru. 2015. 海外における日本語非母語話者教師と母語話者教師の
協働に関する基礎的研究 [Basic Research on Collaborative Language Teaching
by Non-Native Japanese Speaker and Native Japanese Speaker Teachers]. The
Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research Results Report.
Kadowaki, Kaoru. forthcoming. Japanese Native Speaker Teachers at High Schools
in South Korea and Thailand. In Toward Post-Native-Speakerism: Dynamics
and Shifts. Springer.
Kadowaki, Kaoru, Eiji Nakayama, and Masako Takahashi. 2014. 日本語非母語話
者教師と母語話者教師の協働の現状と課題—タイと韓国の高校における母
語話者教師対象の調査による考察– [Current Situation and Challenges of
Collaborative Language Teaching by Non-Native Japanese Speaker and Native
Japanese Speaker Teachers – Based on the Survey on Native Japanese Speaker
Teachers at High Schools in Thailand and South Korea]. 日本語教育学会秋季
大会予稿 [The Proceedings of The Society for Teaching Japanese as a Foreign
Language Autumn Conference] 2014.146–51.
Korean Educational Development Institute. 2012. Statistical Yearbook of Education
2012. Seoul: Ministry of Education and Science Technology.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA). 2013. 海外における日本語の普及促進に関
する有識者懇談会最終報告書 [Final Report for Advisory Panel of Experts on
Promotion of Japanese Language Abroad]. Accessed March 6, 2017. http://
www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/files/000022908.pdf
Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). 外国教
育施設日本語指導教員派遣事業 [Regional and Educational Exchanges for
Mutual Understanding Program]. Accessed March 6, 2017. http://www.
mext.go.jp/a_menu/shotou/rex/main.htm
Noborizato, Tamiko. 2016.「日本語パートナーズ」派遣事業の概況 [Overall
Condition of “NIHONGO Partners” Dispatch Program]. The Bulletin of
Japanese Language Education: Japan Foundation 12:113–20.
Shiina, Kazuo. 1991. 国際交流のための日本語教育 [Japanese Language
Education for International Exchange]. Japanese Language and Japanese
Language Education 14:253–170. Tokyo, Meiji Shoin.
CHAPTER 8
Japanese Pop Culture as a Motivating Factor

for Japanese Language Learners in Qatar
Aiko Nemoto
According to surveys conducted by the Japan Foundation, the approximate

number of Japanese language learners worldwide was 2.98 million in
2006, 3.65 million in 2009, up 22.5% from the 2006 survey (Japan
Foundation 2011), and 3.99 million in 2012, up a further 9.2% from 2009
(Japan Foundation 2013), but 3.65 million in 2015, down 8.4% from
2012 (Japan Foundation 2017). Commenting on the growing interest
in Japanese language over the past decade, Japan’s Ministry of Foreign
Affairs (MOFA) stated that “It is conceivable that the reasons for this may
include increasing interest in aspects of Japanese pop culture such as anime
and manga” (MOFA 2008, 10; author’s translation). For this reason,
in the 2009 survey on Japanese language education overseas, the Japan
Foundation added the option “learning about manga, anime” to the mul-
tiple choice answers to the question about the respondents’ purposes in
learning Japanese language (Japan Foundation 2011). This also reflects the
government’s awareness of the power of Japanese pop culture as an inter-
national marketing tool. In addition to implementing a “Cool Japan” pol-
icy to promote Japan as “a peaceful nation of cultural exchange” (Cultural
A. Nemoto (*)
Centre for Global Communication Strategies, The University of Tokyo,
Meguro, Tokyo, Japan

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_8
142 A. NEMOTO
Diplomacy Promotion Working Group 2005) and a “Japan Brand Strategy

Action Plan” (Japan Brand Liaison Group 2009), the Japanese govern-
ment has emphasised Japanese language learning as a means of encourag-
ing those interested in pop culture to become Japan enthusiasts. But, does
pop culture actually motivate people to learn Japanese?
According to Kondo and Muranaka (2010), who surveyed attendees
at Japanese cultural events held at the Japan Cultural Institute in Paris,
those who had not studied Japanese but had some interest in Japanese
pop culture tended to have a greater interest in learning Japanese than
those without such an interest. Aizawa et al. (2010) find that only 40% of
students of a university in California who were interested in Japanese pop
culture wanted to learn the Japanese language. This suggests that inter-
est in Japanese pop culture alone does not necessarily motivate people
to undertake language study—other factors may also have an impact on
people’s decisions to start learning Japanese language.
This chapter explores how Japanese pop culture attracts prospective
Japanese language learners using a comparative analysis of two groups of
students: those who completed a Japanese language course at the Qatar
Ministry of Education’s Language Teaching Institute (LTI) and members
of the Qatar University Japanese Club (QUJC). The LTI program was
launched in 2006 by the Qatar Ministry of Education based on the view
that Qatari citizens might want to learn Japanese language because of their
interest in Japanese pop culture.
There are two reasons for the choice of Qatar for this study. First, when
I was involved in Japanese language education in Qatar, I observed that
the actual motivations of students to learn Japanese language differed from
those assumed by Japanese (and Qatari) authorities. Second, the history of
Japanese language education in Qatar is not very long, and at the time I
was there, no Japanese language instructors had been dispatched to Qatar
by Japanese government organisations such as the Japan Foundation and
the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).1 I therefore consid-
ered Qatar to be a suitable place to investigate the motivations of students
whose views about studying Japanese language had not been influenced
by Japanese educators and authorities.
This chapter comprises five parts. Section “Motivations for Learning
Japanese Outside Japan” examines previous studies of the motivations for
language learning. After briefly outlining the history of Japanese language
education in Qatar, section “Research Design” describes the design of this
study. Sections “Interviews with LTI Graduates” and “Interviews with
JAPANESE POP CULTURE AS A MOTIVATING FACTOR FOR JAPANESE... 143
QUJC Members” examine the results of interviews conducted with the

LTI graduates and QUJC members. Section “Comparison Between LTI
Graduates and QUJC Members” concludes by comparing the responses
of the two groups and discussing the differences between them.
MOTIVATIONS FOR LEARNING JAPANESE OUTSIDE JAPAN

This section considers the relationship between pop culture and motiva-
tions for Japanese language learning. Motivation refers to the presence of
a factor that affects people’s decisions by causing them to move towards
setting a personal goal and maintaining an effort towards achieving it
(Williams and Burden 1997; Schunk et al. 2007). Dörnyei (2001, 6)
noted that “if someone is reluctant to do something, we can easily explain
this by stating that ‘He isn’t motivated’ rather than having to elaborate on
all the forces that have contributed to his negative attitude. Motivation is
a general way of referring to the antecedents (i.e. causes and origins) of
action.” A strong, ongoing interest in Japanese pop culture could qualify
as such a source of motivation for undertaking a sustained effort such as
learning the language.
Pop culture was first considered to be a source of motivation for people
outside Japan to learn Japanese language in the 1980s. At that time, the
pop culture centred on Japanese hobbies and amusements (CDI 1985,
1). In the 1990s, it shifted to Japanese subcultures such as songs, comic
books, animation, and video games (Japan Foundation 2000, 3). In the
2000s, various forms of Japanese pop culture, including manga (com-
ics), anime (animated films), fashion, games and movies, were seen as
a source of growing international interest in Japan (Japan Foundation
2005, 6), and the strong interest in manga and anime continues today
(Japan Foundation 2011, 4). Ogura’s (2010) list of factors that lead to the
increasing interest in Japanese language includes “interest in so-called pop
culture,” “awareness of the ‘Cool Japan’ concept in the areas of manga,
anime, sushi and other Japanese cuisine, youth fashion and cosplay,” and
“interest in Japanese postmodern culture.”
Although studies of motivations for learning Japanese language (Narita
1998; Guo and Okita 2001; Barsukova 2006; Mori 2006; Onishi 2010;
Yang 2011) identify factors related to Japanese pop culture, exactly
how this influences people’s decision to learn the language is not clear.
Some interview-based studies (Lo 2005; Tamura 2009) suggest that pop
culture only provides the opportunity to develop an interest in Japanese
144 A. NEMOTO
language and that other factors play a greater role in people’s actual
decisions. These earlier studies examined only Japanese language learners
who were affiliated with institutions that offered language programs and
did not examine the factors that separate those with an interest in Japanese
pop culture who later became Japanese language learners from those who
did not. This suggests a need to investigate the views of people who were
not involved in Japanese language study in order to understand the exact
nature of the relationship between Japanese pop culture and Japanese lan-
guage learning.
RESEARCH DESIGN
Japanese Language Education in Qatar

Japanese language education in Qatar is relatively new. It is believed that
the first Japanese language class was offered in 1998 at the Japan School
of Doha.2 According to Aoki (2001), from 1998 to 2000, a Japanese lan-
guage course, which was offered by faculty of the school, was available to
local residents in cooperation with the Japanese embassy in Qatar. A total
of 86 students attended the course. Aoki (2001) described these students
as follows:
The students have a strong desire to learn Japanese and use it at work and
in their lives and to improve their livelihoods. They take the course because
they believe that learning Japanese is related directly to their lives. They
have a high degree of interest, involvement and desire, and sometimes it is
quite moving to see how hard they work during the one-hour course ses-
sions. Believing that Japan is a wealthy country, which means that life there
is comfortable, they have serious expressions on their faces as they study.
(118, author’s translation)
However, these Japanese language courses came to an end when the Japan
School of Doha closed in 2000 due to low enrolment numbers. Residents
of Doha recalled that Qatar University also offered Japanese language
courses in its school for women from September 2001 to June 2003, but
details such as class size and number of students were not documented.
The LTI in Qatar started to offer Japanese language courses in
December 2006. At that time, a private language school in Qatar offered
irregular Japanese conversation classes, but the LTI was the only institu-
tion in Qatar to offer courses in which students could learn all four basic
language skills (reading, writing, speaking and listening). According to

MOFA, these courses were offered because of the increasing number of
people who were interested in Japanese pop culture and wanted to learn
Japanese.3 However, the LTI also closed in July 2010 as part of a reorgan-
isation of Qatari government ministries.
The Japan Anime Club, which began in 2006 at a school for women
within Qatar University, became the Qatar University Japan Club (QUJC)
in 2008. The student members of the QUJC consisted mainly of students
with an interest in the aspects of Japanese pop culture such as anime,
manga and J-POP. According to the club’s faculty advisor, the QUJC
had between 100 and 200 members, but only 20–30 of them attended
weekly club meetings. Japanese language classes were meant to be a core
activity of the club, but they were held only irregularly—in fact, only two
classes were held during the winter term of 2010. This irregular schedul-
ing was directly related to the fact that the university itself did not offer
any Japanese language programs. I was teaching Japanese at the LTI
at that time, and I often took LTI flyers to QUJC meetings, but few
students took them home. In the nearly 4 years during which the LTI
offered Japanese language courses, virtually none of the students were
ex-members of QUJC.
Yoshida (2007) observes that one of the problems with Japanese lan-
guage education in the Middle East is that most instructors are dispatched
by the Japan Foundation or the JICA, or are untrained local people. In
both cases, teacher turnover tends to be high—most do not stay for more
than a few years. This means that there has been not much continuity in
Japanese language teaching in Qatar, and no one has taken the initiative
to set up ongoing Japanese language programs.
In light of these circumstances, I conducted a questionnaire-based sur-
vey with Japanese language learners at the LTI and QUJC members who
had an interest in Japanese pop culture but had not yet embarked upon
formal Japanese language study.
Pilot Study
In May 2008, I conducted a pilot study among 30 LTI students and 36
QUJC members to determine their motivations for learning Japanese and
their interest in and involvement with Japan.4 The results demonstrated
that whereas QUJC members had a stronger tendency than LTI students
to have an interest in anything related to Japan and Japanese language,
146 A. NEMOTO
the LTI students were more interested and involved in language learning
than the QUJC members. They also indicated a very low likelihood that
QUJC members would decide to learn Japanese at the LTI in the future.
However, it was not clear whether the LTI students’ interest in the lan-
guage was a cause or an effect of their formal study of Japanese at the
institute. Therefore, in order to probe the two groups’ motivations and
experiences more deeply, I decided to interview them. The results of these
interviews are discussed below.
Theoretical Framework and Data Analysis Method

Data obtained from the interviews were analysed based on a modified
grounded theory approach (M-GTA). The M-GTA identifies concepts
with explanatory power through interpretation of data and increases
the relevance of the concepts in order to generate a consistent theory
(Kinoshita 2003, 2007). Analysis using M-GTA is considered appropri-
ate for this study, because it allows us to view motivation for learning as
a process and takes into account the fact that language learning involves
social interaction.
My M-GTA procedure, following Kinoshita (2003, 2007), was as
follows:
Step 1. I devised analytical worksheets with four blank columns: concept

name, concept definition, variation and theoretical notes. First, I
selected the richest observations from the data from each inter-
view related to the analytic theme, placed similar examples (called
variations) together and interpreted these variations. I then
assigned a concept name and a definition to each set of variations
based on the interpretation.
Step 2. I used comparative analysis to examine other similar or con-
trary concepts. In the theoretical notes column, the possible
relationship of each concept to other concepts, and any thoughts
that came to mind during the interpretation, was recorded.
Step 3. I examined the relationships between the concepts and consoli-
dated related concepts into single categories.
Step 4. I developed a figure to display the relationships between the
remaining categories and described the figure as a story line.
INTERVIEWS WITH LTI GRADUATES5

The interviewees consisted of ten Japanese language learners who had
completed the Qatar LTI’s Japanese language courses during the years
2008 to 2010 (hereafter “LTI graduates”). Four were males and six were
females, nine had Qatari citizenship and all spoke Arabic as their native
language. At the beginning of the LTI course, one was employed and the
other nine were university students—eight at Qatar University and one
at an affiliated US university. Their majors were as follows: four were in
engineering, two in arts and sciences, one in pharmacy, one in medicine
and one in business and economics. Since four students graduated before
completing the LTI courses, five participants were employed by the end of
the language courses and five were still students.
The data were collected through individual face-to-face semi-structured
interviews from December 2009 to May 2010. Each interview lasted
for 30–60 minutes. Prior to the interviews, the LTI graduates received
interview guidelines in English informing them of the purpose of the sur-
vey and the content of the questions, and that the interviews would be
recorded and transcribed. The guidelines also stated that the interview
data would be rendered anonymous; no one would be able to access the
interview data except the researcher; and the data would not be used other
than for research purposes. After the graduates consented to participate,
they were asked whether they would prefer the interview to be conducted
in English or Japanese; nine chose Japanese. They were also advised that
they were free to switch languages during the interview.
The interview questions focused on the following five subjects: (1)
interviewees’ language experience (native language and other languages
known or studied), (2) their first encounter with Japan, (3) their deci-
sion to study Japanese language, (4) changes in their level of interest in
Japan after commencing Japanese language study and (5) their goals in
studying Japanese. The author transcribed the interviews and translated
the Japanese transcripts into English.
The interview data were analysed to determine how the LTI graduates
developed their motivations for learning Japanese. Although many of the
LTI graduates had watched Japanese animation as small children, they
had not recognised that the animation programmes were made in Japan
until they grew older. This surprising discovery sparked their interest in
Japan—and it was easy for them to obtain information about Japan via
the Internet. In some cases, one or more older family members were also
interested in Japan, so they could share their interest with them.
148 A. NEMOTO
Most of the LTI graduates had also been interested in language learning
since childhood and had been given the opportunity to learn English and
other languages by their families. For example, family members had helped
them to learn elementary English even before they began to study English
at school. As a result, they had found English education at school to be
too easy. As they grew older, researching information about Japan was a
way to both learn about Japan and improve their English skills. However,
their choice of additional languages to study was largely determined by
personal experience.
As their interest in Japan deepened, the LTI graduates began to see the
limitations of finding relevant information in English and found it frustrat-
ing that they did not understand Japanese language. This made them to
start to consider the possibility of learning Japanese language, and they
began investigating how they could do so. However, they were unable
to find anywhere to learn Japanese and did not want to attempt to learn
it on their own because they did not believe that self-study was suitable
for them. They then heard, usually from an older family member, that a
Japanese language course was available at the LTI, and they decided to
enrol. Once these students had begun to study at the LTI, their interest
in Japan became deeper and more focused, and they became interested in
topics that they had not previously known anything about. At the same
time, some of the LTI graduates who were also Qatar University students
began to distance themselves from the QUJC because they felt that the
QUJC members’ interests were different from theirs. Although the LTI
graduates had little opportunity to use Japanese in their daily lives and
found that others could not understand their interest in learning Japanese,
they somehow managed to continue their study.
INTERVIEWS WITH QUJC MEMBERS6

