![]() The rise and fall of Japan’s electricity deregulation is an important reminder that “political power” is not limited to votes, campaign cash contributions and organized lobbying. How did such a diffuse public interest like deregulation initially prevail over powerful interests by getting on the national agenda in the early 1990s, only then to face such an unusual degree of skepticism and resistance fifteen years later? This doctoral dissertation (title: “The Politics of Restructuring: Agendas and Uncertainty in Japan’s Electricity Deregulation”) explains the politics behind the puzzle. Indeed, what started as an almost unanimous effort to inject pro-competitive restructuring into the industry ended with an almost equally unanimous decision to cease the reform process altogether. Despite little change in real electricity prices since 1995 (its primary objective), restructuring of the industry eventually fell off the national agenda by 2007. Two further revisions would be made to the Law-the first in 1999 and the second in 2003. The revision to the Electric Power Industry Law (Denki jigyō hō, hereafter “the Law”) in 1995 was the first comprehensive revision of the Japanese electric power industry’s legislation since 1964. This essay aims to shed light on both the literary and the social significance of “Hello, War Brides” as a way to re-evaluate the Japanese war brides’ transnational movement that has taken place in the years after its publication. The production of the text also worked to reconstruct and renew the women’s own memories in a positive light and to create a new form of community of remembrance. Such an understanding could be thought of as an alternative to the monolithic and stigmatized images of Japanese war brides, imposed primarily by the Japanese mainstream media against which these women have struggled for decades. I view this text as a product of collaborative “memory work.” Based on a textual analysis of its narratives and form, I argue that this work represents individual war brides’ memories as counter-memories that provide a new understanding of the experiences of Japanese war brides. This article examines “Hello, War Brides,” a series of short, auto/biographical essays authored by two Japanese war brides from the state of Washington. ![]() The author’s hope is that teachers elsewhere will be able to reflect on the needs of their own workplaces, and use the experiences described herein to begin their own informal Roundtable meetings. It also offers ideas as to how these meetings can be improved, and suggests how teachers at other universities can start their own Roundtables. The article presents participants' views of the meetings' benefits, such as their capacity to help teachers' professional development, as well as their views of the drawbacks, namely that the same teachers often attend, limiting the range of feedback participants receive. How can language teachers who feel isolated from their colleagues and excluded from the development of their school’s language teaching curricula build a sense of community? Citing research on the definition of "community" (Stewart, 2007) and Edge's (1992) concept of "cooperative development", the author discusses his experiences organizing an informal series of meetings for teachers from May 2007 to present at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto called the “Ritsumeikan Language Teachers’ Roundtable” (renamed "the Ritsumeikan TEFL Faculty Development Roundtable" after publication of this article). Essentially, media plays quite a significant role in influencing people and in the construction of new ways of life. The dramas selected in this study reflect the complex lives of people in contemporary Japan, the challenges they face in the context of economic hardship, and the dreams or fantasies about different and possible new lives. These serials also suggest a new construction of gender ideology and relations, whereby women and men can develop more equal partnerships and more liberated non-stereotypical sexual relations. However, a small number of women (the main protagonists of these dramas) fight to embrace different female identities. It was observed that the majority of women in these dramas are still trapped in stereotypical feminine roles who may try to struggle for independence but still face several obstacles and misery. " The research results can be grouped under a few dominant themes. ![]() ![]() This study looks at five Japanese serial dramas which include: " Anego, " " Jotei, " " Magerarenai Onna, " " Ohitorisama " and " Freeter Ie O Kau. This study aims to capture how gender is constructed in Japanese serial dramas and to see whether they provide new or different roles and values. ![]()
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