The Discursive Construction of Hierarchy in Japanese Society: An Ethnographic Study of Secondary School Clubs - Paperback

by Zi Wang (Author)

Seniority-based hierarchy (jouge kankei) is omnipresent in Japanese group dynamics. How one comports, depends on one's status and position vis-à-vis others. To-date, no study shows what constitutes this hierarchy, where and when individuals growing up in Japan first come into contact with it, as well as how they learn to function in it.

This book fills in the lacunae. Considering jouge kankei as a social institution and adopting a discourse analytic approach, this volume examines the ways in which institutional jouge kankei as an enduring feature of Japanese social life are created and reproduced. The monograph analyses how seniority-based relations are enacted, legitimised, transmitted, and reified by social actors through language use and paralinguistic discursive practices, such as the use of space, objects, signs, and symbols. It also looks at how established rules could be challenged. The empirical data on which findings are based are gathered through 10 months of ethnographic fieldwork from 2015 to 2018 in Japanese schools, with certain types of data (school club etiquette books and uniforms) being presented and analysed for the first time. This volume also shows continuity and change of jouge kankei from school to work.

Back Jacket

Seniority-based hierarchy (jouge kankei) is omnipresent in Japanese society. One's status and corresponding responsibilities, entitlements, as well as behavioural code are commensurate with one's age and experience in an organisation. How does jouge kankei come into being in Japanese social life? Addressing this question with empirical detail, the present volume shows when, where, and how individuals growing up in Japan are collectively socialised into the hierarchical system in and through language. Focusing on the milieu of secondary schools, this study examines the ways in which jouge kankei is enacted, legitimised, and transmitted by students in extra-curricular clubs via linguistic and paralinguistic elements.

Coalescing ethnographic methods with discourse analysis, this book is the first monograph-length qualitative study on the topic of jouge kankei among adolescents in the fields of language socialisation/linguistic ethnography in Japanese contexts.

Author Biography

Zi Wang, Universität Duisburg-Essen.