QUJC members with an interest in Japanese pop culture were recruited
through the QUJC mailing list, and semi-structured individual interviews
of 30–60 minutes were conducted from February to May 2010. In some
cases, at the students’ request, two or three students were interviewed
together. Prior to the interviews, participants were provided with inter-
view guidelines similar to those given to the LTI graduates. The interview
questions focused on (1) activities of the Japan Club, (2) interviewees’
reasons for becoming a member, (3) their language experience (native lan-
guage and other languages known or studied) and (4) their first encounter
with Japan. Eleven students participated; four others withdrew because

they did not meet the survey criteria—they were not interested in Japanese
pop culture. Of the 11 participants, 6 held Qatari citizenship and 6 were of
other nationalities (including one with dual citizenship). Seven were born
in Qatar, and the other four had moved to Qatar with their families by age
nine; all had been educated at schools in Qatar. Ten spoke Arabic as their
native language. They were studying at Qatar University—six in engineer-
ing, two in arts and sciences, and three in business and economics.
The interview data were analysed in order to clarify how QUJC mem-
bers recognised or assessed the importance of learning Japanese. Although
most of the QUJC members wanted to learn Japanese language through
formal education as opposed to club activities or self-study, they thought
this would happen sometime in the future, not in the immediate future.
Their recognition of the need to learn Japanese language seemed to
involve three elements: their passion for Japan, their relationship with the
people around them and their understanding of their current Japanese
language skills.
Most of the QUJC members started to have a passion for Japan when
they became friends with people who were interested in Japanese pop cul-
ture. As they became reacquainted with the Japanese animations they had
watched as small children, they obtained further information about Japan
by visiting relevant websites. As a result, their interest in Japan grew and
they felt emotionally closer to Japan. They came to feel strongly attracted
to Japan for two reasons: first, they discovered similarities in the way of
thinking between themselves and Japanese people; and second, they con-
sidered Japanese culture exotic. This led them to dream of working or
studying in Japan in the future, but they also believed that they had to
learn Japanese language to realise their dream because English was not
widely understood in Japan. At the same time, they consolidated their
relationships with others with an interest in Japan by exchanging informa-
tion about Japan and aspects of Japanese pop culture such as animation,
dramas and music.
After entering Qatar University, they had joined the QUJC and met
other students who were fascinated by Japan and Japanese pop culture.
They built friendships with their fellow students, sharing information and
improving their knowledge of Japan. In a sense, they began to feel supe-
rior to students who were not QUJC members, because they felt that no
other club or society on campus had such enjoyable activities or such a
strong connection with an overseas embassy. This belief enhanced their
150 A. NEMOTO
sense of pride in being members of the QUJC and influenced the way they
related to other members and non-members. The students’ understanding
of their Japanese language skills was related to their experience and views
of the club. They were aware that while their Japanese language skills were
sufficient for them to understand Japanese animation and TV dramas, they
were not good enough for communicating with Japanese people. Many
felt bad about not being able to speak Japanese well. They took pride in
the QUJC and admired Japan, and they felt that people who loved Japan
should speak Japanese well.
For these reasons, the QUJC members who participated in the survey
wanted to enrol in a formal Japanese language course at some point, but
they felt unable to do so immediately.
COMPARISON BETWEEN LTI GRADUATES

AND QUJC MEMBERS
A comparison of the views about learning Japanese language of the LTI

graduates and the QUJC members suggests that they took different
approaches to obtaining information about Japan. The LTI graduates felt
frustrated by their inability to understand Japanese language, whereas the
QUJC members considered themselves able to understand the language
well enough for their current purposes. For example, LTI graduate A
commented:
I discovered that all those games are made in Japan. So I was surprised, then
I discovered that we actually get the games one year after they are released
in Japan because it takes a whole year to translate them. Often I read articles
about games produced only in Japanese. They usually say that the game is
very good and very interesting, but they also say “we don’t know whether it
will be translated or not. We hope it will be translated at some stage.” When
I read such articles, I’m always annoyed that there are interesting games that
I cannot even try. (Author’s translation from Japanese)
LTI graduate B talked about her favourite anime series “Detective Conan”:
At first I watched it in Arabic on Arabian and Qatar television. Then, after

one season, Qatar television stopped broadcasting it. I thought, “What?! I
want to watch more!” So I searched online for Japanese anime and related
subjects. As I continued searching, I discovered manga, but the manga I
found were in English. That’s when I began to like English. I was glad that
manga were available in English too, but then the English movie manga
series also ended. Everything that was left was in Japanese. It was terrible! It
made me a little bit angry. (Author’s translation from Japanese)
By contrast, the QUJC members did not express any such frustration. For
example, QUJC member C stated that:
I want to see everything that interests me. When I have to wait for a new
episode to be translated and I can’t wait, I go to the ones that don’t have
subtitles and I watch them and sometimes I understand the general idea.
After a long time, you start to understand the basic idea. (Original English)
LTI graduates A and B mentioned that they were interested in video

games and “Detective Conan.” By contrast, QUJC member C referred
to Japanese dramas in general, because she was not only interested in one
program. On the one hand, LTI graduates confronted a barrier to col-
lecting information due to their limited understanding of Japanese lan-
guage, and this motivated them to learn the language. On the other hand,
the QUJC member students found the information they could obtain
through their limited Japanese sufficient. They were not seeking in-depth
information, so they did not experience a sense of frustration or perceive a
need to engage in Japanese language study straight away.
CONCLUSION
It is clear from the above data that contact with Japanese pop culture
is not enough to motivate students to learn Japanese language. They
become strongly motivated to learn the language only when their interest
in Japanese pop culture leads them to more specific aspects of that culture.
The findings suggest that attempts to entice foreigners to study Japanese
by presenting Japanese pop culture are likely to be more effective if they
encourage prospective learners to take an in-depth interest in a specific area
rather than simply providing wide-ranging but superficial information.
If people believe that they will have opportunities to use their knowl-
edge of Japan and Japanese language skills in the future, as in many Asian
countries where speaking Japanese could help them to obtain a job and to
mix with Japanese people, they will be strongly motivated to learn the lan-
guage. In places where people have fewer chances to use Japanese, how-
ever, such as Qatar, pop culture has been seen as a more significant source
of motivation for learning the language. But as Nye (2004, 12) points
152 A. NEMOTO
out, “The popularity of Pokémon games [does not] assure that Japan will
get the policy outcomes it wishes.” In the case of these survey respon-
dents, interest in Japanese pop culture did not necessarily lead directly to
studying Japanese language. To make pop culture a strong motivation for
Japanese language learning, it is not enough to simply promote and show
Japanese anime and dramas. It remains uncertain whether the situation
observed in Qatar is similar to that in other countries and regions where
Japanese language teaching does not have a long history. Investigation of
how an interest in pop culture motivates Japanese language study in other
settings would be a valuable topic of further study.
NOTES
1. For the detailed activities of JICA, see https://www.jica.go.jp/english/
about/index.html
2. There have been two Japanese schools in Doha: one that operated from
1979 to 2001 and the current one, which opened in 2009. Although both
are known as the Japan School of Doha, they are separate organisations.
3. This is based on the Japan Foundation website about Qatar: http://warp.
da.ndl.go.jp/info:ndljp/pid/998229/ www.jpf.go.jp/j/japanese/survey/
country/2003/qatar.html
4. See Nemoto (2011) for an overview of this survey.
5. See Nemoto (2016) for an overview of this survey and details of the analyti-
cal results.
6. Ibid.
REFERENCES
Aizawa, Marie, Minoru Ohno, Darin Garard, and Mikako Garard. 2010. “アメリ
カにおけるクールジャパン現象” [Cool Japan Trend in the USA]. 尚絅学院
大学紀要 [Bulletin of Shokei Gakuin University] 60:65–78.
Aoki, Jun’ichi. 2001. “ドーハ日本人学校における日本語教室の実際–カタール
人、現地外国人への日本語指導の実践” [Status of Classrooms at the Doha
Japanese School: The Implementation of Japanese-Language Instruction for
Qataris and Foreigners]. 在外教育施設における指導実践記録 [Record of
Implementing Instruction at Educational Institutions Overseas] 24:17–21.
Barusukova, Anna. 2006. “ロシア人大学生の日本語学習の動機づけについて”
[Motivation of Russian University Students Towards Learning Japanese]. 新潟
大学国際センター紀要 [Journal of the International Exchange Support Center]
2:144–51.
Cultural Diplomacy Promotion Working Group. 2005. “「文化交流の平和国家」

日本の創造を” [Building Japan as “A Peaceful Nation of Cultural Exchange”].
http://www.kantei.go.jp/jp/singi/bunka/kettei/050711houkoku.pdf
CDI. 1985. 日本語教育および日本語普及活動の現状と課題 [Current State of
and Issues in Japanese-Language Education and Promotion Activities]. Tokyo:
Nippon Institute for Research Advancement.
Dörnyei, Zoltan. 2001. Motivational Strategies in the Language Classroom.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Guo, Junhai, and Yoko Okita. 2001. “シンガポール華人大学生の日本語学習の
動機づけについて” [Chinese-Singaporean University Students’ Motivation
for Learning Japanese]. 日本語教育 [Journal of Japanese Language Teaching]
110:130–9.
Japan Brand Liaison Group. 2009. “日本ブランド戦略アクションプラン”
[Japan Brand Strategy Action Plan]. http://www.cas.go.jp/jp/seisaku/
brand/dai02/nbap.pdf
Japan Foundation. 2000. Survey Report on Japanese-Language Education Abroad
1998 Summary. Tokyo: Japan Foundation. https://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/
japanese/survey/result/dl/e_gaiyou.pdf
2003 Summary. https://www.jpf.go.jp/e/project/japanese/survey/result/
dl/2003_summary.pdf
2009, Summary. https://www.jpf.go.jp/e/project/japanese/survey/result/
dl/2009/summary2009.pdf
2012 Excerpt. http://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/survey/result/dl/
survey_2012/2012_s_excerpt_e.pdf
2015. http://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/survey/result/dl/survey_
2015/text.pdf
Kinoshita, Yasuhito. 2003. グラウンデッド・セオリー・アプローチの実践–質
的研究への誘い [The Practice of Grounded Theory Approach: An Invitation to
Qualitative Study]. Tokyo: Kobundo.
Kinoshita, Yasuhito. 2007. ライブ講義 M-GTA 実践的質的研究法修正版グラ
ウンデッド・セオリー・アプローチのすべて [A Live Lecture on M-GTA: A
Comprehensive Guide to Practical Qualitative Research Methods: A Modified
Grounded Theory]. Tokyo: Kobundo.
Kondo, Yumiko and Masako Muranaka. 2010. “日本のポップカルチャーファン
は潜在的日本語学習者といえるか” [Can Japanese Pop Culture Enthusiasts
154 A. NEMOTO
Be Considered as Potential Japanese Language Learners?]. 国際交流基金日

本語教育紀要 [The Japan Foundation Japanese-Language Education Bulletin]
6:1–7.
Lo, Hsiao-chin. 2005.“ライフストーリー・インタビューによる外国語学習動
機に関する一考察–台湾における日本語学習者を対象に” [Research About a
Foreign Language Learning Motivation by the Life Story Interview; Japanese
Language Leaner in Taiwan]. 外国語研究 [Foreign Language Research]
8:38–54.
MOFA. 2008. 我が国の発信力強化のための施策と体制~「日本」の理解者
とファンを増やすために~ [Measures and Systems for Enhancing Japan’s
Influence: Increasing the Numbers of People Who Understand Japan and Fans
of Japan]. http://www.mofa.go.jp/mofaj/annai/shingikai/koryu/pdfs/
toshin_ts.pdf
Mori, Madoka. 2006. “モンゴル人日本語学習者の日本語学習動機に関する分
析” [Analysis of Mongolian Japanese Language Learners’ Motives for Learning
Japanese]. 語文と教育 [Language and Culture] 20:105–15.
Narita, Takahiro. 1998. “日本語学習動機と成績との関係–タイの大学生の場
合–” [The Relations Between Motivations and Examination Scores: The Case
of University Students in Thailand]. 世界の日本語教育 [Japanese-Language
Education Around the Globe] 8:1–11.
Nemoto, Aiko. 2011. “カタールにおける日本語学習者の学習動機と「日本の
ポップカルチャー」に興味がある者の興味・関心の比較” [Comparison of
the Motivations for Learning of Japanese Language Learners in Qatar and the
Curiosity and Interest of People Interested in “Japanese Popular Culture”].
言語文化と日本語教育 [Language Culture and Japanese Education] 42:95–8.
Nemoto, Aiko. 2016. 日本語学習動機とポップカルチャー: カタールの日本語
学習者を事例として [Japanese Language Motivation and Pop Culture: A Case
Study in Qatar]. Tokyo: Harvest-sha.
Nye, Joseph S. Jr. 2004. Soft Power the Means to Success in World Politics. New York:
Public Affairs.
Ogura, Kazuo. 2010. “海外における日本語教育推進のための基本政策はいか
にあるべきか” [What Form Should Be Taken by Basic Policies for Promoting
Japanese Language Education Overseas?]. http://www.jpf.go.jp/j/about/
survey/bp/pdf/rep_101130jk.pdf
Onishi, Yumi. 2010. “ウクライナにおける大学生の日本語学習動機” [Motivation
Among University Students Learning Japanese in Ukraine]. 日本語教育
[Journal of Japanese Language Teaching] 147:82–96.
Schunk, Dale H., Paul R. Pintrich, and Judith L. Meece.2007. Motivation in
Education: Theory, Research and Applications 3rd edition. New Jersey: Pearson
Education.
Tamura, Chika. 2009. “ドイツにおける日本語学習動機に関する一考察–3人の
学生を対象とした episodic interviewing の事例をもとに” [A Study of
Motives for Learning the Japanese Language in Germany: Based on Examples

of Episodic Interviewing with Three Students]. 大阪大学言語文化学 [Osaka
University Language and Cultural Studies] 18:157–68.
Williams, Marison, and Robert L. Burden. 1997. Psychology for Language Teachers.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Yang, Mengsyun. 2011. “台湾における日本語学習者の動機づけと継続ストラ
テジー–日本語主専攻・非専攻学習者の比較” [Motivation and Perseverance
Strategies of Japanese. Language Study Students in Taiwan: Japanese Language
Major vs. Non-Major Students]. 日本語教育 [Journal of Japanese Language
Teaching] 150:116–30.
Yoshida, Shohei. 2007. “日本語教育における中東との連携を目指して–一私的
取り組み” [Aiming for Cooperation with the Middle East in Japanese Language
Education: A Private Initiative]. 横浜国立大学留学生センター教育研究論集
[Journal of the International Student Centre, Yokohama National University]
14:79–93.
PART IV
Japanese Language and Learners’

Empowerment
CHAPTER 9
Japanese Language in the Wake of Hong

Kong’s Umbrella Movement: Is It a Form
of Soft Power?
Kazuyuki Nomura and Takako Mochizuki
“All of the clocks in my home and my iPhone are set to Japanese time,”
said Ivan in Japanese.1 Ivan, who is in his early 30s, did this to feel as if he
lived in Japan, his favourite country, even though he actually lived in Hong
Kong at the time of our interview. Although Ivan’s Japanophilic tenden-
cies seemed a little too intense, many young Hongkongers in their 20s
and 30s grew up surrounded by Japanese cultural products, whether or
not they speak Japanese. Since their childhood, they have been exposed to
Japanese food, animation, comics, and music. Particularly since the 1990s,
Japanese popular culture has set a significant social trend among (largely
young) fans, who are often called jyu6 zaak6 zuk6 in Cantonese—the literal
translation of the Japanese otaku zoku (otaku tribe).2 In Hong Kong—a
K. Nomura (*)
Department of Japanese Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong,
Sha Tin, New Territories, Hong Kong
T. Mochizuki
Language Centre, Hong Kong Baptist University,
Kowloon Tong, Kowloon, Hong Kong

