Japanese Journal of Sociology最新文献

The global spread of COVID-19 has significantly affected cultural participation worldwide, including in cities and countries in East Asia. Scholars have observed that cultural activities and events transitioned online due to policy responses, such as lockdowns and other measures that restricted mobility. However, relatively little attention has been paid to face-to-face cultural activities and events held in physical spaces during the pandemic. Tokyo occupies a distinctive position for examining on-site gatherings in place for cultural participation, as its infection control measures are less stringent compared with other East Asian cities. This study investigated individuals' cultural participation in physical cultural event spaces in Tokyo during the pandemic. Data were collected through an online questionnaire survey targeting users of various cultural event spaces, including theaters, small theaters, concert/music halls, nightclubs, music venues, and doujin events. The analysis revealed four participation patterns: continuous participation, corona non-participation, gradually increasing participation, and new participation, and identified the social factors influencing these patterns. Although cultural participation in physical venues was reduced owing to the risk of infection, this study found that the genres of cultural activities, attachment to places, and social ties contributed to the diversity of participation patterns. These findings suggest that while cultural participation has diminished for some respondents, it was also sustained in varied ways.

In this study, we examine the relationship between young people's musical tastes and demographic variables using data from an international comparative survey of Japan, South Korea, and the United States (US). A feature of this study is the analysis of the characteristics of cultural omnivorousness in each country and the factors that determine it. Most studies of cultural omnivorousness have focused on the West. This study's analysis of Japan and South Korea provides valuable insights. The results show that, first, the symbolic boundary separating omnivores from univores in each country is rock and urban in Japan, anime songs and rock in South Korea, and anime songs and K-pop in the US. In general, there is a preference for genres that are removed from the musical culture of one's own country; when this is the case, omnivorousness has an affinity with a cosmopolitan orientation. Second, in Japan, South Korea, and the US, people who like a wide variety of music genres tend to be more confident in their own musical tastes. This suggests that omnivores are not culturally tolerant. In other words, the omnivore selects music with a distinctive aesthetic sense that seems to be consistent with the characteristics of emerging cultural capital. Third, in terms of the factors that define cultural omnivorousness, socioeconomic factors such as father's educational background and living arrangements have an influence in South Korea and the US, but no such influence is confirmed in Japan. This trend may be specific to young people in Japan.

While social scientists have increasingly focused on the relationship between fields of study and labor market outcomes, our understanding of how men and women differ in the utilization of college major skills at work and how such differences are linked to labor market outcomes remains limited. To fill this gap, I use nationally representative cross-sectional data from Japan to examine how fields that offer portable skills, which are beneficial across different employers, are related to earnings and employment likelihood. Results from ordinary least squares regression and Heckman two-stage models indicate that fields offering portable skills, such as medicine and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), have a positive association with earnings for both genders. Moreover, results from linear probability models suggest that law/business, medicine, and STEM have a positive relationship with employment status among women. The relationship is stronger for women than men, showing no differences between mothers with young children (0–5 years) and nonmothers. These findings indicate that acquiring portable skills through education makes women's careers more compatible with their family responsibilities. Considering the increasing salience of fields of study in the world of work, these findings provide important insights into the interplay between gender, higher education, and labor market stratification in Japan.