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May 6, 2013

[SSJ: 8058] Invitations for gradaute students working on anti-nuke groups

From: David H. Slater
Date: 2013/05/06

Some of my very good graduate students are doing research on anti-nuclear groups in Japan in the post
3.11 era. They would like to meet other graduate students engaged in similar research, under two possible arrangements.

1. Workshop: If you or your students are interesting in presenting at a graduate student workshop in January
2014 at Sophia University. Your presentation could either be on Japanese groups or on anti-nuke groups from outside of Japan. For the workshop, they would like to present in English, but could do a bilingual event.

OR

2. Research Project: If you or your students are interested in working together on this project on a a longer-term regular basis, see abstract below.

Please contact me directly.
David Slater, Sophia University (d-slater@sophia.ac.jp)

Research Project Abstract

Why and how do people become socially mobilized in Fukushima? There have been many accounts on social movements after 3.11 such as demonstrations in Tokyo but there have been few voices heard from the place where it all started- Fukushima.

Reasons of social movements in Fukushima have a few hypotheses. First, social mobilization in Fukushima may have a connection to how they handle their emotions.
Some groups may have started to become activated fueled with anger toward TEPCO. Others more with fear than anger may have stood up to protect their loved ones.
Second, reasons for participation may be because of their age group. People in their 70's may overlap their memories of the "good old times" of their student movements with the anti-nuclear demonstrations. Instead younger people may react more sensitively toward the negative image of "Fukushima=radiation". As a result they may participate in activities such as festivals and concerts to cheer up the spirits of Fukushima residents. But none of these hypotheses have been tested and looked through with detail. By seeing why and how Fukushima residence participate in social movements we will able to take a glimpse of how they have viewed the world from 3.11.

We will conduct interviews with groups that are living in Fukushima (mainly from the two biggest cities in Fukushima, Fukushima City and Koriyama City) which have participated in social movements after 3.11. All interviews will be either videotaped or recorded and transcribed for coding. All interviews are done in Japanese.

Questions asked planned to be asked are the following:
- Why did you participate in this movement?
- Have you ever participated in a social
movement before?
- Has anything changed in how you view issues
in your life?
- What has changed the most?
- What keeps you motivated in continuing?


--
David H. Slater, Ph.D.
Director of the Institute of Comparative Culture Associate Professor of Cultural Anthropology Faculty of Liberal Arts, Graduate Program in Japanese Studies Sophia University, Tokyo

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