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_9
160 K. NOMURA AND T. MOCHIZUKI
former British colony and now legally a special administrative region of the
People’s Republic of China—young people perceive Japan as an integral
part of their habitus that guides their thoughts, tastes, and manners.
On the other hand, Hongkongers are proud of their tradition of the
rule of law and liberal economic policies, and will oppose any moves from
Beijing that undermine Hong Kong’s autonomy. In fact, the Umbrella
Movement of late 2014—a political movement seeking the fully demo-
cratic election of the next Chief Executive in 2017—politicised the
entire city of Hong Kong. The movement ultimately failed, as the Hong
Kong government, backed by Beijing, refused to grant full democracy to
Hongkongers. And yet, the movement’s sociocultural impact on today’s
Hong Kong has been immense. Pro-democracy demonstrators occupied
the city’s main avenues for around three months, and people were divided
into two opposing camps, signified by different colours: yellow for democ-
racy and blue in support of the government. The movement led to a polit-
ical awakening across Hong Kong, and the sociopolitical conflict between
Hong Kong and Beijing remains a hot topic.
Given that “soft power rests on the [country’s] ability to shape the pref-
erences of others” (Nye 2004, 5), Japanese culture—especially popular
culture such as animation, games, and comics—which boasts vibrant fan-
doms in Hong Kong, is the epitome of soft power. Nevertheless, whether
Japanese language itself functions as a form of soft power in its own
right to the same extent as Japanese culture remains largely unexplored.
Employing data from interviews and observations, this ethnographic study
explores how Japanese language feeds into Hong Kong’s sociocultural
context in order to understand whether it constitutes soft power in Joseph
Nye’s (2004) terms. As a theoretical contribution, we hope to elucidate
how a language may (or may not) legitimise itself as a form of soft power
and exert a symbolic impact on its learners in another country.
Our participants are Hong Kong Chinese in their 20s and 30s who
know Japanese language and use it with personal friends and/or at work.
We will argue that, before 2014, Japanese language was basically a means
for its users to enjoy economic and/or cultural consumption—as tourists
or as fans of an idol group, for example. From 2014 onwards, however,
Japanese-speaking Hongkongers began paying attention to the Japanese
gaze on Hong Kong; namely, the different ways in which Japanese
people perceive Hong Kong. William, for instance, is a pro-democracy
Hongkonger in his late 20s. “My Japanese friends are well aware that
Hong Kong is different from China, thanks to the Umbrella Movement,”
he remarked with a rather proud look.
JAPANESE LANGUAGE IN THE WAKE OF HONG KONG’S… 161
The chapter is organised as follows. We first offer an overview of the

sociolinguistic and sociocultural landscape of Hong Kong in relation to
Japanese language and culture, against which the Umbrella Movement
broke out. This is followed by a brief section in which the sociological
notion of gaze is brought into Nye’s (2004) theory of soft power. Then,
after delineating the method for our fieldwork, we present our findings on
how Japanese-speaking Hongkongers gaze on Japan and how their gazes
on Japan were transformed in the wake of the Umbrella Movement. This
is integrated with discussion as to whether Japanese language can be con-
sidered to be a type of soft power in relation to the Japan-oriented gaze of
Japanese-speaking Hongkongers. We finish the chapter with our conclu-
sion that Japanese language functions as a form of co-optive soft power
in the wake of the Umbrella Movement, whereby users of Japanese can
perceive reverse gazes from Japan—especially those that acknowledge the
differences between Hong Kong and mainland China.
HONG KONG AND JAPANESE LANGUAGE

Even though its pre-1997 history as a British colony gives it an interna-
tional feel, Hong Kong is a predominantly Chinese city located to the
south of China’s Guangdong province. Ethnic Chinese account for nearly
95% of its 7.2 million population. Cantonese, a Chinese dialect, is the
regionally dominant language, and Cantonese shares its standard written
language—modern written Chinese (see Chen 1993 for definition and
history)—with Mandarin Chinese. Along with Cantonese, English and
Mandarin Chinese—the official language of China—are Hong Kong’s
official languages. Of the three official languages, Mandarin Chinese is
less popular among the local population than Cantonese and English, and
Cantonese is considered to be emblematic of local identities in today’s
Hong Kong (Lai 2011).
Apart from the wartime occupation for nearly four years in the 1940s,
Japanese has never gained the status of an official language in Hong Kong,
but it is the most popular foreign language among Hong Kong Chinese.
According to the latest census data (Census and Statistics Department
2016), around 90,000 ethnic Chinese speak Japanese. Furthermore, the
number of speakers is still on the increase, because more than 20,000
learners are enrolled in the Japanese language courses offered by vari-
ous educational institutes including all of Hong Kong’s public universities
(Japan Foundation 2017). Since 2012, Japanese and five other languages
have been officially recognised as elective foreign language subjects for

Hong Kong’s public matriculation exam. Japanese is by far the most pop-
ular of these elective languages, and the number of candidates studying
Japanese recently reached three times the number studying French, the
second most popular option (Hong Kong Examination and Assessment
Authority 2017).
The popularity of Japanese language in Hong Kong derives from
Japan’s profound influence on Hong Kong. Major motives for learning
Japanese in Hong Kong include (a) Japanese popular culture, (b) the
perceived utility of Japanese language, and (c) Hong Kong’s geographi-
cal proximity to Japan (Humphreys and Miyazoe-Wong 2007). Japanese
popular culture—especially animation, comics, computer games, and
J-pop music—boasts well-established fandoms in contemporary Hong
Kong, with a multitude of ardent fans. Japanese cultural products,
which have been readily available on TV from the 1970s onwards and
on the Internet in the twenty-first century, exert enormous influence,
along with an abundance of other products imported from Japan such as
food, cosmetics, stationery, and electrical appliances (see Nakano 2009).
Japanese is also useful for the economic and cultural consumption of
Hongkongers, as well as in Japan-related workplaces. Japan is the premier
tourist destination, and was the only overseas destination of more than
20% of Hongkongers in 2015 (Japan National Tourism Organization
2017). Japan is also Hong Kong’s third largest trading partner (Trade
and Industry Department 2016), and Hong Kong has been the world’s
largest importer of Japanese food for the past 11 years (Ministry of
Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries 2015). As Hong Kong’s major neigh-
bour, Japan is by far the largest country in East Asia after China in terms
of economy and population. Despite sporadic Sino-Japanese diplomatic
tensions, every Hongkonger knows something about Japan. People in
Hong Kong—taxi drivers, doctors, and police officers, for example—try
to use Japanese expressions with visitors from Japan. Cantonese song lyr-
ics may include Japanese expressions such as sayonara (goodbye) or chotto
matte (wait a minute). Tourist signs and restaurant menus are often trilin-
gual: in Cantonese, English, and Japanese.
Japanese was occasionally used during the Umbrella Movement, which
began in late September 2014, especially by Japanese-speaking protest-
ers and other pro-democracy citizens who wanted to report on the cur-
rent situation and spread their views on social network sites (SNSs) such
as Twitter. The Umbrella Movement was the longest and largest sit-in
protest in the history of Hong Kong, and was triggered by Beijing’s move
to oppose the fully democratic election of the new chief executive in
2017. Umbrellas became emblematic of the protest after pro-democracy
demonstrators on the street used umbrellas to shield themselves from
the tear gas and pepper spray used by the police. During the Umbrella
Movement, key corners of the inner city in Admiralty, Causeway Bay,
and Mong Kok were occupied for around three months, during which
the protest became part of ordinary life (see Ortmann 2015 for more
contextual detail).
Even though a couple of years have passed since the Umbrella Movement,
the impact of the movement is still observable. One pro-democratic poli-
tician recently put up yellow umbrellas—the symbol of the Umbrella
Movement—when he was being sworn in as a legislator, despite the risk
of his election being ruled illegitimate. Some voters wrote political mes-
sages in support of full democracy on their ballots, even though this would
nullify their ballots. Lion rock—a mountain on Kowloon Peninsula facing
the inner city of Hong Kong—is occasionally decorated with a banner
that reads: “Ngo5 jiu3 zan1 pou2 syun2” [I need true democracy]. At
the same time, senior officials in the government and politicians in the
pro-government camp emphasise the importance of maintaining the sta-
tus quo in the name of political stability. Although the initial fervour of
the Umbrella Movement has abated, politics still matters in Hong Kong.
The Umbrella Movement also attracted considerable attention from
the media and Internet users in Japan and other countries, and a num-
ber of Japanese-speaking Hongkongers were hired to work as interpret-
ers. Japanese-speaking protesters appeared on Japanese TV programmes
and expressed their opinions in Japanese on SNSs such as Twitter and
Facebook. As a result, Twitter, which is very popular among Japanese
users, was wall-to-wall with comments in Japanese about the Umbrella
Movement, along with general information about Hong Kong. Volunteer
teachers offered open-air classes in the occupied areas, and Japanese lan-
guage was one of the most popular subjects among the protesters on the
street, who were basically idle when the police were not in attendance.
The Umbrella Movement came to an end when the police evicted the
protesters from the street in December 2014, but some users of Japanese
continue to broadcast information in Japanese on the Internet.
THEORISING GAZE INTO SOFT POWER

In 2004, Nye pointed out that “Japan has more potential soft power
resources than any other Asian country” (85). This is still true in present-
day Hong Kong. By definition, a country’s soft power resources are
“assets that produce attraction” (Nye 2004, 6). A soft power resource
attracts one’s attention and, in many cases, forms one’s preferences. To
illustrate his concept of soft power, Nye (2004) invoked several countries
including Japan and the USA. Nevertheless, Nye (2004) is less eloquent
about how people’s attraction and preferences are created by soft power;
he simply states that “[w]hether a particular asset is a soft-power resource
that produces attraction can be measured by polls or focus groups” (6).
In fact, Nye’s (2004) findings were illustrated by a host of polls and other
quantitative data, but his argument could have more thoroughly discussed
ways in which individuals feel attracted to and become fond of a country’s
soft power assets in a particular sociocultural context.
This study attempts to offer a more nuanced and contextualised
account of the attraction and preference that soft power gives rise to.
We thus employ the concept of gaze tinged by power relations (Foucault
1979). Gaze is an anthropological term corresponding to various ways
of seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling, and perceiving in other
ways (Urry and Larsen 2011). Gazing is not a mere bodily movement but
a socioculturally contextualised act performed “through a filter of ideas,
skills, desires and expectations, framed by social class, gender, nationality,
age, and education” (Urry and Larsen 2011, 2). Particularly in the case
of tourism, gazing is fundamentally social and relational since gazers are
normally gazing at something through the eyes of significant others such
as peer gazers and gazees. While more powerful gazers (e.g., tourists)
may exploit less powerful gazees (e.g., local inhabitants), Maoz (2006)
indicated that gazing is mutual in that gazees can also be powerful and
objectify gazers. Gaze lies in a maze of multidirectional power relations
embedded in a particular sociocultural situation, and therefore gaze can
be linked to the theory of soft power.
Provided that soft power in Nye’s (2004) terms determines attraction
and preference, we suggest that a country’s soft power should be inter-
preted as its sociopolitical capacity for earning and holding gazes from
the outside. By means of soft power, a country draws gazes from peo-
ple in other societies to its soft power resources in the hope of continu-
ously retaining favourable gazes. For instance, visitors to Japan’s tourist
destinations and consumers of Japanese cultural products are motivated to

gaze at Japan—whether or not they “like” Japan at that point in time. In
such situations, the object of gazing is Japan—or, more precisely, Japan’s
“presentable” soft power resources such as the ancient city of Kyoto or
the recent animated movie Your Name. If one enjoys their travel to Japan
or Japan-related cultural consumption and forms a favourable impression
of the country, it can be said that Japan’s soft power is strong because it
can retain gazes. Yet, the strength of soft power, contrary to Nye’s (2004)
claim, is highly complex and cannot be measured by a single poll or focus
group. Rather, we need to thickly document soft power as a sociocultural
phenomenon embedded in the local context. We thus employ an ethno-
graphic method to delve deeper into the issue of soft power.
ETHNOGRAPHIC FIELDWORK
Ethnography is the qualitative method of portraying a group of people
who share sociocultural norms and practices. To understand the lives of
their participants, ethnographers remain in the field “being really in con-
tact with them ... [to adopt] quite a natural course very much in har-
mony with his [sic] surroundings” (Malinowski [1922] 2014, 6). This
ethnographic research began unexpectedly when the Umbrella Movement
emerged in September 2014. The authors are teachers at Hong Kong’s
local universities, and the Umbrella Movement had a significant impact
on our professional lives. Especially at the beginning of the movement,
half of our students did not come to class because they were protesting on
the street. Immersed in the developing situation, we spontaneously docu-
mented and recorded the events.
As teachers of Japanese, we noticed that Japan and Japanese language
played a role in the situation. Although we were not participants in the
strict sense, we were not complete bystanders either. We occasionally
went out to provide protesters—many of whom were university students,
including our own students—with food and commodities. Furthermore,
some of our students and personal friends who were involved in the pro-
test sought our help when they needed to translate their messages into
Japanese to disseminate them to as many Japanese people as possible. We
also saw messages in Japanese on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, and we
occasionally managed to communicate with the authors of such messages.
As time went on, our digitally recorded field notes expanded to include
photos and videos taken during our observations, including direct and
online interactions with participants and other individuals in Hong Kong.
Along with these observations, between September 2015 and
November 2016, we conducted multi-sessional life history interviews with
11 Japanese-speaking ethnic Chinese individuals (seven women and four
men) in their 20s and 30s, including one public figure—Agnes Chow, the
former spokesperson for Scholarism and one of the student leaders of the
Umbrella Movement.3 Apart from Agnes Chow, all of our informants in
this study are referred to using pseudonyms. We focused on speakers of
Japanese in their 20s and 30s—those born between the late 1970s and
the mid-1990s—in this research because they grew up surrounded by
Japanese cultural products. In fact, each participant shared Japan-related
collective experiences and expressed a fondness for some aspects of Japan.
Eight of the eleven participants in our study claimed to belong to particu-
lar Japan-related fandoms—such as that of a voice actor, an idol group,
or a comic—while the remaining three were attracted to more general
aspects of Japan such as travel or Japanese food. The participants were
born in Hong Kong or had immigrated to Hong Kong from mainland
China before the age of six. In terms of political beliefs, most of our
participants were pro-democracy. Yet, not every young Hongkonger is
sympathetic to the Umbrella Movement and other pro-democracy political
movements. In fact, one of the participants—referred to as Dolly in this
study—clearly expressed her sympathy for the government and the police
force. We recruited participants through our personal networks and SNSs.
While some participants were eager to share their views with us, for vari-
ous reasons (e.g., working for a governmental organisation) it took a while
to enlist the cooperation of others. Interviews were audio-recorded and
transcribed, and we translated the original data into English. The medium
of communication was primarily Japanese, although a smaller amount of
Cantonese and English was also used. This was because all participants
wanted to speak in Japanese with us to the best of their ability; they used
Cantonese or English only when they could not find appropriate expres-
sions in Japanese.
JAPAN AND JAPANESE BEFORE THE UMBRELLA MOVEMENT

For most Hongkongers in their 20s and 30s, Japan has long been part of
their lives. “Japan has been out there for as long as I can remember,” said
Alice, who is in her early 20s. She and other young Hongkongers were
born and brought up at a time when Japan’s economic and sociocultural

influence was substantial. The visibility of Japanese department stores and
supermarkets was at its peak in the 1990s and early 2000s. Japanese res-
taurants were ubiquitous, and convenience stores were filled with Japanese
snacks and beverages. Japanese cultural products such as songs and TV
drama series—with (modern written) Chinese subtitles or dubbed into
Cantonese—were easily obtainable through the mass media, and later on
the Internet. Patty, who is in her early 20s, echoed this situation: “When
I was about 10, I began reading Japanese comics, watching Japanese ani-
mation, and listening to Japanese songs.” Various soft power assets from
Japan are perceived to be attractive in Hong Kong. Patty continued, “To
me, Japan is so interesting—they are always creating new things while also
keeping the old things.”
Especially after the Japanese government granted visa-free access to
tourists with Hong Kong passports in 2004, travelling to Japan became
a social trend. Many Hongkongers travel to Japan repeatedly—10, 20,
or even more times (see Japan National Tourism Organization 2017).
Despite this, having been exposed to various Japanese products and
media content in Hong Kong, many young Hongkongers had formed
an image of Japan in their minds even before they actually visited Japan.
In other words, as Urry and Larsen (2011) argue, “the tourist gaze is
largely preformed by and within existing mediascapes” (179, emphasis in
original). Yet, being economic and cultural consumers—not at all peculiar
in today’s Hong Kong—Hongkongers are gazing at specific Japanese soft
power assets, but pay less heed to opposite gazes on Hong Kong from
Japan. Talking about his Japanese friend, Ivan said, “When I went to
Japan in 2008, a Japanese friend thought Hong Kong was little different
from China. I thought Japanese people were basically indifferent to poli-
tics. I didn’t mind, though.”
Because of the ubiquity of Japanese culture, for Hongkongers, learning
Japanese has been strongly associated with economic/cultural consump-
tion, including tourism (see Fig. 9.1). This tendency became particularly
salient after the economy of Japan peaked in the early 1990s and then
began to decline. As a result, learning Japanese came to have connotations
of a hobby or leisure pursuit in the Hong Kong context, rather than being
an instrumental means to obtain a Japan-related job or business opportu-
nity.4 For example, it was a Japanese comic that motivated Anne, who is in
her late 30s, to begin learning Japanese some 20 years ago. “I had to study
Japanese, simply because there was no translation available in Hong Kong.”
Fig. 9.1 Fans of Japanese culture often form communities to interact with one
another and exchange information. The young Hongkongers in the photograph
are promoting a society for Japanese culture at a local university, displaying posters
with messages in Japanese. The society has around 400 members. Photograph by
Kazuyuki Nomura, January 2017
Owing to her language proficiency, as a teenager, Anne managed to enjoy

that Japanese comic and to communicate in Japanese with Japanese fans.
Anne and other participants agreed on the usefulness of Japanese language
for cultural consumption. And yet, it was Japanese cultural products rather
than Japanese language itself that prompted these Hongkongers to study
Japanese in the first place. Japanese language merely functioned as a means
to satisfy their desire to enjoy Japan-related cultural consumption. The
same interpretation can be applied to tourism. “Thanks to Japanese, I can
travel rural Japan where nobody is expected to speak a foreign language,”
commented Clara, who is in her early 30s. In this case, Japanese language
is an instrument for satisfying her proclivity for travelling in Japan rather
than what Nye (2004) called “attractive power,” however essential the
language may be.
Cantonese dubbing or Chinese subtitling is essential for Japanophiles
who do not understand Japanese—who, in the Hong Kong context, far
outnumber speakers of Japanese—to engage in cultural consumption,
because many Japanese cultural products are only available in Japanese.

