With great pleasure, we would like to announce the annual VSJF (German Association for Social Science Research on Japan) Conference 2023 from November 3-5 at JDZB (Japanese-German Center Berlin) in Berlin. This year's conference theme is

"Labor and (im)mobility in Japan and East and Southeast Asia: Transnational, regional and rural-urban perspectives".


Lifetime full-time employment and the male breadwinner model have been recognized as key characteristics of the Japanese employment system. Nevertheless, demographic change, urbanization, and deregulation in employment have led to adjustments in the employment system, including the integration of women, the elderly, and international and internal migrants. At the same time, gendered forms of regular and irregular employment continue to persist in the Japanese labor market. This phenomenon is not unique to Japan, but can also be observed in other Asian economies, such as South Korea and Taiwan, which are exposed to similar economic, demographic and social changes. Furthermore, travel restrictions during the Covid-19 pandemic and economic and social uncertainties have led to career, geographical, and social (im)mobility within and beyond borders.

This conference examines the complex interlinkages of (im)mobility and labor with demographic change, rural decline, the emergence of global cities and (offshore) economic zones, and the subsequent socio-cultural change in East and Southeast Asia. It provides a platform for discussing emerging trends and unexpected developments captured by empirical research on labor and (im)mobility within East and Southeast Asian economies. The conference seeks to disentangle local/municipal, national, and transnational processes of labor and (im)mobility in Japan and the wider region.

For a detailed conference program, please refer to the VSJF website: https://vsjf.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/2023-vsjf-annual-conference-tentative-program.pdf

Conference registration with information on the conference fees is expected to open from the end of September. As we encourage the participation of university students, we will provide a full conference fee waiver for up to 10 students. To apply for this fee waiver, please send your student certificate and a motivation letter (1 page) outlining how attendance at the conference furthers your academic training to Ms. Sohee Park (s1447961@stud.uni-frankfurt.de) by 30th September 2023 (CEST time). The conference organizers reserve the right to select the 10 most qualified applicants.

The conference is co-organized by Ruth Achenbach (Goethe University Frankfurt), Helena Hof (University of Zurich / Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity), Aimi Muranaka (University of Duisburg-Essen), Joohyun Justine Park (Goethe University Frankfurt) and Megha Wadhwa (Free University of Berlin) as a collaboration of the BMBF-funded research project on "Qualification and Skill in the Migration Process of Foreign Workers in Asia (QuaMaFA)" (https://quamafa.de) in cooperation with JDZB and VSJF.

The conference is partially funded by the Toshiba International Foundation.


We look forward to welcoming you in Berlin!


Kind regards,
QuaMaFA, JDZB and VSJF

 

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Dr. Helena Hof
Senior Research Fellow and Lecturer
University of Zurich / Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity

New book The-EU-Migrant-Generation-in-Asia

https://www.aoi.uzh.ch/en/japanologie/personenuebersicht/wissangestellte/hof.html

http://www.mmg.mpg.de/person/111317/2553

hof@mmg.mpg.de

 

More recent publications:

Hof, Helena, Simon Pemberton and Emilia Pietka-Nykaza. 2021. 'EU migrant retention and the temporalities of migrant staying: A new conceptual framework.' Comparative Migration Studies. 10.1186/s40878-021-00225-5

Hof, Helena. 2020. 'Intersections of Race and Skills in European Migration to Asia: Between White Cultural Capital and 'Passive Whiteness'. Ethnic and Racial Studies. 45 (11). DOI: 10.1080/01419870.2020.1822535.