Some Japanese-speaking Hongkongers are willing to become transla-
tors and interpreters, and Hebe, who is in her early 30s, is one of them.
“I respected people in Jimaku Gumi [Subtitling Group] as a child.
I wanted to be one of them.” Jimaku Gumi is an online group of volunteer
translators in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and mainland China who add Chinese
subtitles to Japanese animation and broadcast it on the Internet. It is
true that their activity infringes on property rights, and some members of
Jimaku Gumi were arrested in 2015.5 Nevertheless, thanks to these anon-
ymous volunteer translators, Japan’s soft power gained favour and prefer-
ence in Hong Kong by means of its cultural products. For this reason,
Jimaku Gumi can be considered to be what Nye (2004) called “willing
interpreters.” Since “attraction often has a diffuse effect, creating general
influence rather than producing an easily observable action” (Nye 2004,
16), a country’s soft power relies on those willing interpreters. Without
willing interpreters, Japan’s soft power would not wield an influence over
a host of non-Japanese-speaking Japanophiles in Hong Kong.
Language proficiency—along with knowledge of the target culture—
is essential to serve as a willing interpreter who mediates soft power.
Knowledge of Japanese language increases the authority and trustworthi-
ness of willing interpreters who exert influence over like-minded receivers
of information who share the same economic or cultural interests, such as
fans of a particular idol group. Hebe had never been a member of Jimaku
Gumi, but she was a passionate fan of a Japanese voice actor in Hong
Kong. Hebe was well known in the fandom of that voice actor as a key
person who connected fans in Hong Kong and Japan. Several other par-
ticipants, including Agnes Chow, operated blogs or Facebook fan pages
about a Japanese idol group or other Japan-related hobby. Even though
those Japanese-speaking willing interpreters’ spheres of influence are based
on specific cultural products and rarely extend beyond their own fandoms,
such cultural products cannot be soft power assets without their volunteer
work. In this respect, Japan’s soft power rests on these Japanese-speaking
interpreters abroad. However, Japanese language was not a form of soft
power in its own right, at least before the Umbrella Movement.
JAPAN AND JAPANESE AFTER THE UMBRELLA MOVEMENT

The three-month-long Umbrella Movement politicised Hong Kong
Chinese, who have been described by Lau and Kuan (1988) as individualis-
tic, economy-oriented, and apolitical. It is not accurate, however, to portray
all Hongkongers as politically inactive, because demonstrations and pro-

tests over various issues were common in Hong Kong prior to the Umbrella
Movement, and its people have enjoyed politico-economic freedom with
a limited democracy since the colonial era. Yet, although a majority of
Hongkongers fled China’s communist regime and many were still cautious
about post-1997 Chinese rule, Hongkongers were previously more ambiv-
alent about politics. The Umbrella Movement differed from earlier protests
in many ways. First of all, it had a huge impact on people’s daily lives. Some
usually busy avenues were crowded with the tents of the sit-in protesters,
and the routes of buses and trams had to be modified (see Fig. 9.2). More
significantly, many people began to express their support for one side or
the other—the pro-democracy camp or the pro-government/police camp.
Fig. 9.2 Protesters set up tents on a main avenue in Admiralty, the central dis-
trict in which the government headquarters, the Legislative Council, and the
Court of Final Appeal are located (left). Because bus routes were altered to bypass
the occupied areas, signs such as “temporary stop” (upper right) and “special inci-
dent” (lower right) became part of everyday life during the Umbrella Movement.
Photograph by Kazuyuki Nomura, October 2014
Some wore a ribbon in the colour of the camp they supported—yellow for
full democracy and blue to support the government. Politics became part
of everyday conversations in the wake of the Umbrella Movement. Most
young Hongkongers, those who were born and/or brought up in Hong
Kong and claimed a local identity, supported the pro-democracy camp,
despite some exceptions.
Another change wrought by the movement is that pro-democracy
Hongkongers began to pay attention to how people in other countries,
including Japan, view Hong Kong. Multilingual supporters of the Umbrella
Movement reported on the developing situation in Hong Kong in English
and other foreign languages over the Internet. Protesters also spoke to
the foreign press. In 2015, when Agnes Chow Ting—the student leader
of the Umbrella Movement who agreed to participate in this study—was
interviewed for a Japanese TV show, she was excited. She recounted in
Japanese her excitement at attracting the attention of the Japanese media.
As an ardent fan of the Japanese idol group Morning Musume, Agnes was
the host of a Facebook fan page of Morning Musume before becoming
a student activist. “I was pleased to get attention from Japan. Japanese
who I don’t know were talking about this Hong Kong girl on 2-channel
[a Japanese textboard].” Similar to Agnes, other participants reported
positive feelings when Japanese people reacted favourably to Hong Kong’s
struggle for democracy and acknowledged its difference from mainland
China. For example, Alfred felt extremely happy when he received a mobile
message in Japanese from a friend in Japan that read as follows:
I know Hong Kong people are well mannered and educated, but mainland-
ers are totally different. Mainlanders are lacking in manners. You see? Hong
Kong passport holders are granted visa-free travel to 156 countries. Only 45
countries let mainlanders do so. I am so sorry about Hongkongers under
Chinese rule, because they’re being treated as birds in a cage!
When Richard, who is in his late 30s, posted a pro-democracy opinion

advertisement in a local newspaper, he wanted to add Japanese to the
English and Cantonese texts. This was because he believed that “Japan
is a democratic country, and they must understand how we feel when
China is depriving us of our freedom.” After the Umbrella Movement,
Hongkongers began to seek gazes from Japan—a significant neigh-
bouring country that was believed to be sympathetic to Hong Kong’s
pro-democracy movement. When Japanese-speaking Hongkongers hear
Japanese acknowledging the “alterity politics” of differentiating Hong

Kong from mainland China, this can be interpreted as meaning that
Japan’s soft power increases among them. This is because pro-democracy
Hongkongers see Japan as a nation that understands the sentiments of
people in Hong Kong. Of course, not all Japanese-speaking Hongkongers
are pro-democracy. Dolly, who is in her late 30s, for instance, expressed
her sympathy for the Hong Kong government: “We Hongkongers rely on
everything from China, say, water, food, and electricity. I’m not a big fan
of the Chinese Communist Party but Hong Kong needs to come to terms
with China.” But Dolly appreciated those Japanese who recognised Hong
Kong as being distinct from mainland China. “It is a fact that Hong Kong
is historically different from mainland China. I do feel thankful if Japanese
know it.” Gazes from Japan, which is seen as an important neighbour,
have created positive impressions among young Hongkongers, regardless
of their political stance.
Despite generally positive views of Japan among our respondents, how-
ever, these young Hongkongers do not see Japan uncritically as a model
democracy. Agnes perceived young Japanese to be much less politically
aware than young people in Hong Kong. “I feel impatient with Japanese
in my generation, because they aren’t very eager to change their own
society.” Agnes even perceived Japan to be “a disappointing country.”
Patty also wished young Japanese people would be more politically active:
“Although I’m just a foreigner [and not a Japanese citizen], I’d like to
suggest that Japanese people should be less afraid of change. They could
express their opinions more boldly.” Nevertheless, it is not always the case
that pro-democracy Hongkongers feel disappointed in Japan because of
the perceived political apathy of Japanese. In fact, Edward, an interviewee
in his late 20s, offered another interpretation: “My Japanese friends sel-
dom talk about their government, but that seems to be a good sign.
Japanese aren’t as dissatisfied with their government as we are.” Even
Agnes hoped for a better future for Japan, because “Japan is my favourite
country.” When Agnes published a comment about Japanese politics on
Twitter in Japanese, that comment was retweeted more often than any of
her other comments. “Perhaps Japanese people are simply unaccustomed
to political action. I hope they will be as eager to change their society
as Hongkongers.” However, Patty was concerned about the lessening
gazes from the rest of the world, including Japan, as nearly two years
had passed since the Umbrella Movement at the time of our interview.
“I was very glad when Japanese people gazed at Hong Kong at the time
of the Umbrella Movement. But fewer people in Japan and elsewhere are
paying attention to Hong Kong now. I hope they won’t forget us.” Since
the Umbrella Movement, it seems that Japan has attracted an increasing
number of gazes from young Hongkongers.
While Japanese language was merely an instrument to gaze at Japan for
various forms of economic and cultural consumptions before the Umbrella
Movement, it has become the indispensable means to receive gazes from
Japan since that time. As with cultural products, Japanese people’s gaze
at Hong Kong is produced in Japanese in most cases. A majority of our
participants generally agreed with Hebe, who maintained that “Japanese
is a barrier. It’s hard to get information from Japan with no knowledge of
Japanese.” This is why Hebe, who used to be active among like-minded
people within the fandom of a Japanese voice actor, began to connect the
societies of Hong Kong and Japanese utilising her language proficiency.
Not only did she publish her own opinions in Japanese on SNSs, but she
also subtitled news and Twitter messages in Japanese so that those without
language proficiency could perceive gazes from Japan. Hebe was not the
only such “bridge” between Hong Kong and Japan, although she was
especially active. Many other users of Japanese, including every participant
in this study, began to transmit messages about Hong Kong in Japanese on
the Internet and in the media, and to translate Hong Kong-related voices
in Japanese into Cantonese and publish them on the Internet or elsewhere.
Under such circumstances, Japanese language helps Japan to attract
favourable gazes. Japanese-speaking Hongkongers receive gazes from
Japan and disseminate those gazes across Hong Kong society. As men-
tioned earlier, Hongkongers generally feel excited if they attract attention
from Japan. Since the Umbrella Movement, users of Japanese in Hong
Kong have perceived curious and—often, but not always—sympathetic
reactions from ordinary Japanese people as well as the mass media. These
reactions from Japanese are often favourable to Hong Kong’s struggle
for democracy and human rights, possibly influenced by the antipathy
in Japan towards mainland China and its socialist regime. This means,
in turn, that Japanese language serves a sociocultural function that gives
Japanese-speaking Hongkongers access to gazes from Japanese that non-
speakers of Japanese would not perceive.
Since the Umbrella Movement at least, messages in Japanese sympa-
thetic to pro-democracy Hongkongers wield a form of soft power that
encourages pro-democracy Japanese-speaking Hongkongers to view Japan
even more positively. We understand that the voices of Japanese people
expressed in Japanese language—even if the original authors may not

intend for their messages to be heard overseas—can count as Japanese soft
power and influence a Japanese-speaking international audience. If opinions
sympathetic to pro-democracy Hongkongers expressed in Japanese lan-
guage function as Japan’s soft power, Japanese language—a passport to
information available only in Japanese—could be interpreted as a form of
soft power that enables Japanese-speaking Hong Kong Chinese to receive
favourable voices that contribute to their political desire to differentiate
Hong Kong from mainland China. As such, Japanese language is a type
of soft power that contributes to the promotion of political values such
as democracy and human rights among politicised Japanese-speaking
Hongkongers. In the post-Umbrella Movement era, proficiency in
Japanese began to function as a type of co-optive soft power to “engender
cooperation—an attraction to shared values and the justness and duty of
contributing to the achievement of those values” (Nye 2004, 7).
CONCLUSION
Our research suggests that Japanese language has functioned as a form of
Japanese soft power that shapes impressions of Japan in Hong Kong as a
whole since the Umbrella Movement of 2014, rather than being simply a
pragmatic instrument that enables Japanophiles in Hong Kong to enjoy
Japan-related economic or cultural consumption within the bounds of their
own interests. Japanese language in Hong Kong has established itself as a
type of co-optive soft power since the Umbrella Movement. Before that
time, it was questionable whether Japanese functioned as an independent
source of soft power; rather, proficiency in Japanese served as a means of
bolstering a willing interpreter’s authority or authenticity when transmit-
ting Japan-related soft power to others. In other words, proficiency in the
language spoken in the target country, as well as other evidence of cultural
fluency, guaranteed one’s qualification as a mediator of particular soft power
assets. But the influence of such users of Japanese was generally limited,
because soft power in conjunction with language was rarely wielded beyond
like-minded friends who were also attracted to Japan-related consumption.
However, during the Umbrella Movement, users of Japanese in Hong
Kong who supported this political movement broadcast their experiences
and opinions in Japanese via SNSs such as Twitter. Because of their lan-
guage proficiency, these Japanese-speaking young Hongkongers attracted
the attention—and often sympathy—of different groups of Japanese,
including the media, and connected with Japanese whom they would not
have reached through their previous networks that were based on eco-
nomic or cultural consumption. Empowered in this way, Japanese-speaking
Hongkongers have begun to perceive compassionate gazes from people
in Japan by means of the Japanese language. Under these circumstances,
in the wake of the Umbrella Movement, Japanese language can be inter-
preted as a co-optive form of soft power that entices users of Japanese to
cast back favourable gazes at Japan, because largely pro-democratic young
Hongkongers consider Japan to support Hong Kong’s struggle for democ-
racy and human rights. As such, the language of a country may function as
a form of soft power in another country, in tandem with an appreciation of
that country’s fundamental values, such as democracy and human rights.
Despite the contribution of this chapter to the increased understand-
ing of Japanese language as soft power, we are aware of the limitations of
this study. Firstly, we were unable to conduct a large-scale opinion poll or
focus group and to quantify the strength of Japanese language as a type
of soft power, as suggested by Nye (2004). Our ethnographic analysis of
the sociocultural functions of Japanese language does, however, supple-
ment social scientific research, in particular in the fields of anthropology,
sociology, and history. Secondly, we did not interview non-speakers of
Japanese, which may have enhanced our understanding of the role of
Japan and its language in Hong Kong. For instance, Joshua Wong—a
prominent student activist in the Umbrella Movement—does not under-
stand Japanese but is known to be a fan of the Japanese sci-fi fiction series
Gundam. A comparative study between speakers of Japanese and non-
speakers of Japanese in the future may help to enrich our findings on the
users of Japanese. Lastly, since the main focus of this study was on the
sociocultural role of Japanese language, further research should explore
Japanese language as a medium for conveying Japan’s political messages
in other contexts. In the case of Hong Kong in the wake of the Umbrella
Movement, Hongkongers largely see Japan as a democratic country that
respects human rights and political freedom, despite the perceived politi-
cal indifference of many young Japanese. For instance, it would be inter-
esting to investigate how Japan is understood sociopolitically in different
contexts in East Asia such as Taiwan, another Chinese-speaking society,
where people have experienced full democracy since the early 1990s.
Japanese is a very popular foreign language in many other places, espe-
cially in East Asia. Nevertheless, little is known about how it is used as
a medium of communication beyond the classroom walls. Apart from
economic and cultural consumption, future research should explore how

Japanese and other languages may change their learners and users and
shape their lives in diverse contexts.
Furthermore, in Hong Kong’s current circumstances, Japan may func-
tion as an alternative modernity (Escobar 1992), whereby local people
(i.e., Hongkongers)—in their everyday practices including gazing at
Japan and being gazed at by Japanese—resist and transform the norma-
tive modernity (i.e., the nation-state of China) inflicted upon them by
the authorities. Hongkongers generally consider Japan to be a country
in which people can enjoy full democracy as a constitutional right, which
China has denied Hong Kong. Although Japan has been a significant other
for Hong Kong, now that China symbolises dominance and oppression,
especially since the Umbrella Movement, pro-democracy Hongkongers
are inclined to view Japan as a politically favourable other. This may be a
new trend, since before the Umbrella Movement, Hongkongers tended to
harbour negative political opinions about Japan, partly because territorial
disputes and/or wartime historical memories tended to cast a shadow over
Sino-Japanese relations (see Choi 1990 on the anti-Japan political cam-
paign over the disputed Diaoyu/Senkaku archipelago in the 1970s). In a
departure from the past, it seems that the country of Japan—as well as the
language of Japan—is now being reinterpreted and assuming a function
that empowers Hongkongers to distance themselves from the dominant
narrative of Chinese nationalism. Further research on how Japan feeds
into sociopolitical currents in today’s Hong Kong would also be fruitful.
NOTES
1. All quotes are the authors’ translations unless otherwise noted.
2. In Japanese, otaku—translated as “nerds” or “geeks” in English—refers to a
group of (largely young) individuals with particularistic and single-minded
proclivities for a certain genre of cultural products (see Kinsella 1998 on
Japanese otaku who consume and create armature comics). The word otaku
in Japanese often has negative, and even derogatory, connotations, such as
infantile obsession. In Hong Kong, however, although it has been associ-
ated with the problem of social withdrawal, the concept of otaku or jyu6
zaak6 zuk6 is not as negative as that of otaku in Japan; as it does in the USA
(Newitz 1994), otaku simply refers to fans of Japanese cultural products in
the Hong Kong context.
3. Scholarism refers to a group of pro-democracy student activists who led
the Umbrella Movement. They also organised a rally in 2012 against the
government’s introduction of Moral and National Education, considered

to be a largely pro-Beijing school curriculum. The group disbanded in
2016.
4. According to Kiyama et al. (2011), around 90% of the Japanese language
learners they surveyed in Hong Kong were motivated to study Japanese by
economic and cultural consumption, including tourism and popular
culture—especially animation, comics, computer games, and J-pop music.
5. In September 2015, two mainland Chinese in Tokyo were arrested for ille-
gally uploading a Japanese animation film with Chinese subtitles on the
Internet (Kyoto Shimbun, 27 October 2016).
REFERENCES
Census and Statistics Department. 2016. “Table A55-1: Population aged 5 and
over Able to Speak Japanese by Ethnicity, 2001, 2006 and 2011.” Unpublished
census data disclosed upon request.
Chen, Ping. 1993. “Modern Written Chinese in Development.” Language in
Society 22:505–37.
Choi, Po King. 1990. “A Search for Cultural Identity: The Students’ Movement
of the Early Seventies.” In Differences and Identities: Educational Argument in
Late Twentieth Century Hong Kong, edited by A. Sweeting, 81–107. Hong
Kong: Faculty of Education, University of Hong Kong.
Escobar, Arturo. 1992. “Culture, Practice and Politics: Anthropology and the
Study of Social Movements.” Critique of Anthropology 12:395–432.
Foucault, Michel. 1979. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York:
Vintage.
Hong Kong Examination and Assessment Authority. 2017. “Table 7: HKDSE
Statistics of Entries and Results over the Years.” Accessed 6 April. http://www.
hkeaa.edu.hk/DocLibrary/HKDSE/Exam_Report/Examination_Statistics/
dseexamstat16_7.pdf
Humphreys, Gillian, and Miyazoe-Wong, Yuko. 2007. “‘So What is the Appeal?’
The Phenomenon of Japanese as a Foreign Language in Hong Kong.” Journal
of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 28:468–83.
Japan Foundation. 2017. “香港 [Hong Kong].” Accessed 6 April 2017. https://
www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/survey/area/country/2014/hongkong.
html
Japan National Tourism Organization. 2017. “2015 Foreign Visitors & Japanese
Departures.” Accessed 6 April. https://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/ttp/sta/PDF/
E2015.pdf
Kinsella, Sharon. 1998. “Japanese Subculture in the 1990s: Otaku and the
Amateur Manga Movement.” Journal of Japanese Studies 24:289–316.
Kiyama, Tomoko, Takako Nakano, Wang Yang Alex Chow, Sanae Ueda, Takako
Mochizuki, Hoi Tat So, and Reijirō Aoyama. 2011. 2010 年香港日本語学習者
背景調査報告 [Survey Report on the Background of Japanese Language

Learners in Hong Kong 2010]. Nihon Gakkan 日本学刊 14:176–95. https://
www.japanese-edu.org.hk/jp/publish/gakkan/pdf/hkgk01414.pdf
Lai, Mee Ling. 2011. “Cultural Identity and Language Attitudes into the Second
Decade of Postcolonial Hong Kong.” Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural
Development 32: 249–64.
Lau, Siu Kai, and Hsin Chi Kuan. 1988. The Ethos of Hong Kong Chinese. Hong
Kong: Chinese University Press.
Malinowski, Bronislaw. 2014. Argonauts of the Western Pacific: An Account of
Native Enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New
Guinea. London: Routledge. First published 1922.
Maoz, Darya. 2006. “The Mutual Gaze.” Annals of Tourism Research 33:221–39.
Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries. 2015. 平成 26 年農林水産物等輸
出実績 [Exported Agricultural, Forestry, and Fishery Products from Japan in
2014]. Last Modified April. http://www.maff.go.jp/j/shokusan/export/e_
info/pdf/26_kunibetsu_meguji_kakutei2.pdf
Nakano, Yoshiko. 2009. Where There Are Asians, There Are Rice Cookers: How
“National” Went Global via Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University
Press.
Newitz, Annalee. 1994. “Anime Otaku: Japanese Animation Fans Outside Japan.”
Bad Subjects 13:1–14.
Nye, Joseph S., Jr. 2004. Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics.
New York: Public Affairs.
Ortmann, Stephan. 2015. “The Umbrella Movement and Hong Kong’s Protracted
Democratization Process.” Asian Affairs 46:32–50.
Trade and Industry Department. 2016. “Hong Kong-Japan Trade Relations.”
Last Modified July. https://www.tid.gov.hk/english/aboutus/publications/
factsheet/japan.html
Urry, John, and Jonas Larsen. 2011. The Tourist Gaze 3.0. Thousand Oaks: Sage.
CHAPTER 10
Accessing the Soft Power of Japanese

Language in Australia: Young Korean
Migrants Studying Japanese as a Foreign
Language
Esther Lovely
The challenges faced by English L2 migrants as they study English and

adjust to life in an English-dominant society have been well documented.
For these migrants, the motivation to learn English stems from a com-
mitment to their projected future identity as speakers of English, which is
described by Norton as “investment” (Norton 1997). Norton also argues
that these hoped-for future identities must be understood in the context
of imagined communities (Norton 2016). That is, migrants may be moti-
vated to study the language of the host country with the goal of gaining
access to an imagined community of users of that language. Norton’s work
has focused on the acquisition of English as a second language (ESL), but
the impact of migrants learning a third language in the host country on
their cross-cultural adaptation has not yet been explored. Once migrants
have gained sufficient competence in the language of the host country,
E. Lovely (*)

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2_10
180 E. LOVELY
learning a third language that is valued in the host culture may have a
beneficial impact on their adaptation to their new life.
To explore the above premise in the context of young South Korean
migrants (hereafter Koreans) in Australia, this chapter begins by broadly
describing the multicultural and multilingual demographic landscape of
Australia and locating East Asian languages within that setting. The focus
is then narrowed to compare the status of Japanese language to that of
Korean language in Australia, showing that Japanese language is more
widely studied and known than Korean language. The status of Japanese
language in South Korea is then discussed to provide context and contrast
between Japanese language learners’ experiences in Korea and Australia.
The subsequent section examines excerpts from interviews with young
Korean migrants residing in Queensland, Australia, which were conducted
as part of a broader research project.1 After spending their childhood in
Korea, these young people arrived in Australia during adolescence, and faced
many challenges in learning English and adjusting to life in an unfamiliar
culture. Analysis of their interviews reveals how the imbalance between
the status of the Japanese and Korean languages in Australia affected the
interviewees. They felt that their cultural identity and Korean language
skills were largely overlooked and undervalued in Australia. The next two
sections of this chapter analyse the innovative ways in which Japanese lan-
guage enabled some of the interviewees to join imagined and real com-
munities and adopt linguistic identities that provided them with further
social and economic opportunities. I argue that by taking advantage of the
soft power that Japanese language holds in Australia, these young migrants
were able to consolidate their position in Australian society.
ASIAN LANGUAGE AND PEOPLE IN AUSTRALIA

Since federation in 1901, the Australian government has progressed
from a commitment to maintaining a white European-only population
to embracing multiculturalism and making efforts to promote language
education. Great strides have been made in recognising the importance of
fostering ties between Australia and Asian nations, given Australia’s close
geographic proximity to Asia. Since the 1980s, there has been a marked
focus on certain Asian languages, particularly Japanese, the language of
one of Australia’s main trading partners. The status of Japanese and other
Asian languages and cultures in Australia has improved dramatically over
the past century. However, the extent to which government initiatives
ACCESSING THE SOFT POWER OF JAPANESE LANGUAGE IN AUSTRALIA... 181
and increased migration have transformed Australia into a multicultural,

multilingual society remains open to question. This section provides
a broad overview of the development of multicultural and multilingual
Australian society and where Asian languages have been located within
that context.
One of the first laws introduced to Australia’s federal parliament in
1901 was the Immigration Restriction Act, which aimed to reduce non-
British migration to Australia and deport unwanted migrants who were
already settled in Australia. This Act marked the beginning of the infamous
“White Australia policy,” which was not abolished for decades. It was not
until 1966 that legal equality between migrants of British, European and
non-European origin was established under the Holt government.2 The
Whitlam government in 1973 passed the Australian Citizenship Act, which
reduced the waiting period for all immigrants, regardless of their country
of origin, to be eligible for citizenship. At the same time, the Whitlam
government renounced the White Australia policy and established a
policy of multiculturalism.3 Finally, in 1975, Australia’s first federal anti-
discrimination law—the Racial Discrimination Act—was implemented,
thus ratifying the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All
Forms of Racial Discrimination (AHRC 2014).
With the racial restrictions on immigration lifted, the number of Asian
immigrants to Australia increased steadily, beginning in the early 1980s.
In 1984, the number of Asian-born immigrants surpassed the number of
European-born for the first time (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2001),
indicating the growing interest in Australia among Asian nations. In the
late 1980s and 1990s, Asia’s strong economic ties with Australia promoted
interest in Asian language learning. This strengthened interest spurred
the government to fund initiatives such as the National Asian Languages
and Studies in Australian Schools (NALSAS) Strategy (1994–2002),
which was aimed at developing strategies to support studies of Asia and
the teaching of four priority languages (Japanese, Chinese, Korean and
Indonesian) in primary and high schools (Wyatt et al. 2002). However,
in Wyatt et al.’s report to the Commonwealth Department of Education,
Science and Training evaluating NALSAS (2002), the evaluation team
asserted that “the position of Korean in Australian schools lags so far
behind the other three languages that it may be more effective with any
future funding to concentrate on the consolidation of the three” (Wyatt
et al. 2002, xiii). Despite this recommendation, from 2008 to 2012,
the government renewed its commitment to Asian language learning
182 E. LOVELY
by implementing the National Asian Languages and Studies in Schools

Program (NALSSP), and retained Korean as one of four targeted Asian
languages (Hamid and Kirkpatrick 2016).
In spite of these positive measures, in its 2011 guide to developing lan-
guage curricula, the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting
Authority (ACARA) expressed its concern about the precarious state of pro-
vision and uptake of languages by students in Australian schools (2011). The
guide laid out the necessary preconditions for the success of languages
in schools, placing “recognition by the school and the wider community
of the value of languages” (2011, 5) at the top of the list, implying the
frequent lack of such recognition in Australia. It also acknowledged that
decisions about language curricula would be subject to the priorities of
the Australian government (2011, 35). The government’s commitment to
Asian language learning was restated in the 2012 White Paper “Australia
in the Asian Century,” which emphasised Australia’s economic and secu-
rity relationships with Asian nations, and stated the aim of developing an
understanding of Asian cultures and proficiency in Asian languages on a
national scale. However, the paper also dealt a significant blow to Korean
language studies, by replacing it as a targeted Asian language with Hindi,
due to India’s rising status as a potential superpower. This indicated the
utilitarian approach of the Australian government to engagement with
Asia and Asian languages, which was driven by economic considerations
more than a desire to develop cross-cultural understanding (Hamid and
Kirkpatrick 2016). In contrast to the government’s approach, ACARA
documents emphasised the important role of language learning in devel-
oping students’ sense of identity and intercultural understanding (2011).
For the Australian Curriculum, 11 languages were selected for develop-
ment from 2013 to 2014, and again East Asian languages were com-
paratively well represented, including Chinese, Indonesian, Japanese,
Vietnamese and Korean (ACARA 2013). This illustrates the dissonance
between the stated priorities of the Australian government, which is moti-
vated by utilitarian factors, and its statutory education body, which rec-
ognises the value of language learning for personal development. It also
underscores the precarious state of Asian language learning in Australia,
regardless of the high visibility of Asian cultures and the soft power held
by Japanese culture and language.
A similar discrepancy between promotion of multilingualism and
actual linguistic outcomes is reflected in Australia’s multiculturalism and
actual population demographics and language use. Australia’s diverse
overseas-born population has continued to grow, with residents of Asian

origin—namely, those from China, India, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia
and Hong Kong—well represented in the top 15 countries of origin. The
year 2016 saw the highest proportion of overseas-born Australians in 120
years, reaching 28% (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2016). However, of
the 6.7 million overseas-born residents of Australia, as of 2015 the larg-
est group remained those born in the United Kingdom, at 5.1% of the
total Australian population (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2016). The
second and third largest groups were those born in New Zealand and
China respectively. This indicates that despite the diversity of cultural
groups residing in Australia, Anglo-European culture and English lan-
guage remain dominant in Australian society. Furthermore, around 53%
of first-generation Australians were found to speak a language other than
English at home in 2012, but this proportion dropped to only 20% among
second-generation Australians (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2012). This
demonstrates the hegemony of English among Australian-born residents
and the continued strength of monolingualism in Australian society. The
following sections will focus on situating the Japanese and Korean lan-
guages in the Australian context.
THE STATUS OF JAPANESE AND KOREAN LANGUAGES

IN AUSTRALIA
Japanese language education is well established in Australia, with records

of Japanese being taught in tertiary institutions from the early twentieth
century. It is the most widely taught Asian language at school and univer-
sity level, a position it has held since the 1980s. As of 2015, approximately
350,000 students were studying Japanese in Australia (Japan Foundation
2016). Across Australia, 25 tertiary institutions offer Japanese language
courses,4 and in 2008, a total of 1921 primary, secondary and combined
schools offered Japanese classes (de Kretser and Spence-Brown 2010).
Furthermore, as mentioned in the previous section, the Australian govern-
ment continues to consider Japanese a priority language in its education
policy planning. It is worth noting that the number of migrants from Japan
to Australia remains small, at a little over 35,000 (DIAC 2011a, b), repre-
senting around 0.001% of the total population. It is evident that the status
and popularity of Japanese language in Australia is not dependent on the
size of Japanese communities within Australia. Instead, the perceived soft
184 E. LOVELY
power of the language and high visibility of Japanese culture in Australia,

as well as government initiatives, have maintained its high status.
By comparison, Korean language enjoys less soft power in Australia, even
though according to the 2011 Census there were more than twice as many
Korean migrants in Australia as Japanese migrants (DIAC 2011b, c). It
was reported that in 2009, Korean language was only taught at a total of
49 primary and secondary schools in Australia (Asia Education Foundation
2010). Currently, undergraduate Korean language programmes are offered
at only ten tertiary institutions, less than half the number of institutions
that offer undergraduate Japanese language courses.5 There have been
surges of interest in Korean pop culture among the Australian general
public due to factors such as the global success of Korean recording artist
Psy’s hit song “Gangnam Style” in 2012, and the popularity of Korean
Australian singer Dami Im, who in 2013 won X-Factor, a reality TV talent
competition,6 before going on to achieve second place in the Eurovision
singing competition in 2016.7 In addition to Korean pop music, Korean
cuisine has become more popular and widely available in Australia,8 and
since 2010 the Korean Film Festival in Australia has also been bringing
the latest Korean blockbuster films to Australian cinemas for the enjoy-
ment of local audiences.9 Given enough time, South Korea’s visibility in
Australia may yet increase enough to close the gap with Japan. At the time
of the interviews, however, the interviewees felt that their Korean iden-
tity was often overlooked by the Australians they encountered, and the
Korean language did not afford them as much social and economic capital
as Japanese language did.
JAPANESE LANGUAGE AND CULTURE IN SOUTH KOREA

Whereas Japanese language and culture has remained popular in Australia
over the past few decades, its status in South Korea has been ambivalent. I
argue here that historical and political tensions between Japan and South
Korea have impacted the experiences of present-day Korean learners of
Japanese located in South Korea. Due to such tensions, it would be dif-
ficult for these learners, unlike learners in Australia, to be motivated by a
desire to embrace imagined future identities or to join an imagined com-
munity of Japanese users.
Japanese language has a long and fraught history in the Korean pen-
insula, and the political and social effects of this past are still felt today.
During Japan’s colonisation of Korea, which began in 1910 and lasted
until the end of World War II, the Japanese government took a range of
measures to attempt to encourage the dissemination of Japanese language.
This period was marked by a succession of repressive policies that aimed
to subdue and erase Korean language and culture and replace it with the
Japanese alternatives (Heinrich 2013). These attempts at what has been
called cultural genocide (Kim 2015) included teaching all school subjects
in Japanese, banning publications written in Korean, and forcing Koreans
to adopt Japanese names (Otmazgin 2012). These forceful tactics had the
effect of arousing strong opposition and anti-Japanese activism among
the Korean people (Heinrich 2013). After Korea gained independence
from the Japanese government in 1945, Korean nationalism flourished,
coalesced by the image of Japan as the national enemy that had attempted
the destruction of Korean language and culture (Sun 2012).
Although relations between the two countries were normalised in
1965, tensions persist until the present day. Famously, there is ongoing
dispute over territories such as the islets located in the Sea of Japan, known
internationally as the Liancourt Rocks, which are claimed by South Korea
as Dokdo, and by Japan as Takeshima. Another well-known source of
tension is the notorious textbook controversies that began in the 1980s,
when the Japanese Ministry of Education advised textbook publishers
to use watered-down wording to describe historical events such as the
Nanjing Massacre and the Korean March 1st Independence Movement
(Hamada 2002). Yet another historically based source of strain between
Japan and South Korea is the Korean “comfort women”—Korean women
forced to provide sexual services to the Japanese army. Despite decades of
lobbying by Korean civic groups, it was not until 2015 that the Japanese
government reportedly offered one-billion yen as compensation for the
emotional wounds suffered by these women.10
The political and historical tensions between the two countries have
continued to impact the attitudes of the general public in South Korea.
For example, it is telling that the results of opinion polls reported in
the Asahi Shimbun (one of the major Japanese newspapers) showed that
Korean respondents have consistently ranked Japan as the country they
most dislike (Sun 2012) since the first such survey results were available
in 1984. This lack of positive perceptions of Japan by Koreans was also
supported by East Asian researcher Otmazgin’s study of the dissemination
of Japanese pop culture in Asian countries, including South Korea. When
interviewed about their opinions of Japan and Japanese people, more
than two-thirds of the 119 Korean respondents talked about Japan’s
186 E. LOVELY
wartime role and its action in colonising Korea (Otmazgin 2007). Some
of the respondents in his study explained that, while they had Japanese
friends or appreciated aspects of Japanese culture, they disliked Japan’s
government and its handling of the sensitive historical issues between
Japan and South Korea. It is reasonable to assume that the two countries’
conflict-ridden past have had a negative impact on Korean people’s attitudes
and their motivations for studying Japanese language in South Korea.
In her ground-breaking research on identity and language learning,
Norton (2001) argues that a learner’s investment in or commitment to
learning a language must be understood within the context of an imag-
ined community. The term “imagined community” refers to a group of
people who are connected by imagination rather than physical or tangible
contact (Kanno and Norton 2009). Norton uses the term to signal an
imagined community that the language learner wishes to access by tak-
ing advantage of their language learning (Norton 2016). For example,
fans of Japanese anime may study Japanese in order to feel that they are
part of an imagined community of anime-lovers who can watch and enjoy
anime in the original language without the help of subtitles. When con-
sidering Japanese language learning in South Korea, the question arises as
to whether identity as a Japanese speaker or membership in an imagined
community of Japanese language users is something that would motivate
Korean learners.
At first glance, Japanese language appears to have a significant learner
base in South Korea, but a closer examination of learners’ experiences indi-
cates that they may not be motivated by a positive image of Japan or the
desire to be part of an imagined community of Japanese users. As of 2015,
South Korea had approximately 550,000 learners of Japanese, the third
largest number of learners of Japanese in the world, ahead of Australia,
which is ranked fourth, with around 350,000 learners (Japan Foundation
2016). It is worth noting that this number represents a substantial decrease
from a 2012 survey, which recorded roughly 840,000 learners of Japanese
in South Korea (Japan Foundation 2012). The popularity of Japanese
language study in South Korea and Australia inspired Nakamura (2016)
to investigate the motivation of Koreans studying Japanese language in
South Korea, compared to Australians studying the language in Australia.
The findings revealed significant differences between the two groups that
reflect their different learning environments. The study found that the
Korean learners perceived Japanese language as easy to learn, but that they
had little desire to continue learning it after graduating from university.
In contrast, the Australian learners perceived Japanese as difficult, but

reported that they had enjoyed studying Japanese at both high school and
university. The Australian learners also saw the study of Japanese as a life-
long pursuit, while the Korean learners simply aimed to meet immediate
short-term goals of reaching a certain level of proficiency to satisfy their
university requirements. Some of the Korean learners also stated that they
would shift their focus to studying English after graduation, seeing it as a
more useful skill for their future careers. Nakamura also reported that the
Australian learners developed friendships with Japanese L1 speakers and
took trips to Japan as a result of their language studies. Nakamura’s find-
ings portray learners in Australia as motivated by a lifelong commitment to
Japanese language learning and a personal affinity with Japan, in contrast
to learners in South Korea, who were motivated predominantly by short-
term academic goals. In the following sections, based on my own research,
I demonstrate that for some young Korean migrants in Australia, their
experience of studying Japanese in Australia enabled them to not only
achieve academic goals but also establish a position in Australian society.
KOREAN MIGRANTS’ PERCEPTIONS OF JAPANESE

AND SELF IN AUSTRALIA
The previous section provided an overview of the relationship between

Japan and South Korea, and the status of Japanese language in South
Korea. This section draws upon selected data from Korean interviewees
who were participants in my broader longitudinal research project into
the stories of cross-cultural adaptation among young Korean migrants
who arrived in Australia during their school years. As part of the project,
11 Koreans aged between 18 and 24 years were interviewed individu-
ally up to four times over a period of approximately seven months. The
interviews, supplemented by questionnaires, investigated their changing
social networks and perceptions of Australian and Korean culture. They
also elicited retrospective accounts of the interviewees’ lived experiences
since arriving in Australia. During the interviews, two themes emerged:
firstly, the interviewees felt that their Korean identities were invisible in
Australian society, and secondly, they found that Japanese language had
wide recognition and held more soft power in Australia than did Korean
language. The first theme was brought home by a few key examples. In
one interview, 20-year-old Michael11, who came to Australia at the age of
188 E. LOVELY
12 with his younger brother, described his experience working part-time

at a fast food shop in Australia. He mentioned confronting the low vis-
ibility of Koreans for the average member of the Australian public, saying:
we had a few customers been to Korea or lived in Korea or can speak Korean
… they were like, “Are you Korean?” “Yes I’m Korean, this is actually first
time people asked me ‘Are you from Korea?’ Usually people say ‘Are you
from China or Japan?’ they guess all the way down to Taiwan then for the
last I have to say myself ‘I’m from Korea,’ but you’re the actually first per-
son who asked ‘Are you Korean?’ Here you go, you can have a free drink.”
(Interview with Michael, June 28, 2013)
The customers who were able to guess Michael’s cultural background cor-
rectly could only do so because they had travelled to South Korea and
experienced its people and culture. Michael’s humorous reaction of offer-
ing the customers a reward for their acuity demonstrates his combination
of resignation and frustration at having his identity overlooked so often.
Another interviewee, Harry, also 20 years old, recalled that he was a mys-
tery to his Australian classmates during high school:
I just tried to study, learn English and those things, but they feel curious,
and they feel like, “Who’s that guy?” … “Is he really Korean? Or Chinese?
Vietnamese? Japanese?” … They don’t really know if I’m … Korean,
Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese. (Interview with Harry, February 13, 2013)
Other participants had similar experiences, and expressed surprise when

they encountered Anglophone Australians who were fans of Korean TV
dramas or Korean pop music.
In addition to their Korean identity being invisible or unrecognised,
some interviewees also mentioned the lack of demand for Korean lan-
guage in Australia in comparison to Japanese language. They discovered
that the lack of importance placed on Korean language in Australia also
affected their future plans, and that by comparison Japanese language
skills could be more useful. Karen, aged 20, who was studying education
at university, commented on this issue in one of her interviews:
I want to like teach Asian history and Korean … ’cause, all these primary
schools I’ve been on prac, they have really good Japanese um, language
programs as LOTE and everything, and yeah but not so much Korean.
(Interview with Karen, April 5, 2013)
This was echoed in the response of another interviewee named Erica, who
was also studying to be a secondary school Japanese teacher. During a
teaching practicum, some of her students asked why she did not teach
Korean, and she responded:
I would love to take Korean as my teaching area, but like for now, um, I’m
doing Japanese ’cause that’s popular subject in high school so I can get a
job. (Interview with Erica, June 28, 2013)
Another interviewee, Joan, came to Australia at the age of eight and was
21 years old at the time of her interviews. She explained that she had stud-
ied Japanese at high school in Australia, and then continued her study at
university in order to enhance her career prospects. She recalled:
I was really enthusiastic about learning when I first came to uni … because
my area is hospitality so if I know another language, it will be beneficial,
but then my Japanese don’t improve, I know it’s because … I don’t try to
improve. (Interview with Joan, June 13, 2013)
Joan was embarrassed at her currently low level of proficiency in Japanese.

During the same interview she blamed herself for this saying:
because I don’t have any Japanese friends, or you know, I don’t speak
Japanese outside of class … I just [didn’t] put in effort on learning.
(Interview with Joan, June 13, 2013)
Even though she had been unable to maintain her level of commitment to
her Japanese language study, Joan believed that Japanese language would
be valuable in her future career in tourism and hospitality in Australia.
The previous sections of this chapter have described the compara-
tively low level of soft power enjoyed by Korean culture and language in
Australia. The above excerpts show that my interviewees were keenly aware
of the relative lack of social and economic advantage afforded them by
their cultural background and native speaker status. They had come from a
largely culturally homogeneous country, where their cultural identity was
taken for granted, and moved to an environment where their inherited
identity was invisible and not valued by the host society. They had experi-
ences in Australia that made them realise that to most Australians, their
Korean identity was unidentifiable. Furthermore, they discovered that
Japanese language and culture had comparatively more recognition and
190 E. LOVELY
value in Australia in terms of their future careers. At the same time, the
interviewees were aware that their Korean language proficiency was not
an asset compared to proficiency in Japanese language. As discussed in the
following sections, some interviewees acted on this realisation by taking
advantage of the soft power offered by Japanese language. Studying and
becoming proficient in the Japanese language afforded them opportuni-
ties to adopt identities and access imagined communities that helped to
consolidate their position in Australian society.
JAPANESE LANGUAGE AND AN IMAGINED COMMUNITY

OF LEARNERS
While some of the interviewees felt frustrated and marginalised because of

their lack of English proficiency, the soft power of Japanese language in
Australia allowed them access to imagined and real communities, provid-
ing a more secure foothold for them in Australian society. For successful
adaptation to a new host culture, the importance of increasing one’s com-
petence in the host language is well recognised (Kim 2001). As the inter-
viewees arrived in Australia between the ages of 7 and 17, their English
proficiency levels varied significantly. In particular, those who had arrived
in Australia as teenagers, after completing most of their schooling in South
Korea, experienced many challenges in learning English and adapting to
a predominantly English language environment. However, even some of
the interviewees who had come to Australia at an earlier age stated that
they still lacked confidence in their English skills and felt uncomfortable
speaking with English L1 speakers. A common concern among the inter-
viewees was their perceived lack of English proficiency, even though they
had all graduated from Australian high schools and were able to success-
fully carry out their everyday activities. To them, lack of English profi-
ciency meant that they could not gain access to an imagined community
of English L1 Australians. As one interviewee, Yunah, recalled her early
high school days in Australia:
My English wasn’t good at the time as well, so I had to hang around with
Chinese people, which we came together from [her previous school].
(Interview with Yunah, December 3, 2012)
Clearly, she viewed her perceived lack of English proficiency as an obstacle

to socialising with non-Asian students who were English L1 speakers. This is
consistent with evidence Norton found indicating that English L2 speakers
were most uncomfortable speaking English with English L1 speakers—

“the very people who were members of—or gatekeepers to—the learners’
imagined communities” (Norton 2001, 166). Instead, Yunah felt that her
language skills restricted her to the company of other Asian students who
were English L2 speakers. However, knowing that her family planned to
stay permanently in Australia, Yunah wanted to gain access to a network of
English L1 speakers. The following quote shows that her imagined com-
munity of Australian English speakers broadened from Anglo-Australians
only to also include those of Asian background. She remembered:
at that time I really want to hang around with, at least, Asian people who
lived here a long time so I can … also learn some more English while I was
in high school. (Interview with Yunah, December 3, 2012)
At the time she started university, her fears of being unable to gain mem-
bership in a community of Australian English L1 speakers still lingered.
She recalled her concerns:
what if I don’t have any friends, what if same things happens that when I was
in high school, that I don’t wanna do like that, I don’t wanna have like too
many Korean people. (Interview with Yunah, December 3, 2012)
In common with other interviewees, Yunah believed that English profi-

ciency and Australian identity were inextricably linked. This meant that a
failure to gain access to this imagined community of English L1 speakers
reflected a failure to become a legitimate member of Australian society.
When she began to study Japanese at university in Australia, Yunah
gained entry to a new community that placed her on a more equal footing
with those around her—a community of Japanese L2 learners. Previously
she had perceived herself as an English L2 learner always striving and fail-
ing to join an imagined community of Australian English L1 speakers.
This reflects Pavlenko’s (2003) study of students in a Teaching English
to Speakers of Other Languages Masters programme, which found that
students who positioned themselves as English L2 learners experienced
feelings of frustration and failure. The identity of English L2 learner had
also been assigned to Yunah during her schooling in Australia, when she
first studied at an English language school, and then studied ESL in high
school. The pressure to improve her English proficiency was greater because
of her family’s strong investment in a future imagined life in Australia. In
contrast, the stakes were lower in a Japanese classroom. She was able to
192 E. LOVELY
feel comfortable communicating with English L1 classmates as a fellow

Japanese L2 learner. In the language classes, Yunah had to participate in
speaking activities with a partner, which brought her into contact with a
Vietnamese Australian classmate and an Anglo-Australian classmate. Their
shared interest in Japanese language formed the basis for their friendships,
which lasted even after Yunah transferred to a different university at the end
of her first year. These friendships helped her to feel confident in speaking
English and comfortable befriending English L1 speakers.
Another interviewee, Erica, came to Australia with her family at the age
of 17 as a consequence of her father’s work transfer. She studied Japanese
during the three years she spent at an Australian high school, and chose to
stay in Australia after her father’s work commitments ended and her family
returned to South Korea. Motivated by a desire to continue improving her
English and Japanese language skills, she decided to study both languages
through an education degree at university. This demonstrated her self-
identification as a continuing L2 learner of both Japanese and English. At
this time, she did not intend to live in Australia permanently, admitting
that she had planned to return to South Korea after graduating from uni-
versity. During her degree studies, Erica experienced a change of heart and
decided to become a Japanese language teacher in Australia. She found
that even as a trainee teacher of Japanese language she was able to con-
nect with her students by emphasising her identity as a fellow Japanese L2
learner. At the same time, she suffered doubts about her ability to achieve
her goal of teaching in Australia due to her English L2 status. She was
particularly affected by the final teaching practicum of her degree, when
the Japanese language teacher supervising her found little to criticise in
her ability to teach Japanese, but derided her English level as only “under-
standable.” She felt disadvantaged as an L2 speaker of both Japanese and
English, and even considered returning to South Korea, explaining:
the thing I was really stressed about was … Japanese and English aren’t my
first language … so you have to study both during your prac, so that’s like
full-on … at least like I don’t think I have to worry about it when I go to
Korea. (Interview with Erica, June 28, 2013)
Fortunately, while teaching Japanese, Erica was able to use her hitherto
disempowered identity as a Japanese and English L2 speaker to find com-
mon ground with her students. Despite the negative comments she had
received from her supervising teacher, her students did not have problems
with her English:
students said, yeah they had no problem with me speaking in English. … I

was like saying for year 11, year 12, saying my experiences learning a second
language, like encouraging them, you can do that as well. (Interview with
Erica, June 28, 2013)
She emphasised to her students that she was still a language learner too:
“I just came to Australia about seven years ago, I’m still studying Japanese
so,” “I’ve been through what you are going through, so I understand that
… anxiety of the exams and speaking, that’s fine, that’s what I did as well.”
… I was sharing my experience, and they loved it. (Interview with Erica,
June 28, 2013)
The positive response of the students increased Erica’s confidence in her

teaching abilities, which in turn solidified her plan to live in Australia for
the long term.
For both Yunah and Erica, taking advantage of the soft power of
Japanese language in Australia gave them access to new identities and
imagined communities. Whether studying or teaching Japanese, they were
able to shift away from the restrictive identity of English L2 speaker and
instead find common ground with Australian learners of Japanese from
different cultural backgrounds. Ultimately, accessing the imagined com-
munity of Japanese language learners helped them to position themselves
more securely within the broader context of Australian society.
JAPANESE LANGUAGE AND IMAGINED IDENTITY

Achieving proficiency in Japanese language was also a means of expand-
ing their identity beyond that of Korean or Korean Australian. This was
evident in the case of Yunah, who became more confident in her social life
due to her Japanese language study. In one of her interviews, she attrib-
uted her success in finding a part-time job to her Japanese language skills,
which allowed her to present herself to a potential employer as a multi-
lingual member of Australian society. After a year at university, Yunah had
suspended her Japanese study in order to study a different area that she
believed would improve her job prospects. At that time, she feared that
her English language skills were not adequate for working and living in
Australia in the long term. In order to improve her English proficiency,
she searched for a part-time job that would bring her into contact with
English L1 Australians. Even though Yunah never resumed her Japanese
194 E. LOVELY
studies, in 2013, her knowledge of Japanese language enabled her to find

a new part-time job as a cashier at a chain store in downtown Brisbane.
She recalled that she was very nervous before her job interview, and attrib-
uted her success to the fact that in her résumé and during the interview
she emphasised her multilingual skills, particularly Japanese. She said:
I think the manager like me … and also I told to manager that I am able to
speak English, Korean and Japanese and then little bit of Chinese … so I
tried to talk to him that I have the languages benefits, and I think he really
liked it. (Interview with Yunah, April 5, 2013)
This demonstrated Yunah’s awareness of the soft power of Japanese lan-

guage in Australia in comparison to Korean, and her ability to capitalise
on this situation. In this way she was able to portray herself as a multilin-
gual Australian, and shift away from the negative identity of an English
L2 speaker. This effectively enabled her entry to an imagined commu-
nity as proposed by Pavlenko (2003), consisting of multilingual L2 users.
While Pavlenko’s findings relate to the various imagined identities claimed
by non-native ESL teachers, they can also be applied to this context.
Pavlenko’s teachers shifted away from the subordinate identity of English
L2 speaker and claimed the more advantageous identity of multilingual
individuals. In the same way, Yunah claimed proficiency in Japanese and
Chinese language, foregrounding her multilingualism and downplaying
the less-valued aspect of her identity as an English L2 speaker.
Her self-representation as a multilingual individual was developed based
on her observations and experiences of Australia’s diverse cultural land-
scape. Her comment that her employer seemed impressed by her purported
language skills indicated that her employer also shared her view of the local
community as multicultural and multilingual. In Kanno and Norton’s
research on imagined communities (2009), which focused on learners of
English, they observed that some of their participants’ imagined communi-
ties did not, in the end, align with their actual circumstances. For example,
a Polish woman they spoke to who had been a teacher in her home country
found that after migrating to Canada, her identity as a teaching professional
was superseded by the reality of being a disadvantaged English L2 speaker
and migrant. Fortunately, in Yunah’s case, the identity she claimed—
multilingual Asian Australian—was validated by her employer’s belief that
her language skills would be useful in the workplace. Interestingly, in reality,
her overlooked identity as a Korean L1 speaker proved to be more useful
than her Japanese language skills. She encountered many Korean-speaking

customers, proving Korean language to be the greater asset in this situation.
Working at the store had the added benefit of increasing Yunah’s confidence
in her English communication skills, and strengthened her long-term plan
to pursue a career in Australia. In this way, she further consolidated her
future as a member of Australian society.
CONCLUSION
This chapter began with a brief overview of the position of Asian languages
and cultures in Australia, which revealed that Japanese language has become
a priority language for the Australian government. Despite the govern-
ment’s measures to promote LOTE (Languages other than English) pro-
grammes in schools and an increasingly multicultural population, Australia
remains overwhelmingly monolingual, with English as the uncontested lin-
gua franca. However, despite the small number of Japanese migrants, the
soft power of Japanese language has made it the most widely studied Asian
language in Australia. The associated positive perceptions of Japanese lan-
guage in Australia are in marked contrast to the image of Japan and Japanese
people in South Korea due to the long-term historical and political conflict
between the two countries. Nakamura’s research into the Japanese language
learning experiences of students in Australia and students in South Korea
showed a clear contrast between the two. Based on my interpretation of
Nakamura’s results, I have suggested that compared to learning Japanese in
South Korea, the experiences of Korean learners of Japanese in Australia are
more likely to be influenced by widespread positive perceptions of Japanese
language, which makes them more likely to embrace future imagined identi-
ties as Japanese users.
This was the case for some of the young Korean migrants whose expe-
riences of studying Japanese in Australia were discussed in this chapter.
These examples demonstrated that the soft power of Japanese language in
Australia played a significant role in establishing the futures of these young
people. The interviewees found that owing to the low level of awareness
of Korean people and culture in Australia, their Korean identity and lan-
guage skills were relatively unrecognised and undervalued. They found
that Japanese language skills could provide greater advantages for them
in various ways. By adopting the identity of Japanese L2 learners, some
interviewees were able to gain access to communities of Australian learn-
ers of Japanese. Developing proficiency in Japanese language also enabled
196 E. LOVELY
one interviewee to shift away from her less-valued identity as a Korean L1

speaker and adopt an identity as a multilingual individual, which was more
advantageous in the Australian job market. As well as the immediate social
and economic benefits granted by Japanese language, the interviewees also
gained a sense of security and confidence in their plans for the future. By
taking advantage of the high status of Japanese language in Australia they
were able to continue building for themselves stable positions as members
of Australian society.
In increasingly culturally diverse societies such as Australia’s, the binary
of host culture and home culture is gradually changing to create a soci-
ety composed of multiple cultures co-existing and blending together.
Recently, research on migrants and their adaptation is changing to reflect
this reality, and is shedding light on the complex relationships between
language and cultural identity. However, as illustrated by the cases dis-
cussed in this chapter, more research remains to be done to examine the
role of third cultures and languages in migrants’ journeys of adaptation.
NOTES
1. These interviews are part of my PhD research into the changing commu-
nication patterns and social networks of young Korean migrants in
Brisbane.
2. “White Australia Policy,” 2015, http://www.nma.gov.au/online_features/
defining_moments/featured/white_australia_policy_begins
3. “Foreign Affairs and Immigration,” 2015, https://www.whitlam.org/
gough_whitlam/achievements/foreignaffairsandimmigration
4. From a search on website www.hotcoursesabroad.com (2016) for Australian
tertiary institutions that offer undergraduate-level Japanese language
courses. The same search on www.hotcourses.com.au (2016) confirmed
this number.
5. From a search on website www.hotcoursesabroad.com (2016) for Australian
tertiary institutions that offer undergraduate-level Korean language courses.
The same search on www.hotcourses.com.au (2016) confirmed this
number.
6. Genevieve Dwyer, “Why Dami Im is the Perfect Choice to be Australia’s
2016 Eurovision Star,” SBS, March 4, 2016, http://www.sbs.com.au/
7. “Eurovision 2016: Dami Im Claims Song Contest Second Place with
Sound of Silence,” ABC News, May 15, 2016, http://www.abc.net.au/
8. “First it was Gangnam Style, Now Korean Food is Tipped to be the Next
Big Thing,” news.com.au., October 20, 2012, http://www.news.com.au/
9. Johnny Au, “The 7th Korean Film Festival in Australia (KOFFIA) Brings
a New Taste of Korean Cinema,” Hello Asia, July 15, 2016. www.helloasia.
com.au/
10. “Japan Offers $11M Compensation to WWII ‘Comfort Women’,” ABC
News, December 28, 2015, http://www.abc.net.au/
11. All names of interviewees are pseudonyms to protect privacy.
REFERENCES
Asia Education Foundation. 2010. PDF file. The Current State Of Chinese,
Indonesian, Japanese And Korean Language Education In Australian Schools: Four
Languages, Four Stories. Carlton: Education Services Australia. http://www.asia-
education.edu.au/docs/default-source/Research-reports/overarchingreport.
pdf?sfvrsn=2
Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2001. Population Composition: Asian-Born
Australians (cat. no. 4102.0 – Australian Social Trends). http://www.abs.gov.
au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/2f762f95845417aeca25706c00834efa/666a320ed
7736d32ca2570ec000bf8f9!OpenDocument
Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2012. Cultural Diversity in Australia. (cat. no.
2071.0 – Reflecting A Nation: Stories From The 2011 Census, 2012–2013).
http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/2071.0main+
features902012-2013
Australian Bureau of Statistics. “Overseas Born Aussies Highest in over a Century.”
News release, 30 March 2016. http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/
lookup/3412.0Media%20Release12014-15
Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2016. Australia’s Population by Country of Birth.
(cat. no. 3412.0 – Migration, Australia, 2014–15). http://www.abs.gov.au/
ausstats/abs@.nsf/Previousproducts/3412.0Main%20Features32014- 15?
opendocument&tabname=Summar y&prodno=3412.0&issue=2014-15
&num=&view
Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC). 2014. PDF file. A Quick Guide to
Australian Discrimination Laws. https://www.humanrights.gov.au/employers/
good-practice-good-business-factsheets/quick-guide-australian-discrimination-laws
de Kretser, Anne, and Robyn Spence-Brown. 2010. “The Current State of
Japanese Language Education in Australian Schools.” Edited by Employment
and Workplace Relations Australian Government Department of Education,
19. Carlton South, Vic: Education Services Australia Ltd.
Department of Immigration and Border Protection. 2014. PDF file. The People of
Australia: Statistics From The 2011 Census. Australian Government. https://
www.border.gov.au/ReportsandPublications/Documents/research/people-
australia-2013-statistics.pdf
198 E. LOVELY
Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC). 2011a. PDF file. Community

Information Summary: Japan-Born. Australian Government. https://www.
dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/02_2014/japan.pdf
Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC). 2011b. PDF file. Japan
Community Information Summary. Australian Government. https://www.dss.
gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/02_2014/japan.pdf
Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC). 2011c. PDF file. Republic
of South Korea Community Information Summary. Australian Government.
https://www.dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/02_2014/korea.pdf
Hamada, Tomoko. 2002. “Contested Memories of the Imperial Sun: History
Textbook Controversy in Japan.” American Asian Review 20(4):1–37.
Hamid, M. Obaidul, and Andy Kirkpatrick. 2016. “Foreign Language Policies in
Asia and Australia in the Asian Century.” Language Problems and Language
Planning 40(1):26–46.
Heinrich, Patrick. 2013. “Visions of Community: Japanese Language Spread
in Japan, Taiwan and Korea.” Internationales Asien Forum. International
Quarterly for Asian Studies 44(3):239–258.
Japan Foundation. 2012. PDF file. Survey Report on Japanese – Language
Education Abroad 2012: Excerpt. https://www.jpf.go.jp/j/project/japanese/
survey/result/dl/survey_2012/2012_s_excerpt_e.pdf. Accessed 7 July 2016.
Japan Foundation. 2016. PDF file. 2015 年度海外日本語教育機関調査結果(速
報値) [Survey Result of Overseas Japanese Language Institutions in 2015 (Pre-
liminary Report)]. http://www.jpf.go.jp/j/about/press/2016/dl/2016-
057-2.pdf. Accessed 28 November 2016.
Kanno, Yasuko, and Bonny Norton. 2009. “Imagined Communities and Educational
Possibilities: Introduction.” Journal of Language, Identity & Education 2(4):
241–249.
Kim, Joohwan. 2015. “Islands Adrift: Korean-Japanese Relations, National Identity,
and the Zainichi.” The Massachusetts Review 56(3):440–445.
Kim, Young Yun. 2001. Becoming Intercultural: An Integrative Theory of
Communication and Cross-cultural Adaptation / Young Yun Kim. Thousand
Oaks: Sage Publications.
National Statement For Languages Education In Australian Schools National Plan
For Languages Education In Australian Schools 2005–2008. 2005. PDF file.
Hindmarsh: Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth
Affairs. http://www.curriculum.edu.au/verve/_resources/languageeducation_
file.pdf
Norton, Bonny. 1997. “Language, Identity, and the Ownership of English.”
TESOL Quarterly 31(3):409–29.
Norton, Bonny. 2001. “Non-participation, Imagined Communities and the
Language Classroom”. In Learner Contributions to Language Learning: New
Directions in Research, edited by Michael P. Breen, 159–71. Harlow: Pearson
Education.
Norton, Bonny. 2016. “Identity and Language Learning: Back to the Future.”
TESOL Quarterly 50(2):475–79.
Otmazgin, Nissim Kadosh. 2007. “Contesting Soft Power: Japanese Popular
Culture in East and Southeast Asia.” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific
8(1):73–101.
Otmazgin, Nissim Kadosh. 2012. “Geopolitics and Soft Power: Japan’s Cultural
Policy and Cultural Diplomacy in Asia.” Asia-Pacific Review 19(1):37–61.
Pavlenko, Aneta. 2003. “‘I Never Knew I Was a Bilingual’: Reimagining Teacher
Identities in TESOL.” Journal of Language, Identity & Education 2(4):251–68.
Sun, Jing. 2012. “South Korea: A Suspicious Power Resistant to Charm.” In
Japan and China as Charm Rivals Soft Power in Regional Diplomacy. 86–121.
Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. 2011. PDF file.
The Shape of the Australian Curriculum: Languages. http://www.acara.edu.
au/_resources/Languages_-_Shape_of_the_Australian_Curriculum_new.pdf
The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. 2013. PDF file.
Australian Curriculum: Languages. http://www.acara.edu.au/_resources/
Australian_Curriculum_Languages_Info_sheet_Nov_2013.pdf
Wyatt, Tim, John Manefield, Bob Carbines, and Leone Robb. 2002. PDF file.
Evaluation of the National Asian Languages and Studies in Australian Schools
Strategy: A Report to the Department of Education, Science and Training. Erebus
Consulting Partners. http://www1.curriculum.edu.au/nalsas/pdf/evaluation.pdf
INDEX
0-9, AND SYMBOLS Australian high school, 192

4chan, 23, 33 Australian identity, 191
A B
Abe, Shinzo, 15, 28, 132 branding, 17, 18, 46
Abe, Yasushi, 68, 70
Agency of Cultural Affairs, 56, 83
Akashi, Yō ji, 66, 84–8 C
alternative modernity, 176 Cantonese, 159, 161, 162, 166–8,
Andō , Masatsugu, 65, 66, 71, 171, 173
73, 76n3 China, 5, 15, 44, 72, 97, 106, 111,
anime, animé, 6, 16, 17, 20–6, 29, 125, 131, 160–2, 166, 167,
31–4, 36, 44, 50–4, 59, 109, 169–74, 176, 183, 188
110, 124, 141, 143, 145, China Dream, 34
150, 152, 186 Chinese, 5, 7, 22, 26, 29, 30,
animé pilgrimage, 26, 27 33–6, 73, 87, 90, 92, 97,
anti-Japanese sentiment, 137 106, 107, 126, 127, 160,
Asahi Shimbun, 105, 106, 111, 161, 166–71, 175, 176,
112, 185 177n5, 181, 182, 188,
ASEAN, 44–8, 50, 51, 132 190, 194
assistant language teacher (ALT), 3, 4 Chinese Communist Party (CCP),
Australia, 9, 21, 29, 50, 125, 127, 34–6, 172
136, 179, 187 Chinese soft power, 20
Australian culture, 187 Chow, Agnes T., 166, 169, 171

DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-5086-2
202 INDEX
coercive, 6, 66, 71, 74, 75, 76n3, Dörnyei, Zoltán, 143

97, 99 drama, 49, 51, 149–52, 167, 188
Cold War, 19
collaborative language teaching, 137
colony, 4, 66, 71, 76n3, 97, 100n11, E
160, 161 Economic Partnership Agreement
comfort women, 185 (EPA), 7, 54, 55, 105–13, 116,
common language, 3, 71, 72, 75 119, 120n1
communication, 29, 68, 107, 130, education, 1–3, 7, 20, 28, 43, 48–50,
166, 175, 195 52, 65, 67, 69, 70, 73, 84–92,
comparative analysis, 142, 146 95, 97, 98, 109–11, 126–8,
comprehensive national power, 35 131, 134, 149, 164, 180,
Confucius Institute, 5, 30, 35 182, 183, 188, 192
consumption, 18, 23, 32, 33, 160, election, 160, 163
162, 165, 167, 168, 173–6, empowerment, 5, 9
177n4 English, 1–4, 7, 17, 20, 22, 24, 30,
contemporary culture, 46–8, 51 33, 35, 43–8, 51, 52, 77n6, 87,
contingency, 6, 19 89, 99n2, 113, 116, 127, 130,
Cool Japan, 4–6, 15, 32, 43, 59, 83, 131, 147–51, 161, 162, 166,
124, 141, 143 171, 179, 180, 183, 187,
Cool Japan Fund, 32 188, 190–5
Cool Japan strategy, 5, 44, 51, 52, English Imperialism, 2
59n8 English L1 speaker, 190–2
coolness, 26, 27, 32, 45, 46, 52 English L2 speaker, 190–4
co-optive soft power, 161, 174 EPA scheme, 7, 8, 56, 105, 107
cosplay, 24, 25, 33, 143 ethnography, 165
Critical Discourse Analysis exchange, 3, 4, 55, 85, 131,
(CDA), 6, 44 132, 141
cross-cultural adaptation, 179, 187 expansion of Japanese language,
cultural power, 7, 55, 83, 84, 97, 99 54, 71
cultural work, 96, 97
curriculum, 87, 124–6, 128, 177n3
F
Facebook, 23, 163, 165, 169, 171
D factor, 8, 22, 23, 27, 29, 43, 112,
democracy, 9, 35, 160, 163, 170–6 114, 116, 126, 127, 141–4,
dialect, 72, 117–20 182, 184
dichotomy, 43, 58 fansubber, 25
dispatch program, 124, 125, 128–31, fashion, 24, 25, 31, 32, 44, 46, 49,
133, 134, 137, 138 51–4, 143
diversity, 3, 56, 183 foreign labour, 7
Dokdo, 185 foreign students, 27, 28
INDEX 203
foreigners, 2, 3, 6–9, 30, 31, 33, J

43, 44, 47, 49, 51, 52, 55–9, Japan-East Asia Network of Exchange
70, 72, 73, 76, 77n11, 106, for Students and Youths
108, 151, 172 (JENESYS), 132
Japan fans, 5, 6, 9, 43
Japan Foundation, 10n2, 29, 30, 56,
G 106, 109, 110, 120n2, 123–8,
gaze, 9, 93, 160, 161, 164, 165, 130–2, 135, 136, 141–3, 145,
167, 171–3, 175 161, 183, 186
gender equality, 47, 54 Japan International Cooperation
Gil, Jeffery, 106 Agency (JICA), 128, 130–2, 135,
globalisation, 1, 2, 55, 56, 130 142, 145
Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Japan School of Doha, 144, 152n2
Sphere, 84 Japanese government, 2, 5, 6, 8, 9,
15, 27, 28, 33, 36, 44, 49,
56–8, 106–8, 110–12, 116,
H 118, 119, 120n3, 124–6,
hard power, 4, 18, 56, 124 128–30, 133, 134, 136–8,
Hong Kong, 9, 21, 26, 27, 29, 142, 167, 185
159, 183 Japanese language, 2, 17, 43, 65, 84,
Hong Kong Chinese, 161, 169, 174 105, 123, 141, 159, 179
Hongkonger, 9, 159–63, 166–76 Japanese language education, 6–8,
Hoshina, Kō ichi, 72, 73, 77n8, 56, 65–7, 72, 74, 75, 83–6,
77n10, 85, 94, 100n10 88, 92, 94–9, 107–12,
hospital, 55, 108, 113, 118 123–5, 131–8, 141, 142,
human resources, 2, 54–7, 110, 132 144, 145
Japanese Language Education
Assistant Program (J-LEAP), 132
I Japanese language education
identity, 1, 2, 22, 25, 161, 171, 179, at high school, 8, 110, 123,
180, 182, 184, 186, 188–96 125, 187
imagined identity, 193, 195 Japanese language education in
immigration, 3, 57, 106, 181 secondary schools, 123, 125,
Indonesia, 7, 8, 29, 45, 55, 105, 126, 137
107–9, 113, 116, 123, 125, 130 Japanese language learners outside
inferiority complex, 7, 44, 97–9 Japan, 123, 125, 127
international cultural work, 85, 96 Japanese language learning, 8, 9, 50,
internationalisation, 33, 43 92, 109–12, 119, 142, 143, 152,
interview, 8, 107, 112–15, 117–19, 186, 187, 195
128, 129, 134, 136, 143, 146–8, Japanese language proficiency, 55,
159, 160, 166, 172, 180, 184, 109, 110, 117, 119, 127,
187–9, 191–4 133, 134, 138
204 INDEX
Japanese Language Proficiency Test L

(JLPT), 109, 111, 112, 118, language learner, 5, 7–9, 10n2, 56,
120n2 57, 59, 109, 110, 119, 123–6,
Japanese language training, 108, 109, 128, 130, 131, 135, 141, 142,
112, 114, 127 144, 145, 147, 177n4, 180,
Japanese pop culture, 8, 17, 20, 22, 186, 193
23, 26, 33, 48, 50, 51, 109, language policy, 1, 2, 7, 67, 72, 75,
141, 144, 145, 148, 149, 84–6, 94, 97, 126
151, 152, 185 Language Teaching Institute (LTI),
Japanisation, 84, 87, 95 8, 142–8, 150
JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching) learning environment, 186
Program, 3, 4 Lee, Yeounsuk, 69, 77n10, 85, 94,
Jimaku Gumi, 169 97, 100n8, 100n9
Jimbo, Kō tarō , 7, 84, 86, 88–91, Liancourt Rocks, 185
95–9, 99–100n5, 100n6, Lolicon, 33
100n7 Lolita, 25
J-pop, 29, 110, 145, 162, 177n4 longitudinal study, 187
K M
kakkoii, 45 Maejima, Hisoka, 68, 69
kana, 66, 67, 69, 70, 72–6, 77n7, Manchukuo, 94, 95
93–6, 100n8 Mandarin Chinese, 35, 161
Kana no hikari (journal), 67, 69, manga, 6, 16, 20, 21, 23, 29, 32, 33,
74, 75 49–53, 59, 89–91, 95, 98, 109,
Kanamoji-kai, 67, 69, 76 110, 124, 141, 143, 150, 151
kanji, 66–8, 70, 72, 76, 76n4, 77n7, marketing, 17, 51, 53, 127, 141
77n11, 116 Matsunaga, Noriko, 84, 85, 88
kanji abolition, 67, 69, 70, 74 media, 7, 9, 22, 23, 26, 31, 55, 83,
kawaii, 21, 25 85, 86, 88, 91, 95, 96, 98, 106,
Kawaji, Yuka, 85 163, 167, 171, 173, 175
kokugo, 6, 85, 94, 100n11 medium of instruction, 1
Korea, 21, 25, 28, 29, 34, 66, 94, Middle Eastern country, 8
95, 97, 180, 184, 186, migrant identity, 9, 179
188, 192 migrants, 179–81, 183, 184, 194–6
Korean Australian, 193 military, 4, 6, 7, 18, 20, 34, 84, 86–8,
Korean identities, 184, 188, 90, 94, 100n5, 124
189, 195 Ministry of Economy, Trade and
Korean migrants, 9, 179, 196n1 Industry (METI), 31, 32, 108
Korean students, 28, 29, 124, 126–9, Ministry of Education, Culture,
189–93, 195 Sports, Science and Technology
Kurakane, Yoshiyuki, 90, 91 (MEXT), 4, 49, 56, 131
INDEX 205
Ministry of Foreign Affairs non-native Japanese speaker teachers

(MOFA), 2–4, 28, 32, 44, (NNJSTs), 123–5, 127–31,
46, 47, 49–52, 54–8, 108, 133, 134, 137, 138
126, 131, 141, 145 Norton, Bonny, 179, 186, 190,
Ministry of Health, Labour 191, 194
and Welfare (MHLW), 108 Nye, Joseph, 2–4, 9, 18–21, 27,
modernity, 6, 85, 97, 98, 176 30, 36, 66, 76, 83, 96, 107,
modified grounded theory approach 151, 160, 161, 164, 165,
(M-GTA), 146 168, 169, 174, 175
motivations, 50, 51, 96, 142, 143,
145–7, 151, 152, 179, 186
multicultural, 47, 180, 181, O
194, 195 Oceania, 3, 132
multilingual, 47, 171, 180, 181, odourlessness, 21
193, 194, 196 Okamoto, Chimatarō , 72, 73, 77n8,
multilingualism, 2, 182, 194 77n11
opinion poll on Japan, 45
otaku, 18, 23, 33, 53, 176n2
N
National Asian Languages and Studies
in Australian Schools P
(NALSAS), 181 passion for Japan, 149
national language, 2, 6, 43, 50, 56, perception of Japanese language, 107
72, 73, 76, 85, 100n11 Philippines, 7, 45, 55, 77n11, 105,
national language and script problem 107–13, 125, 133, 183
(kokugo kokuji mondai), 68 phonetic script, 69, 74, 75
national nursing exam, 106–8, 112, Pokémon, 16, 20–3, 31, 152
113, 115–19 pop culture, 6, 15–19, 21–4, 27,
national script, 67, 68, 70, 75, 77n6 29–33, 36, 48, 51, 53, 55,
nationalism, 1, 176, 185 141–3, 151, 152, 184
native Japanese speaker teachers popular culture, 4, 5, 124, 159, 160,
(NJSTs), 123 162, 177n4
native speaker, 3, 4, 8, 65, 127 Portland’s Soft Power 30, 5, 45
Nihongo (journal), 65, 67, 77n8 postmodern culture, 143
NIHONGO Partners (NP), 128, 132 practical Japanese, 113, 115, 117
Nippon no Rō mazi-sya, 69, 76n4 proficiency, 2, 89, 114, 116, 127, 133,
Nippon-Go, 88, 92 168, 169, 173, 174, 182, 187,
Nippon-Go Popularising Week, 7, 86, 189–91, 193–5
88–91, 95, 98, 99n2 protest, 54, 97, 163, 165, 170
non-English-speaking countries, 1 public diplomacy, 3, 8, 45, 55, 58
206 INDEX
Q spirit, 68, 84, 85, 89, 91, 93–8

Qatar, 8, 141, 142, 144, 147, 149, spread of Japanese language, 57, 65,
151, 152 67, 71, 73, 124
Qatar University, 144, 145, 147–9 Super Global Universities Project, 28
Qatar University Japan Club (QUJC), Super Mario, 16, 27
8, 142, 143, 145, 146, 148–50 survey, 16, 45, 109, 123, 124, 128,
131, 133, 134, 136, 141, 147,
149, 150, 152, 166, 185, 186
R Syonan, 86, 89, 90
Racial Discrimination Act, 181 Syonan Nippon Gakuen, 88, 91–4, 96,
radio, 35, 71, 89, 90, 95 98, 99n5
Regional and Educational Exchanges
for Mutual Understanding (REX)
Program, 131, 132, 136 T
Rō maji (journal), 67, 69, 74 Taiwan, 21, 27, 29, 66, 76n3, 97,
Rō maji Hirome-kai, 67, 69 125, 169, 175, 188
Takeshima, 185
teacher talk, 133, 134
S teaching assistant (TA), 3, 124,
Satō , Takumi, 83–5, 96, 97 129, 135
scholarism, 166, 176–7n3 teaching of English as a foreign
script reforms, 7, 66–70, 74, 75 language (TEFL), 2
second foreign language, teaching skill, 127, 130, 134,
124, 126, 127 135, 138
Second World War, 7, 83–6, 97, 185 team teaching (TT), 3, 4, 125, 128
Singapore, 7, 45, 71, 83–6, 88–91, Technical Intern Training
93, 95–9 Program, 110
social network service (SNS), textbook authorisation, 52
166, 173, 174 textbook controversy, 95
social networks, 187 textbook Japanese, 113, 115, 117
soft power, 1–9, 15, 24, 44, 45, 54, Thailand, 8, 21, 26, 45, 123,
58, 83–6, 95, 97–9, 106, 107, 125, 130
114, 115, 118, 119, 124, 125, Tokyo Olympics (2020), 52, 132
137, 159, 179 tourism, 18, 20, 26, 27, 54, 164,
song, 89–91, 98, 143, 167, 184 167, 168, 177n4, 189
South Korea, 5, 8, 9, 44, 123, 125, tradition, 6, 31, 47, 52, 53, 59,
130, 180, 184, 187, 188, 190, 96, 160
192, 195 traditional culture, 47, 48, 52
Southeast Asia, 66, 67, 85, 97–9, 132 trainee nurse, 7, 8, 55, 105–8,
southern territories, 65–7, 71, 72, 110–12
75, 88 Twitter, 163, 165, 172–4
INDEX 207
U W
Umbrella Movement, 9, 159 Watanabe, Wataru, 86, 87
universal characteristics, 66 Western civilisation, 7, 97–9
USA, 15, 20–2, 24, 27, 29, White Australia Policy, 181
35, 36, 44, 46–50, 132, Whitlam government, 181
164, 176n2
X
V Xi, Jinping, 20, 34
video game, 49, 143, 151
Vietnam, 7, 45, 55, 105,
107–12, 118, 125, Y
133, 183 Yasuda, Toshiaki, 2, 66, 67, 70, 76n3,
views of foreigners, 52, 53 77n6, 77n9

Japanese Language and Soft Power in Asia PDF

Diunggah oleh

Informasi Dokumen

Judul Asli

Hak Cipta

Format Tersedia

Bagikan dokumen Ini

Bagikan atau Tanam Dokumen

Opsi Berbagi

Apakah menurut Anda dokumen ini bermanfaat?

Apakah konten ini tidak pantas?

Hak Cipta:

Format Tersedia

Japanese Language and Soft Power in Asia PDF

Diunggah oleh

Hak Cipta:

Format Tersedia

Edited by Kayoko Hashimoto

ISBN 978-981-10-5085-5 ISBN 978-981-10-5086-2 (eBook)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017945666

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018

Cover illustration: © Thoth_Adan

Printed on acid-free paper

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature

Japanese Language and Soft Power in Asia is a cross-disciplinary work by

Brisbane Kayoko Hashimoto

1 Introduction: Why Language Matters in Soft Power 1

Part I Cool Japan and Japan’s Soft Power 13

2 Cool Japan Versus the China Threat: Does Japan’s

3 Cool Japan and Japanese Language: Why Does

Part II Japanese Language and the Historical

4 Japanese Language Education in the Greater

5 Media and Cultural Policy and Japanese Language

Part III Japanese Language Teaching in Asia 103

6 Japanese Language for Trainee Nurses from Asia:

7 The Roles of Native Japanese Speaker Teachers

8 Japanese Pop Culture as a Motivating

Part IV Japanese Language and Learners’ Empowerment 157

9 Japanese Language in the Wake of Hong Kong’s

10 Accessing the Soft Power of Japanese Language

Gerry Groot Department of Asian Studies, The University of Adelaide,

Fig. 9.1 Fans of Japanese culture often form communities

Table 3.1 Q4&5: Descriptions of Japan and Japanese people 46

Introduction: Why Language

© The Author(s) 2018 1

Since the Japanese government acknowledged the impact of globalisation

by a non-native English teacher (Japanese national) and an ALT (native

of Japan’s cultural products has been to promote the concept of Cool

kokuji mondai (National Script Problem)” by Hovhannisyan, examines

activities by the numerous government units” as “a fundamental weakness

Part IV, “Japanese Language and Learners’ Empowerment,” is important

Hashimoto, Kayoko. 2013b. “The Construction of ‘Native Speakers’ in Japan’s

Cool Japan and Japan’s Soft Power

Cool Japan Versus the China Threat: Does

© The Author(s) 2018 15

the famous running plumber at the closing of the Rio Olympics on 20

the continued popularity of learning Japanese, as discussed elsewhere in this

This chapter initially discusses the definitions and meanings of soft

WHAT IS SOFT POWER?

The shaping of preferences is crucial to subsequent political action which

usually a key to inducing a desire to emulate national success by adopting

see attracting international education as a soft power tool (Wojciuk et al.

JAPAN’S POP-CULTURAL SOFT POWER RESOURCES

The Rise of the Foreign “Otaku”

Otaku and Other Conventions

It attracted a few dozen participants. By 2016, AVCON had become the

Although some have tried to exclude the Lolita-related aspect of such

FROM TECHNO-COOL TO COOL JAPAN: AN ATTRACTIVE

seven serving world leaders were graduates of United Kingdom institutions

THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF STUDYING JAPANESE

ROLE OF LANGUAGE IN SOFT POWER

disseminating languages by national governments via institutions such as

PROBLEMS WITH THE COOL JAPAN AND RELATED STRATEGIES

The undoubted popularity of Japan’s pop culture exports and the

The chronology of these developments already tells as a story of a shift

THE CHINA CHALLENGE

to a significant degree. Though the CCP publicly eschews any suggestion

Animé News Network. 2016. “Report: Anime Industry Up 12% in 2015.”

Kawashima, Nobuko. 2016. “Film Policy in Japan – An Isolated Species on the

Wojciuk, Anna, Michalek, Maciej and Stromowska, Marta. 2015. “Education as a

Hikari 259:5–6; Shimomura Hiroshi. 1943. カナモジヲ大東亜ノ共通